Growing Great Gardens of Southland Schools
Growing Great Gardens! That's what it's all about and teaching school aged children about sustainability and how to grow great vegetable gardens is a valuable lesson to be learnt early on.
If children learn about recycling, how vegetables are produced and how tasty they are, it sets them up with a good knowledge of 'paddock to plate', not just 'packet to plate' ! The Southern Artisan Christmas Fête is passionate about sustainability and feeding young minds with the right information about where their food comes from. Your school can now be part of this too - the fête has grants to give away to schools within the Southland region to be used towards setting up vegetables gardens and recycling programs at school. It's an initial step to creating a program that can grow through additional sponsorship and support to schools, in the hope that the skills and experiences learned in the school environment will carry over into the students home and everyday life. Download the application form HERE. To apply for a grant... To apply for one of the 'Growing Great Gardens' grants from the fete, please download the application form as above which then involves submitting a small application of how you would propose to use the grant and details of any vegetable gardens or recycling programs currently in place at your school. The fête is proud to announce that the first two grants have been gifted from the fete to Lumsden Primary School and Te Anau Primary School. These two schools have already made a fantastic start towards sustainability in their school with vegetables gardens and recycling programs underway. With the money from their grants, they are expanding and improving their current systems and will be able to make their fantastic ideas a reality - Lumsden Primary School have put in a green house for seedlings to be planted out into their gardens. A Big Thanks to our Sponsors![]() Growing Great Gardens is proud to have two generous sponsors who have come on board to this fantastic project. Garden Gloves from Geraldine have donated a hand weeder and a bottle top sprinkler to each child involved in the Garden Clubs at each school involved in the program. Te Anau Primary School has 100 children involved and Lumsden Primary School has 52 involved between their Green Teams and Gardening Clubs.
Plants Direct are donating vegetable and herb packs this year for the children to plant out at school - planting is going to happen in early October so that the plants are ready to harvest and eat before the Christmas break. A big thank you to Garden Gloves and Plants Direct for this fantastic donation and initiative to get children growing in the garden! If you would like your business to be involved in sponsorship of Growing Great Gardens, then please contact Jane and we can really get this project going! Check them out our sponsors online at www.garden-gloves.co.nz and www.plantsdirect.co.nz. |