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Hot Springs Elementary School Garden ROCK-a-thon
How many pounds of rocks can each grade remove from the garden area in a five minute period? Students will take on the challenge May 13th and 20th. We know they’re going to ROCK at it! 100% of the proceeds will go directly to supporting next year’s garden classes at HSES. Here children learn:
Sponsor Name Sponsor email address and phone number Grade You'll Sponsor $ Per Pound of Rocks Example: Jane Doe [email protected] (828) 206-1111 First Grade $0.50 *No donor will be charged for more than 40 pounds of rocks. For example if you pledge $0.50/pound, the most you will be asked to donate is $20. How to Donate Email us the above chart information to [email protected] or text Natalie Hesed, the Garden Coordinator, at (828) 206-1487. We will contact you with final rock tallies and donation amounts after the event is completed! You can then donate online or by check. You can also choose to donate a flat amount instead of pledging. You can donate any time now through May 20 using the online method or a check. All donations will go through Bountiful Cities, the nonprofit sponsor for the garden program. All contributions are tax deductible. Online donations can be made April 26-May 20, 2022 at the following link: https://www.paypal.com/fundraiser/charity/173226. Credit cards accepted. No fees are charged to you or us! Checks can be made out to “Bountiful Cities”. Be sure to write “HSES” in the memo! They can be mailed to Bountiful Cities PO Box 898 Asheville, NC 28802 Thank you for your generous support of the HSES garden program! This garden is supported by the Community Foundation of WNC Human Services Grant
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What FEAST Math Class looks like...Why would you need math in the garden? Ms. Jordan's FEAST students find out quickly that skills traditionally learned sitting at a desk are useful in the garden and FUN! These 4th graders are playing the Square Foot Gardening Game while planning where to plant vegetables, and the 5th graders are calculating the volume of the wheelbarrow and the surface area the mulch will cover! Want to support Bountiful Cities/FEAST educational efforts? The Lucy Herring Elementary Peace Garden in West Asheville needs ~20 bales of straw (ideally not sprayed with glyphosate)! If 20 people each bought a bale and dropped it off, we would be set for the rest of the growing season. We would also welcome loose straw, so if you know of a source and/or can help deliver, please reach out to [email protected] Bountiful Cities Community Garden Network FREE Workshops To RSVP for this kid friendly event click HERE. The Bountiful Cities Community Garden Network is pleased to present free workshops each month in conjunction with The City of Asheville. For more information about this workshop go to our Facebook Page or check out our events on our Bountiful Cities Website. You can also contact our Community Garden Network Coordinators Isa Whitaker [email protected] or Lydia George [email protected] Workshops Presented in Collaboration with The City of Asheville Thank YOU Student Volunteers! Thanks to students from Odyssey High School and University of Tennesse for coming out to our Pearson Garden last week to learn, plant, and build! They helped pot up plants that will get donated to community gardens (see below for more detials on getting plants!) and they helped build infrastructure for the greenhouse! Would YOU like to Volunteer?If you would like to sign up to get regular updates about our volunteer opportunities please contact [email protected] or fill out this FORM. You can also attend one of our weekly garden workday events: Pearson Garden and Nursery Garden workdays Wednesdays from 3-5pm. Located at 408 Pearson Dr. in Montford. Please click this link to sign up. Contact [email protected] for more information. Hall Fletcher Elementary School FEAST Garden Wednesdays 2:45-4:00pm, 60 Ridgelawn Rd. Please click this link to sign up. Contact [email protected] for more information. Lucy Herring Elementary School Peace Garden (formerly Vance Elementary School) in West Asheville. Workdays Tuesdays 2:45-3:45. The garden will again be closed to the public from 8 AM- 2:30 pm so that classes can use the garden for outdoor learning. Please contact [email protected] for questions and to RSVP. We Need Help Building a Block Foundation for our GreenhouseDo you have skills? Or do you want to learn more about Greenhouses and Construction? Please contact [email protected] if you have experience building or would like to learn! In the coming months we will be constructing a donated greenhouse at our Pearson Garden and this is an opportunity to learn and share. Hello and GoodbyeWelcome to Kelly Applegate the new Bountiful Cities FEAST program assistant! Kelly has been organic gardening and farming for 9+ years and