Growing Together
“Growing Together – Bay Area” is a 501C3 tax-exempt non-profit 843 East Meadow Avenue Pinole CA 94564 www.growingtogetherproject.org School-based Garden/Nutrition Education Programs -
Bayview ES and Dover ES
Project Narrative
1. Letter of Interest (Maximum 500 words): Describe applicant’s interest, qualifications and experience with similar projects and working with municipalities in the capacity sought for this project.
Founded in 2013, Growing Together works to create a living future, focusing on the children of our communities - deepening their personal connection to the living world around us, and to the living systems that sustain us. Cultivating long-term collaborative relationships with local schools, our organization develops innovative teacher-, family-, and neighborhood-centered programs that align with the goals of their various stakeholders, resulting in tangible improvements to health, sustainability, and equity.
We partner directly with 3 East Bay school districts and 30 Title 1 public schools, focusing on three program areas:
1. Greening school campuses, and establishing hands-on garden/nutrition education programs
2. Improving student & family access to farm-fresh foods through production, distribution, promotion, and education.
3. Planting trees on school campuses and in surrounding neighborhoods Our 15 program directors include both long-time local leaders and former student-interns, representing over 200 years of combined experience successfully developing and operating these programs. By interweaving our strategies with networks of trusted relationships within neighborhood schools, we are able to achieve unparalleled cost-efficiency and effectiveness.
Beginning our work in West Contra Unified Schools (WCCUSD) in 2019, Growing Together has made substantial progress towards one of our primary organizational goals - permanently establishing garden/nutrition education programs throughout WCCUSD Title 1 schools, which provide every student with regular opportunities to grow, harvest, and prepare fresh fruits and vegetables.
From our experience, the initial steps on the path to a sustained school-wide program involve laying the foundation for growth, which is composed of three main elements: 1) Infrastructure - the garden facility and its tools/supplies/materials; 2) Stewardship - a group that holds responsibility for the ongoing maintenance of the garden; 3) Instruction - the ongoing use of the garden by during-school teachers in alignment with their instructional goals. Once these foundational elements are established, the program can grow to have school-wide impact, and then become integrated into the school’s site plan and budget. Our universal experience is that for this development process to take place and reach a stage of “sustainability”, the essential ingredients are: 1) a small group of stakeholders who are embedded in the school community and are deeply committed to the program vision; 2) a partner organization whose expertise is in working with schools to develop this specific program area.
In WCCUSD, we first identify interested stakeholders in each school community, and then work with them to develop and implement a vision for their garden/nutrition program. In doing so, we have employed a set of proven strategies, carefully designed to build the basic foundational elements through a collaborative process. Four years later, we have made significant progress:
1) 75% of WCCUSD Title 1 schools have an edible garden of sufficient size for regular use by multiple student groups, stocked with the needed tools/supplies; 2) 100% of these schools now have groups of students regularly stewarding their garden, with direct support for their staff to lead hands-on lessons from our specialist instructors; 3) 20% of these schools have subject- aligned, during-school garden/nutrition education programs involving all students.
2. Approach, Management, and Evaluation Plan (Maximum 500 words): Describe in detail the projected qualitative and quantitative outcomes of their proposed project. Describe applicant’s internal capacity to implement and evaluate proposed services, including how the applicant plans to record, submit, and report on measurable outcome data, both during the proposed program, and at the conclusion of services. Applicant should also discuss how it intends to comply with the San Pablo Local Economic Opportunity Policy.
Over the next year, our goal is to fully establish school-wide garden/nutrition education programs at two Title 1 WCCUSD schools located in San Pablo (Bayview ES and Dover ES), each of which we have partnered with for the past two years to 1) develop a basic garden or revitalize & expand an existing garden, and 2) offer regular activities as part of their after-school program. We have prioritized these particular school communities because each has a committed and engaged group of stakeholders (including the support of the principal), as well as a demonstrated need for this program area, based on access to healthy food and safe open space.
Our experience, without exception, is that carrying out a high-quality pilot program - using standards-aligned, grade-level appropriate lessons taught by an experienced specialist - generates an extremely high level of support for expanding the program into garden/nutrition classes offered to all teachers on a regular basis, throughout the school year. In WCCUSD, at each of the 5 schools where we carried out school-wide pilots over the past 3 years, 100% of teachers signed up for biweekly classes the following year, and the school made a significant financial commitment (15K+) to support this level of programming. In addition to developing the “instruction” element, we will expand each garden’s infrastructure to support school-wide programming, as they are currently set up for use only by after-school groups (i.e., 6-8 raised beds, with a few seating benches).
