I probably should have written this first but that other piece came together at just the right time, and I felt like posting it! Anyways, welcome to my blog, I’m Donald Coon, an educator, researcher, modeler, and grower focusing on controlled environment agriculture (CEA). I plan to post something here about one of those topics, at least once a month.
This whole project started as a way for me to explore, research, and share with others in ways that I enjoy. While some people use social media for these types of activities, I felt a need for something different than what those platforms offer. I wanted a place that would allow me the flexibility of not only design but content. Here I don’t have to worry about the number of characters if the video matches the trendy styles of the moment, or whatever other limitations different platforms might impose.
An added benefit of using this site is that it is a centralized location that will remain accessible over time regardless of the company, its management, or the migration of communities. Those who want to follow this content can and will be able to without an account, unlike some of the other content management platforms. Sure, I lose out on the built-in tools and networks from something like Substack, but I currently don’t plan on sending things out through email or attempting to monetize this, so that isn’t too much of a loss.
Broadly speaking this blog will cover the three dominant forces in my life, education, agriculture, and science. The specifics will likely change and evolve over time, but those three subjects have always been a part of what excites me. I’ve always found education fascinating, not just the learning of new things, but also the teaching process. Instead of texting my teacher friends the neat tools and lessons I create or find, I’ll use this space to share those. If a post is not about education, I hope to pass on some knowledge about something agricultural and/or its associated sciences.
Until recently, I didn’t think that I could be considered a voice for these subjects. Then at some point during my PhD I realized that others don’t think so. Having worked at multiple CEA facilities both as a researcher and grower for over a decade, I have built up some credibility I wasn’t aware of. This coupled with beginning to see the ease at which misinformation spreads, led to the blog as a method to share my expertise with others. Conveniently, doing so combines three things I love science, agriculture, and education!
Like I said earlier, I’ll be posting monthly on the first. This should give me enough time to ensure that every post has a level of quality I am happy with. Most of the posts will be simple text and photos, occasionally I might get inspired and ambitious enough to put up a recording of audio or video. Where necessary I will provide citations and links to original material.
I’ll also be using social to share snippets of these posts and guiding people back here to read the full post on different social media, likely X and LinkedIn. If for some reason people begin demanding some kind of newsletter format emailed to them, I’d be open to exploring that option, but for now, it will be posted here.
The main goal of this blog is to share some of my insights and work on CEA that is normally not visible to larger audiences since they may not attend conferences or read the papers I publish. I enjoy writing and thinking about these complex systems and know that plenty of others do too. I hope you find the information contained in my future posts to be engaging and thought-provoking, if so, each post will have a digital object identifier, so you can easily share and attribute them.
Thanks for taking the time to read what might arguably be the dullest post I will have on here. It’s important to at least have some of this written down so others know what/why I am doing it and so I don’t forget either. I look forward to exploring the complexities of agricultural science and education here with whoever else tunes in.
Enjoy!
Proudly written without large language models.
©Donald Coon 2025 available at https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.11448258
This work is licensed under CC BY 4.0
Donald S. Coon 