School projects have evolved as Shuksan Middle School and Birchwood elementry take on gardening for their school grounds
Birchwood elementary and Shukan middle school have newly became members and are a part of the Whatcom county school collectives which are a part of common thread farms. Whatcom collective is an organization that assists schools throughout the county on gardening projects.
Gardening on school grounds have already been put in efforts as committees of middle school students and parents at Shuksan have already started their first project, gardener educator, Tessa Bundy, who has been assigned to work with the Shuksan middle school project said, “We are going to start with small projects beginning with the design of SMS in the front of the school grounds”.
The project took the group of students and volunteers around three hours, Bundy said, “a lot of the time spent was the set up process of the formatting of soil and chips, the next two letters we apply will go by much faster”. The team of volunteer started their first work party on one of the projects earlier this month where the group worked from 9 a.m. to 12 p.m.
Homestead Habitat which is located in the Bellingham area assisted the group of volunteers on there first work party on creating the first “S” on Shuksan school grounds.
How Shuksan became apart of Whatcom Collectives
How Shuksan became a part of the collectives was by the efforts of a local parent, Bill Angle, who currently has a child attending shuksan middle school. Shuksan which was newly rebuilt this earlier this year doesn’t have much gardening done to the school that symbolizes the schools originality, students and parents want more a personalized spin on the grounds of Shuksan. Adrienne Battis, President of Birchwood Neighborhood Association, said, “I don’t know much about the project but I think what they are doing is great and will defiantly, make the schools look beautiful”.
Funds for the project
Funding for the project came from the Whatcom collectives in a loan based form. Other funds came from parent, teacher, and business donations. Angle said, “Efforts of how to pay back the loan that was collected from the Whatcom collectives will be discussed at the next work party on May 15th”. The committee has been working with the Cordata starbucks, which has been showing interest in funding the group for their future projects.
The company provided lunch for the group on their first work party that was held earlier this month. Other organizations that have helped supply the group with donations is the Growsource gardening company which helped supply materials for the project. Park services also helped with donation of materials for the project, they provided woodchips for the project from left over supplies that they had in stock.
Upcoming projects in store for Shuksan
Future projects have not been discussed yet but Bundy says the group is excited for the upcoming projects that they wish to think up. As of right now the group does not have set meeting dates due to the fact they just started this committee. They also don’t have a group of set people that will permanently be a part of the gardening project, Bundy said, “a lot of the people who have helped so far, were just volunteers that don’t know if they have time to be fully committed to the committee for the long run”.
The group is open to anyone who would love to join and become a part of the committee. The second meeting will be open to anyone who would like to join and learn more about the club.
Learn more about Whatcom Collectives at:
http://www.commonthreadsfarm.org/content/view/22/36/
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