greening & educational gardening
Through our greening and gardening program we improve the quality of learning, knowledge of nutrition, the environment, and horticultural practices of students.
The program consists of planting trees that will serve as live fences and canopies that provide shade for both indoor and outdoor classrooms. It also includes planting and maintaining organic vegetable gardens and fruit orchards in otherwise open spaces at each school. Not only are students learning hands-on agricultural practices and gaining nutritional knowledge, but also, experiential learning approaches are designed to integrate various aspects related to the gardens into a wide range of course curricula. The programs provide work for students and the resulting produce provides income for the school and local families. Support by way of providing seeds, seedlings, expertise, water tanks, irrigation equipment, farm implements and gardeners have been provided by Bahir Dar University, ISEE-urk, a Dutch NGO, and Compassionate Eye Foundation.
Despite water shortages, high cost of diesel and technical challenges to operate pumps and the absence of an expert to lead it, the greening and gardening program is providing children with opportunities to learn the classroom curriculum in hands-on manner, learn improved farming practices and improve their knowledge of nutrition while generating income to the school. We are delighted that some are now generating income from fruits and vegetables they are growing, and students are expanding their knowledge through working in, and tending to, the gardens. Our Monitoring and Evaluation Expert is also helping to develop curricula that will incorporate the agricultural program into various class lessons. The program and students are proving to be agents of change as other schools and surrounding communities are adopting our model. As an example, one farmer living next to Sebatamit Elementary School has switched from growing qat (similar to marijuana) to fruits and vegetables.
