Ardyth Gillespie

Ardyth Gillespie

Ardyth M. H. Gillespie, Ph.D. recently “retired” after serving for 34 years on the faculty in the Community Nutrition Program in the Division of Nutritional Sciences at Cornell. She currently holds the titles of visiting faculty member in the Division and is a Collaborator Faculty member in the Department of Food Science and Human Nutrition at Iowa State University. In her scholarly career she has striven to bridge academic research, extension, and practice through her work in family food decision making and community collaboration and engagement. Gillespie’s current leadership roles include co-chairing the leadership team of the Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development in its transition to a new publishing model; being an incoming council member for the Agriculture, Food and Human Values Society; and serving on the advisory committee for Groundswell Center for Local Food and Farming. She is also co-founder and director of the nascent Harrisdale Homestead Leadership Institute for Collaborative Engaged Research (CER). 

Gillespie’s research is focused on family and community food decision making from a systems perspective and on developing transdisciplinary research approaches for collaborative engaged research (CER).  CER is conducted in partnership with community food system stakeholders, change leaders, and scholars. Her research addresses the foundational mechanisms of collective food decision-making in families and communities, including facets of communication competence, presuppositions, alternative pathways, and change strategies.  She seeks to create generative environments which foster innovative leadership for promoting more sustainable food systems that also foster improved health and well-being, as well as build family and community capacity for nourishing and nurturing children and their families across generations.

 The family food decision making system framework (Gillespie and Johnson-Askew, 2009), which brings together experiential knowledge with quantitative and qualitative research, is guiding current CER and its application. CER integrates research with campus teaching and community-based practice (extension/outreach & public engagement).  Key outcomes and impacts of CER include understanding and fostering relational as well as instrumental communication competence within leadership teams, within families, and the intersection between change leaders and families.  These findings are discussed in the forthcoming chapter, Enhancing Interdisciplinary Communication: Collaborative Engaged Research on Food Systems for Health and Well-Being (Gillespie & Sung. In Enhancing Communication and Collaboration in Interdisciplinary Research. Editors, Michael O'Rourke, Stephen Crowley, Sanford D. Eigenbrode, and J. D. Wulfhorst. In Press, Sage publications).

Gillespie connects graduate and undergraduate students with community-based practitioners and change leaders, and  with Cornell and visiting scholars as part of her collaborative engaged research program on Family and Community Food Decision-making (NS 4000 series; NS 9990).  These teams build capacity of current and future leaders to engage in transdisciplinary and multi-perspective research and its' application with families and communities.  From multiple perspectives, these teams discuss and reflect upon CER principles and presuppositions as they contribute to emerging CER methodology.

Cornell University. "Outstanding Educator,"selected by Merrill presidential scholar Lin-Lin Wang, Class of 2011.

Gillespie also led the Community Nutrition Research Seminar, NS 6440 which engaged graduate students and faculty in co-learning and critiquing research and evaluation by creating a learning environment for graduate students and faculty to: (1) discuss and reflect upon their own research in a safe environment; and (2) learn about:

•         Current research in the Cornell Community Nutrition Program (CCNP)

•         Community Nutrition theories and research methodologies

•         Research of Cornell and visiting scholars in related fields of inquiry

The approach and seminar formats have varied to meet changing needs and interests of students and shifting goals of faculty participants.

Gillespie has advised and mentored undergraduate as well as graduate students as they identify their career goals and strategies for achieving them.  In addition to formal advisees, mentoring/co-learning includes a variety of students with whom Gillespie discovers common interests, values, and visions – especially those who seek relationships beyond the dominant faculty-student relationship form.

Gillespie draws upon these teaching and mentoring experiences as she consults with Marylhurst University for the development of their new Food Systems Studies MS program.

• Co-chair, leadership team for Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development
• Cornell Graduate Field Membership: Nutrition
• Fellow, Cornell Atkinson Center for Sustainable Futures
• Society for Nutrition Education
• Family and Community Food Decision-making Program leadership
• American Society for Nutritional Sciences
• Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics
• Agriculture, Food, and Human Values Society
• American Association of Family and Consumer Sciences
• Kappa Omicron Nu
• American Association of University Women
• Women, Food, and Agriculture Network

Gillespie studies the Family Food Decision-making System (FFDS) and related family dynamics, and develops methodology for Collaborative Engaged Research (CER).  Her current focus is on enhancing communication for transdisciplinary and multi-sector research.  In collaboration with social scientists and community-based partners, Gillespie has developed a conceptual framework which describes the pathways and critical decision-junctures and impetuses for engaging in rethinking eating practices and food choices (Gillespie & Johnson-Askew, 2009).  This framework serves as a heurisitc for organizing and conceptualizing research and experimenting with change strategies which integrate research with practice. She leads teams in studying family dynamics of the system including food and eating roles and interactions as well as components of the thoughtful family food decision-making pathway. 

