Rutgers Master Gardeners of Monmouth County - School Programs Committee

Rutgers Master Gardeners are volunteers trained and certified by Rutgers Cooperative Extension to provide educational programs and activities in support of environmentally responsible gardening.  The group is dedicated to education, outreach, and suport.

School Programs Description

     The School Programs Committee is the branch of the Monmouth County master Gardeners that supports school gardens.  We field requests made by schools and meet with each to look at their site, hear what they want to accomplish, make suggestions for how they can proceed, and guide them on their journey.  We also give them Rutgers Fact Sheets with information on a variety of gardening topics.

     In addition, we send the schools several resources electronically, which include how to start a school garden, many grant opportunities, Doug Fisher's (New Jersey Secretary of Agriculture)article about using school garden produce in the lunchroom, and a variety of other very useful articles and links.

     When requested, we bring lessons ad activities to classrooms, after school garden clubs, and other school venues.

     This year we are holding our third annual School Garden Conference.  The morning consists of whole group, general interest presentations.  During the afternoon, attendees walk around the building visiting a variety of tables with Master Gardener demonstrations, outside agencies and organizations with gardening and environmental education displays, make-and-take tables, and networking with other attendees.  As organizer (Pat Eisemann) of this conference, I envision having our representatives that attend the Edible Schoolyard training this year to be presenters at our conference next year.  We attract 50-60 educators to the conference annually.

     The Monmouth County Master Gardeners School Programs Committee is very excited about reaping the benefits of having our representatives who attend the Edible Schoolyard workshop bring back the knowledge, tools and experience to help schools become part of this initiative.  This will be an incredible facet of our committee.  There are almost 40 county school gardens that we are currently working with, representing a huge potential to reach many schools, educators and students.

     We anticipate this initiative to grow outside our county as we turnkey the information gleaned from ESY training to support programs one school at a time.

     We have found an excellent place to begin this process.  We were approached recently by the president of the Matawan/Aberdeen School District's Parents of Special People Inc.  They are a parent run 501 (c)3 special needs children's charity in the Matawan/Aberdeen area.  They are looking to do exactly what your program offers and asked for help as to where to begin and how to go about it.  Their plan is to begin the project with the middle school by starting their gardens this Spring and include the high school in the next year or two.

Their website is http://www.parentsof specialpeopleinc.com

The school district website can be found at http://www.marsd.org