Doing hard labor isn’t how most people like to spend a sunny morning, but on one recent Saturday, Caloosa Middle School students, staff, and family members put on gloves and picked up axes and shovels to break ground and dig trenches for irrigation tunnels to help expand the school’s garden.
Leisha Roy, a chair member of the Healthy Living Collaboration, is part of the Lee County Food and Nutrition Services Department and oversaw the process. Roy knows it’s highly unusual for any child to get up early on a weekend, but the garden club is dedicated.
“How many middle school kids are going to come out and shovel dirt on a Saturday?” Roy said.
Caloosa Middle School isn’t the only school going green. Gardens are popping up all over Lee County, thanks to programs like farm-to-school. In February alone the Lee County School District expanded its garden program to 14 schools. Farm-to-school teaches students about healthy eating and also produces fresh food for school cafeterias.
“We’re core-curricular, hands-on, and we’re gaining momentum,” Roy said. “We’ve got a wait list for schools.”
During the 2023-24 school year, these gardens harvested more than 11,000 pounds of produce, saving cafeterias over $30,000. Seventh-grade life science teacher Amy Bombace said she knew she wanted a garden back in 2022 and helped get the ball rolling with sixth grade comprehensive science teacher, Shelby Fest.
“We started planning, we made designs for the garden, and we started a garden club,” Fest said. “Since then we’ve been very exclusive with the students.”
Their garden has seven raised beds and an elaborate hydroponics system with a huge tank powered by a solar panel Dunbar High School built for them. They grow lettuce, tomatoes, broccoli, and much more.
Allyssa Hope is a seventh-grade student and has been in the garden club for two years. She appreciates the hard work her mentors have put into the program.
“I like that our teachers' dreams get to come true because they had been dreaming about having a garden for the school,” Hope said.
School gardens are fueled by grants from places like the Foundation for Lee County Public Schools, and even Whole Foods. Expired seeds are gifted from Walmart, and other sources come straight from the community.
“We have a pretty big wish list for crops that we want to plant, most of what we have was donated from students and parents who have connections with plant nurseries, or other schools in the area that have bigger facilities and are able to share their sprouts and seeds with us,” Fest said.
There’s a collective effort to support these gardens because of their value to students. In an age where kids seem more invested in video games than their backyards, it’s refreshing to see the positive impact environmental programs like these have.
“Sometimes I hear from the kids that they only came to school because of the garden club, so we know that it definitely has a lot of meaning for them,” Fest said.
The garden club doesn’t just benefit the students who are members, it feeds the entire school. The club meets twice a week and students tend and harvest crops for the cafeteria.
“We harvest one lettuce, put it in one bag, weigh it, and then we write it down in our journal, and it has all the things that we harvested so far,” Hope said. “Then we bring it down to the cafeteria and put it in the kitchen so that the cafeteria ladies can take it in the morning.”
The fresh produce is popular with students, and the club said many students eagerly await the next harvest.
“Our cafeteria has been very cooperative preparing it and serving it,” Fest said. “I’ll be walking to the teacher’s lounge and I see all these kids around chewing on broccoli and lettuce.”
Roy sees more potential in the program and intends to branch out. She hopes to make it an elective so more students can get involved. Programs like these plant seeds of success and can even help students excel academically.
“One of the schools that had a garden, their test scores went up from spending more time outside… by bringing the kids outside and doing something engaging, the standards stuck more,” Roy said.
Roy hopes to get all school subjects involved and create interactive lesson plans that take place in the garden to boost test scores. She also sees how the aesthetics help with students' mental wellbeing.
“Another part of it too is giving them some pride in their school, and knowing that they have some sort of investment in it,” Bombace said. “We’re also going to plant flowers and things, just making it beautiful so the kids are happier when they come to school.”
The farm-to-school program is in full bloom at Caloosa Middle School and the community has rallied around the program. Matthew Carrier teamed up with his stepson, Liam Spencer, to fill in dirt for the irrigation system. Spencer is in seventh grade and has been in the club for a year.
“It helps them learn how to grow vegetables, learn how things operate, but there’s also some teamwork and some responsibility and planning for their future,” Carrier said. “I think it’s great.”
Perhaps it’s no wonder farm-to-school is growing in popularity across Lee County Schools. The program grows healthy plants, bodies and minds. Liam Spencer has another, and simpler, motivation.
“I like to get my hands dirty,” Spencer said.
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