Recent Accomplishments: The WELLKIND Garden Program
By Walker Laughlin and Terese Chalmers
Cali Calmecac Language Academy, Windsor, CA
WELLKIND’s Education and Garden Program partners with local leaders and schools to cultivate inner and outer wellness with gardens and outdoor education. We help develop school gardens as learning labs for K-12 students, covering science, health, ecology, nutrition, and more. We also support community gardens, which serve as bridges between people and the Earth, increase awareness of healthy eating, and provide access to organic food production.
From the launch of our program in 2020, we have supported 15 Sonoma County schools in creating and maintaining school gardens, reaching over 5,000 K-12 students. We have also partnered with 12 community groups in Sonoma and Marin City to support their food security and gardening projects, serving over 17,000 people. And our 3-part webinar series, Seeds of Change, shared tips on home gardening and outdoor education to over 200 viewers from 27 different countries
The Education and Garden Program
Starting in September of 2020, WELLKIND‘s Executive Director and Senior Education and Garden Coordinator launched our Education and Garden Program. Staff members have a combined experience of over 45 years in education. In past projects, they provided school garden instruction, trained teachers to use gardens for their classes, and drafted educational guidelines to support outdoor education at the state level.
Our Senior Education and Garden Coordinator reached out to form relationships with schools in Sonoma County. Many of these schools are supported by the federal Title 1 program, which serves campuses with high percentages of low-income students.
We then recruited members of the local community to our Garden Advisory Board, a group designed to help us assess and respond to the needs of our partner groups. The board is composed of three Sonoma County-based experts in education, gardening, and student wellness: Montserrat Archila, School-Based Behavioral Health Lead for the Community Health Investment department at Providence St. Joseph Health; Amy Chevrolet, Manager of Hospice Counseling Services at Providence; and Christopher Szecsey, an internationally recognized development consultant who helped develop the State of California’s Blueprint for Environmental Literacy for the Department of Education.
While the Covid-19 pandemic complicated our goal to provide outdoor education within the classrooms of our partnering schools, we worked with the Garden Advisory Board to provide support from afar. The WELLKIND Education and Garden Program developed a grant-making campaign to help jump-start the gardens of schools and community groups in Marin and Sonoma.
Through our Garden Mini-Grant Program, we have formed relationships with 15 schools and 12 community groups. The schools will use our funding to serve over 5,100 students and their families in Sonoma County. Community groups will help over 17,600 individuals in Sonoma County and Marin City. Our mini-grants are funding supplies and equipment such as soil and fertilizer, markers, bags, seeds and seedlings, garden boxes, fruit trees, wood chips, and stipends for educators and facilitators to plant and maintain gardens and design garden-based curriculum for K-12 students.
a list of our wonderful partners
Schools
Brook Haven Middle School (Sebastopol)
Sequoia Elementary School (Santa Rosa)
Penngrove Elementary School (Penngrove)
Cloverdale High School (Cloverdale)
Alexander Valley School (Healdsburg)
Cali Calmécac Language Academy (Windsor)
Guerneville Elementary School (Guerneville)
Hillcrest Middle School (Sebastopol)
Albert Biella Elementary School (Santa Rosa)
Oak Grove Elementary School (Sebastopol)
Brooks Elementary School (Windsor)
University Elementary at La Fiesta (Rohnert Park)
Gravenstein Elementary School (Sebastopol)
Fitch Mountain Campus, Healdsburg Elementary School (Healdsburg)
Community Soil Foundation, serving the Mark West Union School District (Santa Rosa)
Community Organizations
Valley Oak Homes (Sonoma)
LandPaths (Santa Rosa)
Earth Care Committee at First Congregational Church (Sonoma)
Windsor Garden Club (Windsor)
Windsor Service Alliance Pantry (Windsor)
Farm to Pantry (Healdsburg)
Monte Rio Park District (Monte Rio)
Food for Thought (Forestville)
Daily Acts (Petaluma)
Windsor Wellness Partnership (Windsor)
iGrow Community Garden (Healdsburg)
Here is a collage of some of our partners’ “before pictures” of their gardens. Check-in later to see how they will grow!
In May we will bring our grantees together for a virtual garden networking and peer support meeting, where we will provide our guidance for their garden projects and encourage peers to work together over this next year.
As schools and community organizations re-open, WELLKIND staff will visit our partners to support the development and maintenance of their gardens on-site and meet with teachers to integrate our outdoor education goals throughout the school year.
We have three general objectives for our lesson plans: 1, to teach on the relationship between students and local agriculture; 2, to reintegrate an understanding that human health is directly linked to the environment; and 3, to provide hands-on, experiential education activities.
Combatting Food Insecurity in Local Families
Food security is a major component of WELLKIND’s Education and Garden Program. Given the health and economic impacts of the Covid-19 virus, we have started to support low-income families as they build gardens of their own for better nutrition and food security. So far, seven Sonoma County families have applied for assistance.
People’s Inter-Cities Fellowship, Marin City, CA
We are also partnering with a church to provide nutritious meals to 200 families in need in Marin City, with the support of a major grocery store and a local market. Over 70% of the food provided is organic and heart-healthy. For those unable to come to the church to pick up food weekly, local community leader Leticia Jones delivers food to the doorsteps of 30 individuals within a 15-mile range.
The Seeds of Change Webinar Series
In February, Terese Chalmers, our Senior Education and Garden Coordinator, led our Seeds of Change webinar series on Zoom. She hosted leaders in permaculture and organic gardening as well as outdoor and garden education. The three webinars were viewed by hundreds of people from 27 different countries!
Environmental activist Rob Greenfield joined us for the first event, where he and WELLKIND’s Shad Qudsi, a master permaculturalist, discussed how everyday people can bring gardens into their backyards to eat healthier diets. Rob gave tips on how to reduce our environmental impact by cutting back on single-use containers and growing our own food.
Laura Honda, a recipient of the California State Teachers Association’s Distinguished Science Teacher of the Year Award, shared stories from her career as an elementary school teacher and environmental educator. Laura drove home the many benefits for K-12 students who can step outside of the classroom and explore school gardens. Students who participate in school garden programs develop a stronger love of nature, better focus, increased capacity for teamwork, and greater self-awareness, while learning key concepts in math, science, and nutrition.
Our final webinar featured Shad Qudsi, the Executive Director for WELLKIND Guatemala. He spoke about the principles, ethics, and key design methods of permaculture, which he uses on a daily basis on his farm and on behalf of the villages surrounding Lake Atitlán. Shad is certified in Permaculture Design and has trained around 2,000 people from around the world.
Looking Forward
The Covid-19 pandemic has called on teachers and NGOs to find innovative ways to support food security and outdoor education. The WELLKIND Education and Garden Program feels encouraged as we create a better environment for students, their families, and their communities.
In case you missed a Seeds of Change webinar and are interested in home gardening tips or school garden programs, you can catch our recordings by following the YouTube links below:
● Seeds of Change Webinar 1: Food Freedom: Living Off Your Own Garden with Rob Greenfield
● Seeds of Change Webinar 2: "Outdoor Education: Lessons Children Learn in a Garden" with Laura Honda
● Seeds of Change Webinar 3: “Permaculture Design in the Garden” with Shad Qudsi