Student plans garden as service, education for kids
By William Duffee
Children at the TownsendCommunity Center will soon be getting their hands dirty, thanks to Earlham junior Mary Jones.
Jones is organizing a children’s community garden for the Townsend center as part of her Bonner Scholar service. She projects planting to begin in May and continue as a summer program.
“In May and in June the kids will plant,” Jones said. “The kids that come after school will be planting the garden and the kids that come in summer will be maintaining the garden every day.”
Jones intends for the garden to act both as a learning resource for the kids and as a service project for the community. She hopes that the children who maintain the garden can become involved with the local farmers’ market and perhaps donate fresh produce to local soup kitchens.
“So the kids are learning how to grow and make stuff, but they’re also learning that we can share this with the community and people in need who don’t get fresh produce,” Jones said. “That’s the goal … teaching kids how to garden, teaching them about nutrition, giving them a project that they have ownership of.”
For the time being, the garden will be for the children’s use. Community support is needed and appreciated, Jones said, but the kids will be the ones directly gardening.
“We’re calling it a community garden but it’s not a community garden in the sense that most people probably think, in that there’s a piece of land and I rent a plot and I plant my own stuff in my plot,” she said.
Instead, the garden will be an after-school and summer youth program, but, if successful, the center could “expand it, maybe, in the future and have it be more like a community garden,” Jones said.
Jones began the project last semester, starting with general research and preparation. The garden will fill a 27-by-49-foot plot behind the center.
The garden has already received community support. One volunteer tilled the plot for free this past fall, and Richmond gardeners have expressed interest in helping teach the kids. Jones has also begun fundraising, and had a letter to the editor published in the Palladium-Item, Richmond’s primary newspaper, on March 8.
Assistant Professor of Education and Director of Wilderness Programs Jay Roberts helped Jones construct a rain barrel system for the Townsend center. Rain barrels collect rainwater, which can then be used to water the garden, adding to the sustainability of the garden.
Roberts said that Jones’ project ties in with Earlham’s recent move to create an environmental studies major and other shifts towards sustainability.
“This is exactly what I think we as the faculty were hoping for [in creating the major], which are students who are engaging in the community, doing projects that are both beneficial to the community but also to the student, and putting knowledge to action,” he said. “So I think what Mary’s doing with that particular project is a wonderful example of … what we’re hoping to do with this major as a whole.”
Associate Director of Wilderness Programs Tom Ferrell assisted Jones in designing the garden.
“I think it’s a great thing,” Ferrell said. “There’s a lot of conversation right now about healthy eating, both on-campus and in the larger community of Richmond [and] Wayne county, as well as the world right now, so I think this is a very timely thing.”
For Jones, planning the garden has been an opportunity to learn something new.
“I don’t know a ton about gardening,” she said. “This has been something I’ve always wanted to learn about, but I don’t know a lot about, so it’s been a really educational experience for me.”
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