KCUYC Youth Share Gardening with the Wider KC Community

by Nicole Morrow, Healthy Choices Program Coordinator

    
Late in the spring of 2009, students from the KC Urban Youth Center were asked to help plant a garden at the Church of the Nazarene in Cameron, Missouri. One of the students asked, "Why did they ask us? We don't know very much about gardening. Isn't there anyone else that knows more?" They soon realized that they know much more than they thought they knew. Just two years of gardening has given them a wealth of knowledge and experience.

In addition, KCUYC students were able to share more of this knowledge at several events during the Urban Farm and Garden Tour. On June 26th, they joined students from Benjamin Banneker School to speak at the Central Library youth night about their experiences with gardening. They were able to share how our garden project grew out of a passion to provide produce to families in their neighborhoods and were able to give practical advice to other students interested in starting a garden. In addition, on June 28, the KC Urban Youth Center was a

  
featured garden on Kansas City's Urban Farm and Garden Tour. During this tour over 800 people stopped at the 30 featured farms and gardens across the Kansas City area. Students and staff from the KC Urban Youth Center were able to share about the crops we were growing and thanks to students from Rockhurst University partnered with the Youth Center providing all participants with nutritional information about every vegetable planted in the garden.



For more information about how to connect to our gardening program, contact Nicole Morrow at nicole@kcurbanyouthcenter.org