September 17 2007

Edible Schoolyard

Edible Schoolyard is an organization established to provide urban public school students with an organic garden and kitchen classroom which has both health and educational benefits especially since the organic vegetables are used to supplement the school lunch meals.

Currently the program is being tested at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Middle School in Berkeley, CA. The concept behind the program stemmed from a conversation between a former principal, the chef, and a local restaurateur, chef and author, Alice Waters. To create room for the program a 1-acre asphalt parking lot was removed, the soil enriched using a cover crop, and the cafeteria renovated to become a teaching classroom.

"Today, the program is integrated into the middle school's daily life. The organic garden is flourishing, plants feed and outgrow the adolescents who nurtured them, and the kitchen is filled with delicious smells, music, and enthusiastic young chefs."

The program uses principles of Participation, Ecology, and Aesthetics to help guide the program.

More information on the Edible Schoolyard can be found here.

September 17th, 2007 at 3:12 AM. Posted in Other. Share this post.