Middle School Courtyard Project
Founder, Julie Rappaport, first spoke with people and parents in the school district about schoolyard gardens in 2012. This led to 7 people attending the first UMN Schoolyard Garden Conference. From there, 4 Park and Rec gardens were installed and 100 straw bales were installed at Lenox and Central’s Kids Place in 2014. By the end of 2014, the Edible Playground program for Kids Place was so successful that the 100 straw bales were transformed into 28 permanent garden beds. Over the next few years, over 3,000 children were taught, over 6,000 lbs of food were given to families to take home, and community meals and education were held in the gardens.
Conversations re-ignited in 2019, after a number of elementary, middle and high school students participated in the UMN Extension’s Cooking Matters © as a satellite. That course was also offered to Teens and Tweens with public cook-offs.
Discussions led to meetings about implementing a garden in the SLP Middle School ½ acre courtyard in the school. Seeds Feeds was allowed to apply for outside funding, and began hosting a Permaculture Design Certification Course where participants of the class started designing the space.
A presentation of the classes final design is being presented to the community on November 8th, 2020 from 10-11:30am, in order to keep the conversation flowing and get feedback from the many stakeholders.
The Permaculture Design Certification course cohort has come up with their vision for the space. The vision is that the courtyard will become a place where students of all ages come together to learn and interact with nature. Students will be able to learn garden management skills, sustainable practices and will have experiential learning opportunities in nature. This space will be a functional property full of elements for the community to utilize, ecstatically appreciate, and that will produce fresh food used towards hunger relief efforts. Visitors will find a space of peace and an area to connect with the natural landscape and community.
