On Thursday, February 23, 2023, 24 middle schoolers from the Rainard School for Gifted Students in the Memorial neighborhood came to do a “Day of Service” at the WCG.
The students were very motivated to work. They first had a hands-on short class on herbs conducted by Julie Fordes.
The students were then divided into groups assigned to different tasks.
Those working in the composting area, pooled together the mature compost, and filled buckets to distribute to gardeners. They also incorporated kitchen waste to the intermediate compost and flipped the whole bin, and emptied space to start a new pile. These activities were performed paying attention to safety under Betina Wolfowicz’s supervision.
Kat Elder led several groups of students. She taught them how to identify wanted native plants from unwanted weeds in the pollination and Apiary gardens. She also modeled how to remove an unwanted plant by its roots. They then proceeded to weed, remove dead plants, and dispose of them in the dumpster.
With Steve Goldberg the students created pots for Bluebonnets and cleared an aisle of weeds between two beds.
Mike Blaha helped to reorganize a central area of the garden and water winter vegetables growing there. Julie Fordes directed cleaning and storing of the tools.
There was one hour dedicated to lunch and break during their 5-hour visit to the Garden.
The students were very happy and manifested their desire to return and work with us again, without prompting!
Betina Wolfowicz & Steve Goldberg