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Children from Rosa Parks Elementary School come to the garden during recess to make a salad with greens they've grown.
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The Garden Classroom
Imagine you’ve been sitting in a plastic seat inside a classroom for over two hours, your eyes are starting to cross under the fluorescent lights. Your toes begin to tap on the linoleum floor, as your pent-up energy becomes too strong to hold back. Then, the clock hits 12- garden class time! You run outdoors and as the warm sunshine seeps into your skin, you remember that today is Salad Day! You and your friends rush over to the southeast corner, where six weeks ago you worked together to plant arugula and kale, and carefully harvest the leaves at the base, gently tearing the edible leaf from the hard stalk which you toss into the compost bin, just like Ms. Anna taught you. Together, your class washes the greens and prepares the other vegetables, proudly and carefully practicing your newly acquired knife skills. With the help of parent volunteers, you assemble the salad and make a dressing, using herbs from the garden, olive oil, and a little bit of mustard.
As you settle into your seat in the outdoor classroom and bite into a juicy tomato, you smile, content, happy and healthy.
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Dear friend ,
Did you know that in the Western Addition there is only one full-service grocery store to serve over 51,000 residents? Increasing edible garden space and teaching children about the individual and community impact of healthy eating is vital for equity and justice. Through our interconnected programs, children and youth are developing the tools for healthy bodies, minds, and communities. Tools that they then take back to their families and friends, practicing lifelong healthy habits.
In the last year, we improved our financial sustainability and increased our after-school and summer partnerships, helping over 1,350 children experience the joy of planting and watching something grow, of harvesting and eating their own food, and practicing job and life skills. Through our free, outdoor education programs, kids and youth reconnected with the earth in safe spaces; learned about the environment and nature while building STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, the Arts and Mathematics) skills; cultivated and ate the kinds of nutritious food necessary to lead the healthy, active lives they deserve. Our BEETS (Band of Environmentally Educated and Employable Teens) worked to increase the amount of green space in the Buchanan Mall - building and maintaining gardens along the five-block stretch in the Western Addition and teaching the community how to grow and prepare healthy meals.
In 2019, we want to strategically expand our school programming. For each $10,000 we raise this season, we will be able to teach garden and nutrition education classes at one additional school, reaching an estimated additional 250-500 youth.
We can’t do this work without you, our friends and dedicated supporters. We need your investment to expand our programming and increase our impact- the kids need you to lead their healthiest, happiest, best possible lives.
Please consider making a donation today. You can can donate online here or send a check to CommunityGrows/Tides Center, 762 Fulton St. San Francisco, 94102.
On behalf of the thousands of young lives we touch each year, thank you!
Kelly ErnstFriedman, Executive Director
CommunityGrows, a project of the Tides Center
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