More Schools Cultivating Organic School Gardens

The 8-year-old girls peer through the leaves of basil, green bean and cucumber plants, searching for peppers that still need to be picked.

"The droopy one is peppers," third-grader Simran Shankardass calls to her best friend, Jessica DeKoven.
If all goes well, the organically grown fare will end up as food for students at the Louisa May Alcott School, where a large vegetable garden just outside the cafeteria is planted, tended and harvested by students.
The project is part of a larger movement sweeping the country: From New York to California, schools are getting students out of the classroom and into the garden in a back-to-nature approch to learning and -- perhaps more important -- as a way to introduce them to healthy food


Some schools even use the student-grown food to supplement their lunches, although that practice is not widespread. Other programs promote the use of crops grown by local farmers to get healthier food into schools.
But "kids actually eat more fruits and vegetables when they've grown them themselves," said Abby Jaramillo, director of the school gardening program Urban Sprouts in San Francisco. "The hands-on experience in the school garden helps kid change their eating habits."

The National Gardening Association's online registry lists 1,500 school gardens, up from 1,100 a year ago, although spokeswoman Barbara Richardson said there are thousands more. In California alone, 2,500 schools have gardens, according to a 2002 survey. Last year, 3,900 schools applied for state grants after the General Assembly made $10.8 million available for school gardens, said John Fisher from the California Department of Education school garden resource center. Some schools supplement their menus with vegetables and herbs grown by students.

More Schools Cultivating Organic School Gardens

Abundant Organics

Welcome to the new and improved website for Abundant Organics - an organic fruit, vegetable and groceries home delivery service based in Sydney delivering to the Sydney suburban area, Central Coast and the Illawarra. We specialise in certified organic fruit and organic vegetables and our completely secure on-line store is open 24/7 to take your order.

Abundant Organics

Organic Farming: ATTRA - National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service

With the organic market growing steadily, you may be interested in learning more about organic certification and organic production options. These resources offer guidance in preparing for certification, and in production methods for a range of organic crops and livestock. Many of these publications were developed in response to producer questions, and they deal with issues related to specific products, as well as production methods, marketing, and organic certification requirements.

• Organic Publications Overview
• Organic Regulation, Certification, Transition & History
• Organic Fruits
• Organic Vegetables, Flowers and Herbs
• Organic Field Crops
• Organic Livestock
• Organic Control of Pests
• Organic Soils & Fertilizer Issues
• Organic Marketing
• Organic Farming Information from Other Sources

Organic Farming: ATTRA - National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service

Management of Organic Inputs in Soils of the Tropics Homepage - Management of Organic Inputs in Soils of the Tropics (MOIST) is a rich source of information on green manure/cover crops and h

Management of Organic Inputs in Soils of the Tropics (MOIST) is a rich source of information on green manure/cover crops and hosts an active email discussion group on green manures/cover crops.

Management of Organic Inputs in Soils of the Tropics Homepage - Management of Organic Inputs in Soils of the Tropics (MOIST) is a rich source of information on green manure/cover crops and h

International Composting Awareness Week: Home Page

International Composting Awareness Week (Sunday 3rd to Saturday 9th May 2009) is a week of activities, events and publicity to improve awareness about the importance of this valuable organic resource and to promote compost use, knowledge and products.

Approximately 60% of the rubbish Australians put in the everyday mixed-waste ‘garbage bin’ could be put to better use in the garden as compost and mulch or could be returned to agricultural land to improve soil quality.

Alarmingly, such a huge amount of organically-active material buried ‘anaerobically’ (without air) in landfill causes over 3% of Australia’s total greenhouse gas emissions annually by producing methane: a gas with 25 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide! If properly composted instead, this same organic waste could help to abate climate change in yet another way: by sinking or ‘sequestering’ carbon back into the soil.

And if combating climate change with compost isn’t impressive enough, using compost on land reduces the need for water by an average of 30%!

Compost products can also regenerate ravaged areas (like mining or salinity effected sites) and can even be used to help clean storm water before it travels into the ocean (as is the case at North Steyne beach in New South Wales).
See - http://www.manly.nsw.gov.au/Stormwater-Treatment-and-Re-Use.html

Composting is the intelligent alternative. We can compost to combat climate change and reduce our irrigation needs while we’re at it. Composting is the responsible and sustainable thing to do for our planet.

DOWNLOADABLE RESOURCES

• 2009 A4 Poster (PDF 1MB)
• Benefits of Compost: Fact Sheet (PDF 560 KB)
• Fact sheet - Conserving water using compost materials - SPD_ORG_ConsvWaterCompost_FS.pdf (PDF 189 KB)
• Fact sheet - Reducing soil erosion using compost materials - SPD_ORG_SoilErosion_FS.pdf (PDF 180 KB)
• Fact sheet - Sustainable landscaping using compost material - SPD_ORG_LandscapCompost_FS.pdf (PDF 164 KB)
• Fact sheet - Using compost materials for sustainable viticulture - SPD_ORG_ViticultCompost_FS.pdf (PDF 147 KB)

EVENTS IN OTHER COUNTRIES

United Kingdom - The Composting Association UK ||
Canada - Composting Council of Canada ||
United States - US Composting Council

International Composting Awareness Week: Home Page