is currently a non-traditional student at Warren Wilson studying Environmental Education. Garden education is a passion of Kelly’s and she is so excited to be a part of FEAST’s meaningful and community impacting work! It is with sadness and congratulations that we say goodbye to Whisper Moore. Whisper is an INFJ advocate on the Myers Briggs and as such enjoys bringing the vision of others to fruition. She is a mother of two little girls who enjoy camping and hiking to waterfalls as a family. As an herbalist, Whisper enjoys making tinctures and tea blends as well as plant identification. As she move on from Bountiful Cities to the Campaign for Southern Equality we know she will continue to spread her good work! Bountiful Cities Plant SalesSpring is upon us, and Windfall Collective Nursery has a wide selection of edible, medicinal, native and pollinator plants getting up to size! We'll have plants available to the community starting mid-April, here is a list of our inventory for the spring as well as upcoming perennials. We'll also have the webstore updated with our current inventory soon, including an option to pre-order. Feel free to reach out to Lynx at [email protected] with any questions or direct requests. If you're part of the community gardens and haven't gotten a chance to use your gift card yet, be sure to visit our donation inventory here and fill out this form to put in an order with us. We'll continue to have new varieties throughout the season, and are happy to take specific requests of plants not currently in our inventory. We look forward to growing with you this season! FEAST School Plant Sales Save the Date for the Herring Elementary Peace Garden Plant Sale! We will have a big plant sale on May 5 from 8-4, followed by a donation-based self-service sale with any remaining plants until all are gone. This year we are partnering with First Step Farms, as well as selling home-grown veggie and herb starts. All proceeds will go towards the FEAST Program and Peace Garden at Lucy S Herring Elementary School. Hot Springs Elementary FEAST Garden   We are so glad to support FEAST programming in Madison County! It's exciting to see cooking and gardening education happening. This photo is from their first workday of the growing season, and the community support is obvious! This project is funded by the Community Foundation of WNC, Human Services Grant Progam.
You spoke and we listened. After years of planning and community assessments the Bountiful Cities Apprenticeship Program launched March 14th of this year with three apprentices. For this pilot year we are focusing on hammering out the curriculum and gathering our instructors as well as the sites that the apprentices will visit to gain those hands-on experiences and skills.
Apprentices started the year attending the Come to the Table Conference hosted by Rural Advancement Foundation International. That opened up some good discussion on the ideas of “Land Hunger,” food security, and the USDA’s hand in how food systems function. Land Hunger was a term used to describe the drive freedmen had to acquire land that they had heretofore been barred from. They would squat on the land and take any means necessary to acquire it. Land is integral to growing food. Access to land is one of the number one barriers that new emerging farmers continue to face. It is how wealth has been built in the country for generations. Land is also how we determine rights, voting, and the like via districting. And with more and more farm land being developed and turned into subdivisions, farmers and those who want a secure food future are becoming more land hungry. This brings us to the idea of Food Security. One speaker defined food security as, “All people, at all times, having physical and economic access to sufficient, safe and nutritious food that meets their dietary needs and food preference for an active and healthy lifestyle.” This is a very in depth concept of the term and brings into question how many individuals can truly say they are food secure? With this definition of food security the numbers for food insecurity are staggering. The apprenticeship program is designed to help foster more food security in our community not only by giving community members the skills needed to grow food in their areas, but also to share these skills throughout the community. Finally, the USDA is shaping our food systems through subsidies for certain crops. But they also provide grants and insurance for farmers. It is a very complicated and complex issue and is too much to get into right now. Hopefully, with our apprentices learning about these complex systems they can help envision ideas for change in the future. If you are a community member or organization involved in food systems and would like to share what you do with our apprentices, please reach out to [email protected] |
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