Record Garden Grants Awarded as Outdoor Classrooms Become Essential During Covid-19

We are excited to announce the recipients of our 2020/2021 school year garden grant awards.

Staff training for incorporating garden based education with pre-K youth.

Due to an unprecedented number of grant applications and funding amount needs, we secured an additional $5,000 from partners to be able to distribute almost $15,000 to support 13 outdoor classroom and school garden projects in Central Oregon. Local educators see the importance of getting students out of doors for physical, mental, emotional, social and academic health through this ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. In an effort to support as many students as possible, some projects have been fully funded, some partial, impacting over 1,500 youth.

2021 School Garden Grant Recipients

• Buckingham Elementary School: New outdoor classroom space with native, pollinator, and mobile edible garden beds for use throughout the school.
• Deschutes Children’s Foundation: Materials and supplies for garden and staff training for Pre-K youth.
• Desert Sky Montessori: Outdoor circle garden bed and upcycled sensorial garden.
• Elk Meadow Elementary School: Milkweed plants and soil for pollinator garden.
• Powell Butte Community Charter School: Shade sails for established school garden outdoor classroom.
• REALMS Middle School: Covered cob oven outdoor classroom gathering space.
• R. E. Jewell Elementary School: Portable student outdoor seats and indoor seed starting and growing supplies.
• Sister High School Youth Transition Program: New outdoor school garden to accompany established greenhouse.
• Skyline High School: New outdoor container garden and classroom space.
• StepUp: Indoor seed starting supplies for community seed starting project.
• Waldorf School of Bend: Paver installation to create durable outdoor classroom in school garden.
• Warm Springs K-8 Academy/OSU Extension Warm Springs: Materials and supplies for pollinator garden and greenhouse growing.
• Wildheart Kindercamp: Materials and supplies for expanded garden area and programming.

Community Support

These garden grants would not be possible without the support of local and regional businesses and foundations. Thanks to support from:
Central Oregon Beekeeper Association
Central Oregon Health Council
Central Oregon Pediatric Associates
El Sancho
First Interstate Bank
Hawthorn Healing Arts Center, LLC
Mt. Bachelor
Oregon Farm to School & School Garden Network
Pacific Power Foundation
Pacific Source Health Plans
Peggy and Bob Fowler Fund of the Oregon Community Foundation
Saginaw Sunset
Savory Spice Shop
St. Charles Foundation
Whole Foods Market, Bend
If you would like to contribute to cover the remaining funds these school garden projects have requested, please email Denise!

A Garden for Every School

The Environmental Center’s Garden for Every School program exists to connect youth to nature through food. We do this through garden and food based education in the classroom, cafeteria, school gardens and farm field trips. We support youth organizations, schools and districts with annual garden grants and on-going technical assistance. We gather educators through our Garden Educator Network school garden tours and workshops. Finally, we ground truth our own learning here in our on-site school demonstration garden, the Kansas Avenue Learning Garden. Learn more at envirocenter.org/schoolgardens.