Organic CSA farmer Keith McKenzie honored with UofL's Josh Smith Memorial Sustainability Award
As a part of the Community Engagement Awards Ceremony during UofL's March 21st Engaged Scholarship Symposium, the University of Louisville Sustainability Council gave the 2025 Josh Smith Memorial Sustainability Award to our CSA farmer and the Chair of the Kentucky Composting Council, Keith McKenzie.
Keith and his wife began farming in McClain County in 1988, and in Breckenridge County in 2004. Demonstrating his passion for repairing our relationships not only with the land, but also with each other - as sustainability demands of us - Keith also earned a Masters degree in Social Work from UofL early in his farming career. Currently, he and his family manage 71 acres of farmland in Kentucky, and, since 2019, they use only organic methods. His operation was certified as organic in 2022, and then in 2024, Keith’s Knob Hill Farm stepped in to relaunch a Community Supported Agriculture program at UofL with weekly campus deliveries of fresh seasonal produce for subscribers at a farmstand in Freedom Park at 3rd & Cardinal every Tuesday 4-6pm, starting in June.
For the past two years, Keith has also been a regular fixture at “Compost Church” on Sundays, our Community Composting Project’s weekly volunteer day. He’s provided compost education to countless UofL community members and the public. He has collaborated with UofL’s Sustainability initiatives as Chair of the Kentucky Composting Council, and we were honored to host the Council’s second annual conference on campus during last fall’s UofL Sustainability Week. Keith continues to promote the composting and gardening efforts at UofL across the Commonwealth, and he has elevated the profile of UofL’s sustainability work throughout the region and nationally as a gold standard for others to emulate, providing many contacts and projects for our gardening and composting teams.
Keith McKenzie’s tireless efforts at supporting and promoting UofL’s projects have made him an ambassador for our Sustainability Programs, and we are delighted to honor him with the 2025 Josh Smith Memorial Sustainability Award.
