Gardening should be part of every school curriculum
Students at the Thurgood Marshall Academy Public Charter High School were so swept away with the idea of growing their own food that they decided to film a documentary about how kids can change the way they eat. What may have been most telling about a screening of the film last night was the way the students focused on their own poor eating habits. They interview their classmates, many of whom candidly admit that they opt for sodas and chips over the meals served in the cafeteria. Then they take the camera to a local corner store, where the kids are lined up to buy junk food.
The “green club” at Thurgood Marshall is led by science teacher Sam Ullery, who I met in the spring of 2008 when he signed up for one of the garden classes I was teaching at the Washington Youth Garden. Well Sam has come quite a ways since then. The school now has 18 raised beds. Not only are they eating homegrown produce in the cafeteria, they are selling some of it at the Mt. Pleasant farmers market.
The documentary captures one of the gardeners traveling around the school grounds, trying to tempt other students with freshly harvested kale leaves.
The screening, held at the Busboys and Poets restaurant at 5th and K streets NW, was just one of several events taking place this week as part of D.C. School Garden Week, hosted by D.C. Schoolyard Greening. There are garden workdays scheduled, as well as a bicycle tour and a separate van tour of various school gardens in the city on Saturday.
From what I hear, there’s still plenty of room on the garden tours. For more information, check here.
We are engaging the concerns of a hungry planet--slowly--right here in our kitchen garden in the District of Columbia, about a mile from the White House.
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