In the past, WCG offered limited support to school gardens on school grounds and provided teachers with year-long, garden-based curriculum on our website. In August 2014, however, WCG hired Liz Pedersen to take a close look at needs unique to school gardens.
So far, Liz has approached revamping WCG’s School Garden Program by identifying community allies, gathering information, and coordinating meetings between stakeholders already supporting school gardens. She also asked teachers what they would like to see in a school gardening program and what resources they would need to successfully integrate gardening into curriculum. Here are some key results from Liz’s initial research:
This knowledge gap can act as a barrier, keeping teachers from participating in the garden with their classes. The refrain, “I don’t want to go out and work in the garden, what if I pull out a tomato plant thinking it’s a weed!” was repeated all too frequently.
Next Steps: To address this issue, the School Garden Program is teaming up with the Community Education Program to design some special workshops! Details coming soon….
Stay tuned for Part 2 of this story, posted next Tuesday.
