Search
Jacey Wesley
In 2018, the Seeds to Success Program held its inaugural School Garden Leadership Workshop. The workshop takes place each summer over several days and consists of hands-on learning and lectures to help educators learn how to build and sustain a school garden while incorporating farm to school programming into their curriculum.
In 2022, the fourth-annual training was held from June 20-23, at the LSU AgCenter’s Hill Farm Teaching Facility in Baton Rouge. Thirty-eight teachers registered for the workshop, 26 of which completed the attendance and participation requirements. Participating teachers completed 24 hours of educational sessions during the four-day workshop.
Topics covered included crop basics, composting and fertility management, raised bed construction and how to incorporate the garden into school curriculum.
Hosting the workshop at the Hill Farm Teaching Facility allowed the participants to view fruit, vegetable and herb crops in an actual garden setting.
School garden integration in the classroom was covered for several subjects, including art, reading, science, engineering, history and social studies, math, agriculture, health, physical education and nutrition.
Each participant went home with resources from the Seeds to Success team, including a set of Harvest of the Month posters, a seasonality chart, a container garden growing system, a windowsill greenhouse kit, seeds and many other resources exclusively offered to training participants.
The reviews of the training from previous participants have been overwhelmingly positive; the team received a lot of supportive feedback including: “Very informative and supportive. I learned so much and feel more confident about teaching gardening,” and “I enjoyed being able to learn how to practically incorporate gardening at school. Everything we learned seemed like something we can do at school. Well done!”
In 2023, the Seeds to Success team will be providing two School Garden Leadership Workshops in Baton Rouge and in Alexandria in order to reach more educators from across the state.
If you know someone that would benefit from this opportunity for professional development, please email louisianafarmtoschool@agcenter.lsu.edu.
Jacey Wesley is the communications director for Seeds for Success: The Louisiana Farm to School Program.
(This article appears in the spring 2023 edition of Louisiana Agriculture.)
Educators from across the state work together to learn the basics of creating and sustaining compost piles at LSU AgCenter’s Hill Farm Teaching Facility in Baton Rouge during the 2022 School Garden Leadership Workshop. Photo by Carl Motsenbocker
