Studying their greens, and eating them too

In Loyola School, Bannerghatta road, students maintain their own terrace garden. Produce from the garden goes into the school's mid-day meals

It started with an idea – how practical it would be if we could get schools to grow their own gardens. It would not only give children a hands-on experience with organic gardening, pests and plants, but also enable them to enjoy the produce in their mid-day meals.

Loyola school teachers at the terrace garden. Pic: S Laxminarayan

I discussed this idea with our mentor Dr B N Vishwanath and fellow members of the Garden City Farmers Trust, an NGO working to spread awareness on organic urban farming. We got an immediate thumbs up. Then began my search for funds; I wrote a proposal for a grant. Thanks to Johnson Controls, an MNC with office in Indiranagar – a special thanks to one of its Directors Subramani Varadaraj – what started off as a dream was about to become real.

I then approached Fr Henry Saldanha, Principal of Loyola School, Bannerghatta road. I had been interacting with him for a while as I was teaching Ultimate Frisbee to the school children. He welcomed the proposal without a second thought. A group was formed in the school soon after, mainly of students from 8th and 9th standards, guided by Botany teacher Kanthraj C R, Br Norwin Antony Perira and Sports teacher Jeevarathna E. The team called itself the Eco Club. Dr Vishwanath facilitated a short training for the club on gardening.

On 3rd September 2010, Eco Club members set up the terrace garden with help from GCFT. We set up 15 garden boxes with a variety of plants like dhantu (amaranthus), sabbakki (sago), kothambari (coriander), bhindi (lady’s finger), radish, brinjal and tomato.

In just over 25 days we had our first harvest. We harvested close to 3 kg of dhantu and arave which was used, as originally intended, in mid-day meals. Children enjoy the experience and maintain the garden themselves, with guidance from teachers. Three more garden boxes have been added now. It gives an immense sense of pride, satisfaction and hope.

We look forward to replicating this in other schools as well.

Comments:

  1. Geetha Cariappa says:

    please let me know i how to take the class for the TERRACE GARDEN where &and when the class will be condacted please update me

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Similar Story

Local body polls in Anna Nagar, Zone 8: Wards, candidates and issues

A useful compiler for residents of Zone 8, comprised of areas such as Anna Nagar and Shenoy Nagar as they get set to vote on February 19th.

Zone Snapshot: Wards- 94, 95, 96, 97, 98, 99, 100, 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 106, 107, 108 Population- 757273 (2013) Polling Stations- 572 To locate your polling station – https://tnsec.tn.nic.in/tn_election_urban2021/find_your_polling_station.php To locate your ward and zone – https://chennaicorporation.gov.in/gcc/citizen-details/location-service/find_zone.jsp Issues in the Zone: In January of 2021, the waste collection in 11 out of 15 zones were handed over to private companies. Zone 8, was one of the zones where a waste collection contract was handed to Ramky Enviro Engineers (a private envrionmetal services company). The company absorbed around a 100 workers, and the rest (who were employed under the…

Similar Story

Local body polls in Adyar, Zone 13 : Wards, candidates and issues

A useful compiler for residents of Zone 13, comprised of areas such as Adyar, Thiruvanmiyur and Velachery, as they get set to vote on February 19th.

Zone snapshot Wards -170, 171, 172, 173, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178, 179, 180, 181, 182 Population - 490767 (2013) Number of polling stations - 471 To locate your polling station - https://tnsec.tn.nic.in/tn_election_urban2021/find_your_polling_station.php To locate your ward and zone - https://chennaicorporation.gov.in/gcc/citizen-details/location-service/find_zone.jsp Issues in the zone: Traffic congestion at Madhya Kailash Junction is a key issue that affects commuters. Those looking to travel to the airport or southern parts of the city face long hours of commute during peak hours in the area due to traffic jams. Overflowing sewage and old sewage pipes are an issue in Adyar. The old pipes leak…