Hawaii’s School Garden Programs: Planting Seeds of Sustainability
Most people are familiar with the Chinese proverb, “Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” Hawaii schools are showing just what is possible when we apply this idea to children and gardening.
With the help of the Kokua Hawaii Foundation’s ‘AINA In Schools program, schools like Sunset Beach Elementary and ‘Aikahi Elementary have experienced immediate successes and are envisioning a much brighter, healthier, and more sustainable future for our children and our islands. The Kokua Hawaii Foundation’s ‘AINA program focuses on three main goals: (1) addressing health issues through nutrition education and by encouraging healthy eating habits, (2) creating a sense of stewardship by connecting students to the land and sea, and (3) creating a market for local farmers.
While the concepts of school gardens and farmers’ markets are not new, community collaboration and grant support from the Kokua Hawaii Foundation have helped move market and gardening programs to the next level. At Sunset Beach Elementary School, what started out as a simple farmers market club sale with one table of donated, locally grown produce has grown into a full-fledged gardening and market program that includes a biweekly healthy snack, a weekly lunchtime fresh salad bar, and a school garden and orchard. The program is supported in part by local farmers and the Kokua Hawaii Foundation, and run completely by community volunteers and the students, faculty and staff of the school. In an interview with the Star Advertiser, Kokua’s school food coordinator, Dexter Kishida, expressed the significant connections the program is building, “The students have a heart connection to growing food and eating food. This is not about raising farmers. It’s about raising eaters who understand what it takes to get that (food) to the table”.
Nutrition education and training is also an important part of the program. At ‘Aikahi Elementary School, parents and community volunteers have had the opportunity to learn nutrition and gardening lessons from ‘AINA In Schools staff, lessons which they then pass on to the children. ‘Aikahi Elementary School also has a keen focus on waste reduction and have learned how to recycle with worms, further deepening their connection to the earth and the food we need to sustain us.
While ‘AINA In Schools is busy working with 12 schools on Oahu, The Hawaii Island School Garden Network (HISGN) is coordinating, collaborating, providing training, and implementing school gardening and agricultural programs on the Big Island. HISGN currently includes over 50 schools, all with the aim to create “hands-on living laboratories” where students, faculty, staff and community members come together to support local agriculture and to strengthen their connections with the land, the food, and with one another.
Through community-based, local food-focused programs such as ‘AINA and HISGN, participants are not only learning about gardening and nutrition, but they are without a doubt bringing us one step closer to sustainable living, one seed at a time.
