After more than two years, Fox Chase Farm is open to school field trips again

Amid the pastoral noises of the goats, chickens, and cows of Fox Chase Farm, another sound rose Wednesday — the chatter of excited children’s voices.

After two-plus years of a pandemic and no student visits, the farm reopened to class tours, with dozens of children soaking in the sights, sounds, and tastes of the 112-acre farm on Pine Road in the Northeast.

Gavyn Hamilton, a third grader at Andrew Hamilton Elementary in West Philadelphia, was starry-eyed at the experience.

“I got to see animals, and we crushed apples,” said Gavyn, 8.

Fox Chase Farm is owned by the city and run by the Philadelphia School District, which before COVID-19 typically had 300 students visit daily on field trips. Farm administrator Mandy Fellouzis and farmer Fernando Rodriguez and others kept things running in the years COVID-19 shut the farm to tours.

The farm bustled Wednesday, with high school students from Northeast and Lincoln High Schools learning to be tour guides and Hamilton third and fourth graders making their own apple cider, slipping stethoscopes over their ears to listen to Snickers the lop-eared rabbit’s heartbeat, and petting Oliver the pot-bellied pig.

Fellouzis was in her glory.

“This is such a high,” she said. “For some of the kids, they haven’t had a field trip in years. For some, it’s their very first field trip.”

Philadelphia students speak 166 languages, and Fellouzis is trying to diversify the farm to match. (That’s why you’ll see Indian Runner ducks, for instance — native to the East Indies, the ducks are excellent egg producers that were often kept on ships to ensure a steady food supply.)

“Our goal is when a child comes here, they will see representation from their country, or their culture, on the farm,” Fellouzis said.