The Contra Costa UC Master Gardener volunteer Team works hand-in-hand with teachers, staff, and parents to create, improve, and beautify school gardens throughout Contra Costa County. Master Gardener volunteers play an important role in over forty elementary, intermediate, and high school gardens, plus a few associated after-school daycare centers. Does your school need assistance to pull together a beautiful and productive instructional learning garden? A butterfly or pollinator garden? Or how about just beautifying the entrance to the school office? The School Gardens Team can help!
Each participating school is assigned a UC Master Gardener volunteer to act as a conduit into our county program’s resources and expertise. We can assist your school's “champions” plan new or renovated gardens, advise your team about research-based best practices, or help design effective and efficient irrigation plans, planting bed placements, plant lists, pest control, and fun student project ideas. Your UC Master Gardener volunteer liaison has access to specialists in the program who can be called upon to help solve difficult issues. It’s like having your own free garden consultants at your fingertips to answer questions or help guide improvements.
Did you know that the Contra Costa UC Master Gardener volunteers School Gardens team has a budget? That means we can also donate to your effort small tools, hand gloves, bags of garden soil, irrigation control devices, seedlings, or other small items that you may need.
As a recent example of working with School Gardens, the Oakley Elementary School District had four different school projects this past spring. UC Master Gardeners worked in a collaborative effort with faculty, parents, and students at both Laurel and Oakley Elementary Schools to enhance several set-aside spaces into thriving vegetable gardens where students can plant, maintain, and harvest fresh veggies, all the while learning about nature’s rhythms, needs, and challenges.
At Vintage Parkway and O’Hara Park Middle School, revitalizations of pre-existing gardens were needed. During the COVID pandemic school closures, many school gardens fell into disrepair from a lack of attention. “The O’Hara Park garden had many dead plants, lots of weeds, and a torn-up greenhouse,” says UC Master Gardener volunteer and East County Co-lead Amanda Merrill, “As we looked around, we saw that there were still some irrigation lines, a few rescueable plants, and the intact frame of the greenhouse.” They now have a fully restored student garden, thanks to the planning and hard work of all team members.
And at Delta Vista Middle School, a team of students and parent volunteers, with input from UC Master Gardener volunteers, implemented a new Butterfly Attracting Garden. The soil was a real challenge, heavily compacted and dry as a bone under landscape cloth. Students and parent volunteers pulled back most of the cloth, then heavily watered it before amending, planting, and mulching.
Summer Lake Elementary has two new garden spaces—one for the whole school to enjoy and another created just for the kindergarteners. Amanda has consulted with both groups, and both gardens have been grateful recipients of seedlings and seeds from the UC Master Gardener Program. The students and staff were very excited about their first crop of tomatoes this summer.
Students were thrilled to see the first butterflies visit in the spring. They created colorful signs and a beautiful Thank You poster for the UC Master Gardener Program. Plus, it was an effort where the whole community could come together. Amanda Merrill says, “It was a long time in the works, cutting through red tape and acquiring private donations, but Cristina Langley, a teacher, and her Girl Scout troop were able to realize their goal. Brentwood Home Depot donated plants, soil, mulch, and labor as part of their giving back to the community program.”
The three beautiful and heartfelt posters that Oakley School District students created to thank UC Master Gardener volunteers for our part are now adorning the wall of our “Central Command” for the whole program, the Help Desk office in the Contra Costa County Department of Agriculture building in Concord. Email the Help Desk for assistance with your school garden project at: Help@ccmg.ucanr.edu.