Free Community Education
Community education is promoted in three ways: signage, workshops, and individual one-on-one mentoring and instruction. The nursery’s signage is created from a constantly growing database with more than 600 entries and gives in depth information on plant origin, use and care. This is essential to efforts to introduce or reintroduce useful but often little known species of edible and medicinal plants.
In addition to the signage, however, the nursery serves as a community gardening lab room or workshop facility. On any given day, there are individuals waiting patiently for a chance to query the two Directors regarding proper planting and care of a variety of a plant or even their entire garden. During fiscal year ’07 our capacity building efforts will include developing an outcome based data collection method that will allow us to track and record the exact numbers of individuals who receive gardening and nutrition education through one-on-one queries of our nursery and farm staff members.
Finally, Spiral Gardens has long been recognized as a valuable educational resource for schools, youth organizations, and other groups and organizations. The agency serves as a field trip and host site for at risk youth sponsored by the Berkeley Health Department Chronic Disease Prevention Program. As part of this program, the young participants received hands-on education and experience on the farm and in the nursery and were each able to take home plants to grow.Although the Outdoor Community Classroom saw no major changes this year, the donation of a commercial quality stainless steel sink and counter will allow us to move forward next year with a wash-and-weigh station for the harvest and for simple food preparation for classes.
This year the majority of our educational activities were in one-on-one interactions with community members or through small hands-on gardening and work parties. The increased visibility and productivity of the nursery, produce stand and farm brought in hundreds of people seeking advice on the everything to do with gardening in the Bay Area, from first time gardeners to experienced landscapers. Volunteers-many of who had little or no experience- were able to receive hands-on education in plant care from propagation to harvest. We also strengthened our connection to school and community gardens in both Oakland and Berkeley (and other cities), through advice and access to plants, and field trip opportunities for teachers. Over a dozen organized classes and recreation programs for adults and kids included Spiral Gardens as an integral part of their program this year. We were also able to support the efforts of other community organizations through shared tools and equipment (Aquatic Park EGRET) and donation of plants (Friends of Five Creeks, the Oakland Museum, Berkeley Multi-Agency Service Center). Volunteers also participated in educational community events throughout the Bay Area, many of which focused on gardening for butterflies.
2838 Sacramento St., Berkeley, CA 94702 510-843-1307 510-843-1800 fax
