September's here, and in Yuma County that means the start of the growing season for cool season crops. Since Yuma's known as the Winter Salad Bowl of the nation providing over 90% of the country's winter vegetables, KAWC wanted to take a look at what kids are learning about agriculture in school.
At Yuma School District One, G.W. Carver Elementary School has become an exemplary school due to its garden situated at the center of campus. Each day, students of all grades pass by the garden and help maintain it.
In doing so, they honor their school's namesake, George Washington Carver. Carver was an agricultural scientist and inventor as well as one of the most prominent black scientists of the early 20th century.
"That's definitely a thing we wanted to honor as part of our school and, you know, how do you do that? You get kids involved with getting their hands dirty, getting those seeds into the ground and then doing a daily check on those things, and the way we do that is we do not run separate irrigation lines to the garden beds," Principal Matt Buckley said. "Every garden bed is hand watered every day to guarantee that kids are accessing it and interacting with it daily."
According to Buckley, the school used to have a community garden in the east parking lot for the neighborhood for a very long time, but it shifted to a school garden for better access to students.
"The nice thing about putting the beds centralized in the middle of school—every kid walks by the the garden bed every day so we don't get to ignore that they're there," he said. "And a lot of teachers will designate, you know, kind of like a line leader like you would in class: 'You're part of the watering group for this week.' So the kids get to go out, fill the watering cans and then make sure that their garden beds are taken care of ... the kids get a big kick and then once they finally get to harvest, that's really the payoff, right? They get their hands dirty again, get the vegetables out and then the sampling."
The method of sampling is up to each teacher. Sometimes it'll be first graders trying cauliflower soup. Other times, it'll be students making salsa because they went with a salsa garden theme.
The reason it varies is that each grade gets its own bed.
"So every grade level has a garden bed that they get to attend to, and then even our specialized program classes, they have a garden bed designated for their use as well, which is built a little higher for wheelchair accessibility as well," Buckley said.
The new garden area includes benches and a pergola, too, so that the space can become an outdoor classroom as well.
"So if the third grade team is doing a lesson on pollinators during a certain part of the season, you can go out, watch the broccoli or the broccolini and watch the bees going around and doing their job as pollinators," he continued. "And the students can observe that in real time so it really does become an extension of the classroom."
The campus garden itself predates Buckley, who's now been principal at Carver for eight years. When the school wanted to move it from the parking lot to the center of campus, they partnered with the Yuma County Public Health Services District. The district was integral to planning so that the garden could be certified and its crops would be safe for consumption.
"We had materials donated from General Motors back when they had the proving grounds here," Buckley said. "Champion Church led a lot of donations and a lot of construction help in getting that done. Of course, with our own grounds-folks. We do have some families here at the school that are tied to some local agricultural companies, and they have brought in some plants for us. You know, J.V. Smith has brought in things for us to use.
"And the nice thing is we have a career day every May. And so we've actually, those agricultural companies then come back and teach about their different professions within agriculture at that time."
The garden provides a lot of educational opportunities, and not just for science. Math comes up quite a bit in gardening so kids will learn about grids and using measurements to provide enough spacing between seeds. G.W. Carver's own life as an agricultural scientist provides a historical angle to ag education at the school, too, and this comes up most prominently at the school's annual Carver Day celebration.
Carver Day is a spring celebration with a lot of history integrated throughout its activities. One of the activities is a planting in honor of the school's namesake; they do two plantings a year.
"So we do one mid- to late October; that's the first one," Buckley explained. "And we get to harvest that typically right after winter break. So early January is when they get to bring in their haul and sample those things and try the different things that they've grown. And then we do a second planting because we let the soil rest for a little bit, and then we'll do a second planting in honor of of George Washington Carver on our annual Carver Day celebration."
As for what the kids grow, it varies.
"We have seen the equivalent of a salsa garden where you see tomatoes and cilantro and those things," Buckley said. "They experiment. So some try carrots. Radishes have been really popular and we've learned a lot of lessons about radishes over time. Cauliflower is a very popular one. Of course, different types of lettuce that they want to try or cabbage.
"So it just kind of—we tried to look at what actually grows. We have some information about what grows in Yuma well during what time of year so we try to stick with that."
In addition to honoring Carver, the school's garden aims to provide students with a memorable learning experience and a deeper understanding of the community they live in.
"We hear the word agriculture all the time in Yuma," Buckley commented. "We hear about that type of work, and so we really want our students to understand what that work is because that is a viable career in Yuma, you know, down the road. So we want them to get that exposure.
"And then like I said, the nice thing about our career day, when they come in, they talk about all the different jobs within agriculture. So now there's a film, they're familiar with it when they go into Career Day. But now they get to hear all the different multiple levels they could be involved in agriculture that they may not get that exposure anywhere else."
This reporting is supported by a grant from the Arizona Local News Foundation.
