It’s Elementary

I’m writing another article for Urban Farm Magazine, this time on elementary school gardens. If you have a hand in running or organizing an elementary school garden, outside of California, send me an email at [email protected]. I need another interview or two, though I can’t guarantee I’ll talk to everyone.

I took the picture above at a volunteer work day at the 24th Street Elementary School in the West Adams district of Los Angeles yesterday. It’s run by the Garden School Foundation. I can’t tell you how amazing this garden is, but I think the picture above says it all. It’s about the future, and that future is going to have more mulch and a lot less asphalt! The 24th Street Garden contains vegetables, a mini orchard and two native plant gardens, which are used as part of the school’s California history curriculum. A cooking class happens in the garden once a week, overseen by TV chef Gino Campagna.

Obviously, we need more gardens like this–the Garden School Foundation’s website asks the question, “Why does a school need to look like a prison?” For some school garden resources see the website of the Chez Panisse Edible Schoolyard at http://www.edibleschoolyard.org/. If you’ve got other resource suggestions, please leave some comments.

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4 Comments

  1. I run the garden in every school program in the inland empire… but that’s in california. we do up to 7 school gardens a year and we just installed a demo garden at our headquarters in our chino creek and wetlands educational park (inland empire utilities agency in Chino)… they are vegetable and drought tolerant gardens. if you want to talk to folks inside california, then i’m available.

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