With afterschool garden clubs in two Clarkston schools, and a stipend-based Food Justice internship program, the IRC’s New Roots programming provides garden access, nutrition education and food-related assistance to almost 1,000 DeKalb County students each year. However, when DeKalb County Schools closed due to COVID-19 in mid-March, so did the IRC in Atlanta’s school gardens. Determined to keep their students engaged in gardening throughout the pandemic, our Youth Futures AmeriCorps Associate, Michel Osta, and FoodCorps Service Member, Meggie Stewart, created the Home Garden Challenge, with support from New Roots Program Coordinator, Lauren Ladov.
Home Garden Challenge Goals:
- Promote hands-on learning
- Empower students to eat healthy foods
- Increase capacity for long-term food security
To promote the Home Garden Challenge, Michel and Meggie created a video explaining how to start a simple home garden. Anticipating that students would have limited access to seeds, they created an online survey for students to select the plants they wanted to grow. The survey was shared across digital learning platforms and with students during check-in calls. Throughout April and May, the IRC’s Youth team made hundreds of seed packets and mailed them out to over 50 Home Garden Challenge participants from Clarkston High School and Indian Creek Elementary School. To complete the challenge, students must plant the seeds and share a picture of their home garden with the IRC’s Youth team. The collection of pictures will be used in a video montage to inspire more home gardeners in the community!
More than 50 students from Clarkston High School and Indian Creek Elementary School participated in the Home Garden Challenge!
Students chose three types of seeds from a list of six options: tomatoes, hot peppers, beans, lettuce, herbs and flowers. The most popular request was for tomato seeds, requested by nearly 75% of participants. Students also received video instructions on how to give their plants enough space to grow, and an infographic of DIY container gardening ideas, created by the IRC’s Food Justice interns. 15% of participants reported that the Home Garden Challenge would be their first time growing their own food. Meanwhile, 37% were already gardening at home before the challenge, and the rest had tried gardening before, but were not actively growing any food at home.
The project was funded by a Youth Service America grant from the Sodexo Stop Hunger Foundation, that was awarded to the IRC in Atlanta’s Youth team back in February. Originally, they planned to use the funds to host a catered garden workday and party for the community, that included activities such as planting and harvesting, planting flowers to beautify the local high school, and student-led cooking lessons. With the COVID-19 pandemic forcing school closures in mid-March, our team re-imagined the event as the Home Garden Challenge! We are so grateful to the Sodexo Stop Hunger Foundation for making this physically-distanced garden challenge possible!
In addition to the Home Garden Challenge, the IRC’s Youth team has been working to support our young clients throughout the pandemic. An important part of this support has been helping families access food security resources, including emergency grocery delivery from the IRC. School meals are an important food source for many students, so when schools closed, it became imperative that they receive information on feeding programs and other resources for food security. We hope the Home Garden Challenge continues to spark a passion for gardening in our young people and will provide sustenance for families to increase their resilience over the months to come.
To learn more about the work of the IRC in Atlanta and for information on how you can get involved with the IRC as a donor or volunteer, please contact Development Manager, Kalie Lasiter, at Kalie.Lasiter [at] Rescue.org or 678-636-8941.
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