CER teams experiment with approaches for fostering sustainable change by increasing capacity of families and communities for thoughtful food decision-making.  CER emphasizes methods for the collaborative generation of grounded theory which focuses upon conducting research with rather than on families and communities and thereby increasing the validity and value of the research. At the same time, this approach facilitates the application of research in community-led programs.  Gillespie facilitates CER leadership teams advancing the development of methodology and adding to the research base of Family and Community Food Decision-making.  These include leadership teams for Cooking Together for Family Meals (Kathy Dischner, Holly Gump, Cheryl Neal, Rebecca Crawford, Tina Foster, Loree Symonds, Jonathan Sterlace, Christine Gutelius, and Helen Howard).  Leveraging the Locavore Movement: Exploring Family and Community Food Decision-making, (Paul Curtis  PI, Keith Tidball, Moira Tidball, and Cornelia Flora, ISU); the multi-state leadership team for Food Systems, Health, and Well-being: Understanding Complex Relationships and Dynamics of Change (NC1196).

Gillespie achieves her mission of creating learning environments to expand human potential and build family and community capacity for fostering health and well-being through the integration of research, campus education, and extension/outreach. The long-term goal of these scholarly activities is to build family and community capacity for nourishing and nurturing children across generations. She pursues three overlapping and mutually supportive areas of extension/outreach: food decision-making with an ecosystems perspective, collaborative leadership development, and developing Collaborative Engaged Research (CER) methodology with community-based collaborators. Gillespie seeks to understand and strengthen the connections among sustainable food systems, food decision-making, and health and well-being in the context of CER.

She is currently engaged in expanding the intersection and depth of engagement and collaboration among researchers and practitioners through: 1. Co-chair of the leadership team for the Journal of Agriculture, Food Systems, and Community Development. This online international, peer-reviewed publication focuses on the practice and applied research interests of agriculture and food systems development professionals. The Journal "emphasizes best practices and tools related to the planning, community economic development, and ecological protection of local and regional agriculture and food systems, and works to bridge the interest of practitioners and academics."  2. Participating in Imagining America, “an organization grounded in scholarship, and creative practice, looking to translate our best thinking and creation and actions."  3.  Engagement with community initiated food systems change initiatives including Groundswell Center For Local Food and Farming and Harrisdale Homestead community-based center for food education and research and the Iowa Food Systems Policy Council leadership development..

Gillespie engages with community-based educators and change agents to advance our understanding and improve the application of collective food decision-making in families and communities.  She consults with cooperative extension and other community-based group in planning and evaluating family food decision-making programs. One such project is a family cooking workshop series, Cooking Together for Family Meals, which engages families in rethinking their eating practices and food choices as they develop their family's human, social, and cultural capital for improving their food decision-making system.   Another project, Leveraging the Locavore Movement: Exploring Family and Community Food Decision-making, is developing methodology for engaging communities in collective decision-making to improve community food systems.

Through leadership development projects, Gillespie connects community-based educators, leaders, and decision-makers and food system stakeholders with researchers and students (graduate and undergraduate students) for mutual learning and knowledge creation. This network for co-learning and co-creating includes Food Decision-making Learning Groups on campus, in communities, and among scholars around the world. These projects apply local knowledge and research findings to identify and implement effective locally-driven change strategies. Gillespie’s vision is community stakeholders engaged with each other and with external resources working toward an equitable, just, and healthy food system which contributes to the health and well-being of all community members.  She also supports projects with other community-based organizations and initiatives including Groundswell, the Center for Local Food and Farming, Harrisdale Homestead, Cass County Cultivators. Gillespie was recognized for her collaborative engagement with Cornell cooperative extension of Tompkins County in her collaborative leadership role with the Cooking Together for Family Meals leadership team.

Through her scholarly work and national leadership, Gillespie is contributing to the shifting the paradigm for community intervention toward more engagement of families and community leaders in collective decision-making and seeking balance and integration of multiple goals.

• Ph.D. 1978 - Iowa State University, Nutritional Science and Communication
• M.S. 1975 - Iowa State University, Nutrition
• B.S. 1967 - Iowa State University, Food and Nutrition and Related (biophysical) Sciences

• NS 4010 Empirical Research
• NS 6440 Community Nutrition Research Seminar 
• NS 9990 Doctoral Thesis and Research

Family and Community Food Decision - Making Program

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