Keep School Gardens Thriving Over the Summer!
Julia Sanderson
Boise, Idaho
Does the title of this article give you anxiety? Maintaining outdoor growing spaces in a public school setting is a common challenge for many. So, what can we do?
Partner with summer school!
Getting students (and teachers) outside is the whole goal, so partnering with the summer school program in your area is perfect. This summer, we partnered with elementary schools as well as junior high to get students learning outdoors. Lessons covered bugs, living vs. non living things, weeds you can eat, and a series with junior high math students focused on micro-forests and soil health. A great way to finish each lesson is with a 5-minute weed-pulling blitz. It’s amazing how quickly a weedy space can get cleared when you have a bunch of students helping!
Weed Games:
“Biggest Root” — Encourage students to pull the entire root…the biggest or most intact root wins.
“Magic Weed” — Tell students there is a “magic weed and whomever finds it wins! This is similar to the “magic trash” game where students find that “special piece of trash” on the classroom floor.
Explore community partners!
We have lots of options here in Boise, and I’m sure you have some in your area as well.
Programs that require volunteer hours can be amazing partners!
Your local Extension Office, and Master Gardener Program.
We partner with Boise Urban Garden School for programming
Ada Soil and Water Conservation District has a monthly offering for teaching parents and neighbors about weeds.
Youth summer programs and churches!
Sheriff’s Labor Detail–be sure to book well in advance.
Organize weekly/monthly help!
Before school is out, reach out to parents to organize weekly work shifts using something as simple as an Excel spreadsheet, and perhaps allow volunteers to harvest produce during their shift.
You could also organize neighborhood potlucks or gatherings to bring families into the garden if you’d rather a group approach.
Whatever system you choose, it’s really helpful to have a point person who can provide simple, specific instructions about what needs to be done.
Organize a Summer Garden Tour!
This year, an amazing volunteer reached out to school garden leads and invited them to participate in a Garden Tour, giving school gardeners an opportunity to see the space, share ideas, tell stories and pull weeds. Here are links to the newsletters created by the lovely Lauren Studley!
Adjust what you plant!
If you aren’t able to utilize any of the ideas above, consider focusing on plants that grow during the school year.
For example, in Boise ID:
Late February/early March - Plant crops like radish, peas, lettuce and spinach that can be harvested before school gets out.
May - Have students plant things that can largely take care of themselves (assuming you have irrigation!). Potatoes and/or sweet potatoes are good options, as are low-maintenance annual flowers such as cosmos, sunflowers, cornflowers, and zinnias. You could also simply plant a cover crop such as cowpeas. This creates a great opportunity to harvest and to teach students about how some plants pull atmospheric nitrogen and store it in their roots. Pull one plant up to show students what is happening beneath the soil surface, and cut the remaining plants off at soil level to allow the rhizobia associated with its roots to continue feeding organisms in the soil.
August - Plant crops such as beets, carrots, lettuce, radish, spinach, turnips, mustard greens for a Fall harvest.
October - Plant garlic as a fun precursor to Halloween (plant garlic to “keep the vampires away”). Make a simple cold frame or hoop house and plant kale and spinach seedlings. Try planting one bed without protection and another with protection so students can observe the difference for themselves.
Finally, if all else fails, change the structure!
If you want a school garden for student learning but simply can’t manage everything that comes with maintaining it, consider setting it up as a community garden, either for a fee or for free. Gardeners manage their own plots, while students can continue to learn from the space. This approach will take some forethought to make sure everyone is happy with how the garden is structured, but it could be a great solution for schools that want to keep the learning opportunities without the burden on school staff. Feel free to reach out if you need a thinking buddy on this one!
Happy gardening everyone!
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