Create Garden Classrooms at 3 Low-Income Schools

At this time last year, we launched a Kickstarter in hopes of funding a summer camp for our students. While we were ultimately unsuccessful in our campaign, the idea was seeded and has sprung to fruition this year. Beginning in June, we will offer our Seeds & Sprouts summer programming at Eagleton Elementary.

The program will be based in garden and nutrition education. At Eagleton we will maintain a few beds in the community garden on site. In these gardens we will grow food using permaculture principles, so we will focus on polycultures and perennial pollinators. With funds we were granted last year, we were able to erect a greenhouse at the school and that will be used to propagate seedlings for sale. We learned this past year through our youth farm stand initiative, that they are not only more than capable of managing sales but furthermore enjoy the experience.

For this year, we will also be a part of the City of Denver Youth One Book One Program(YOBOD). This means we will be reading two books from local Colorado authors and facilitating curriculum around them as well. Altogether, we can support up to 50 students with this programming. Our students will get to meet the author in person at a city event and engage them with questions about their YOBOD experience.

We have some strategic partners coming out to make it a well-rounded camp. Swallow Hill will be providing us with a ukelele tuturial. We have facilitators from the Denver Butterfly Pavilion coming to speak to us about invertebrates. Word has it they may even be bringing some animal friends with them! Our camp will have visitors from the CIty of Denver Adaptive Recreation Office hosting a workshop in order to improve disability awareness and inclusion. We will take a trip to Denver Botanic Gardens where they will facilitate a workshop on terrariums and arid climate plants. Lastly, we hope to have a visit from Natures Educators who bring birds of prey to the classroom. 

With your help we can continue to provide spectacular summer programming for underserved youth. This year it's 50 students, but next year maybe it can be 500. The possibilities are endless. Thanks for your time!