Vantage garden ‘classroom’ for students

DAVE MOSIER/independent editor

Although Vantage Career Center’s community garden project is just starting to bear fruit — well, actually vegetables (lots of vegetables) — the garden spent more than a year in the planning stage.

“Technically, the kids that really started this are no longer here,” said intervention specialist Susan Farr, who has been involved in the project from the beginning. “But it’s kind of neat for them to come back and see what has happened in just one year.”

Farr said students from many different Vantage programs were involved in the project.

“We had a group of students from Interactive Media draw up a blueprint for us; we had Construction Equipment, Auto Body, and Ag students all help with designing, building … then I had about 20 academic students work on a garden layout and how to plant it. This has been a total schoolwide project.”

The garden began with approval by the Vantage administration in the spring of 2018. After it was approved, students began looking for grant opportunities and were able to secure $4,500 in grants to help pay for the project.

Students then talked to lab and academic instructors to find ways to incorporate the project into the school curriculum.

Farr noted that students now learn the science of how produce grows in the garden, as well as the history of community gardens — from those of Colonial America to the Victory gardens of World War II — while math students help calculate the percentages of germination of garden seeds and plants, and English students write essays about the garden.

“We’ve found a way that this would really work in every curriculum,” Farr said.

Two senior Construction Equipment Technology seniors, Brendan Karl of Van Wert and Drake Sanders of Wayne Trace, noted that they began constructing wooden garden boxes at the end of their junior year. The students said it took about two months to construct the boxes, although there were some delays, including waiting for wood to arrive, as well as the need to double-check their measurements. Both students said they made sure to “measure twice and cut once” as their instructors had taught them to ensure the beds’ dimensions were correct.

When the boxes were completed, students placed rocks in the bottom of them for aeration and added soil over that in preparation for planting. After the garden was planted this past spring, Vantage students and staff and 4-H club volunteers maintained the garden over the summer.

So far, approximately 420 pounds of food has been harvested and will be donated to food pantries in Vantage’s four-county district. Farr said the garden includes tomatoes, sweet corn, cucumbers, pumpkins and squash, peppers, zucchini, and green beans.

The intervention specialist added that the garden has been a learning experience for all of the students involved.

“Not only are the students learning some life skills of something they can do for themselves, but they are able to give back to the community,” Farr said. “The intent is to take a couple of students with me when we go to the food pantry, and they can show us how that process works, how it is helping people, and how their community is being served by (the garden).”