An experienced garden/nutrition Program Specialist from Growing Together, who already works developing these programs across WCCUSD Title 1 schools (including leading weekly after- school programming at Bayview and Dover), will carry out all aspects of the work to ensure we achieve all measurable outcomes (described in section 4), and will collaborate with the Growing Together Co-Director to carry out a complete evaluation. To evaluate our achievement of the outcomes, including whether these efforts were successful in reaching our goal of program establishment, we will use these metrics:
1. Teachers’ attendance rolls and programs logs - demonstrating number of students and the frequency of classes
2. Teachers’ end of year survey - 75% of participants answer a series of questions describing how the program benefited their students, & their level of interest in taking part in a bi-weekly garden/nutrition education program in the next school year
3. Students’ end of program survey - 75% of participants in grade levels 4-5 describe how participating in the classes impacted them (interest in consuming fresh fruits & vegetables, and engaging in hands-on outdoor activities), and describe their level of interest in a bi-weekly program next year
4. Sustained administrative support - our goal is that in the following school year, site/district administrators will contribute the cost of continuing the program, from their own budgets.
Please see the table below for a summary of the measurable outcomes and metrics described above.
For any staffing needs, we will outreach to San Pablo residents through announcements distributed to the San Pablo EDC, and through schools’ parent and community outreach systems. None of the project will be contracted out.
Datapoint Proposed Number
# of days of classes 8 classes for 16 K-5 classrooms, at 2 school sites = TOTAL 256 classes.
(800 UNDUPLICATED PARTICIPANTS)
# of events 24 hands-on stewardship activities for 3 after- school classes, at 2 school sites= TOTAL 144
classes
(180 UNDUPLICATED PARTICIPANTS)
# of events 5 teacher trainings at 2 schools
TOTAL = 10 events
(30 UNDUPLICATED PARTICIPANTS)
% of student participants (4-5 grades)
reporting increased interest in consuming
fresh fruits/vegetables
90%
% of student and teacher participants
reporting increased interest in garden/nutrition
education classes
90%
# of schools committing to support of
programming in the next school year
2 (100%)
3. Project Experience (Maximum 500 words): Describe similar projects completed or in progress by applicant. Proposals for school-based services should describe previous experience working in San Pablo or other West Contra Costa Unified schools, if applicable.
Over a 15-year period from 2003 to 2018, Growing Together’s Co-Director was a leader in the development of Oakland Unified School District’s (OUSD) garden/nutrition education programs, first as the Program Coordinator of a CBO-led initiative (with OUSD and the county health department), and later as OUSD’s Garden/Nutrition Program Coordinator. During this time, he facilitated a dramatic growth in this program area as the number of school-wide garden/nutrition education programs in Title 1 schools rose from 2 to 25, the number of students regularly participating in hands-on lessons rose from 1,100 to 9,500, and the percentage of abandoned gardens dropped from 75% to 0%, while 18 new school gardens were built at schools that previously had no usable facility.
Beginning a partnership with WCCUSD in 2019, Growing Together has led a similarly successful initiative over the last 4 years with the following accomplishments:
• Building school gardens in 14 Title 1 schools (Pinole Middle, Stewart, Chavez, Helms, Dejean, King, Stege, Bayview, Highland, Montalvin, Riverside, Sheldon, Soskin, Vista, Murphy - none previously had gardens), and providing major repairs/restorations and establishing new programming at another 7.
• Starting two 1-acre production farms (at Soskin MS and Vista High) with paid internships and career technical education (CTE) courses - providing fresh ingredients for new scratch-cooked Nutrition Services lunch menus
• At five schools (Washington, Peres, King, Soskin, Lupine Hills), operating whole-school education programs, which offer every student hands-on bi-weekly garden/nutrition classes - a total of 2,100 students
• Leading a professional learning network which helped 22 Title 1 schools develop garden/nutrition programs (total participation - 1,200 additional students) by providing an array of specialized support services - design/installation, maintenance, supplies/materials, tools, grade-level standards-aligned curriculum, group trainings, and one-to-one mentoring/direct support for program staff.
• Developing the Farms to Communities program, which substantially increases families’ consumption of fresh fruits and vegetables by selling high quality, culturally appropriate produce sourced from regional farms to hundreds of low-income students’ households each week, at highly affordable prices.
Growing Together partners closely with stakeholder-champions of the garden/nutrition program area at nearly all Title 1 schools in WCCUSD, and collaborates regularly with principals at various school sites as well as with the leaders of Buildings and Grounds, Facilities, Extended Learning/Community Services, and Nutrition Services departments. In the 2023-4 school year, Growing Together will be expanding production farming and career training models to multiple WCCUSD sites, and supplying product to Nutrition Services’ scratch-cooked menus (“Plate it Up”), as well as to low-income families through Farms to Communities. Finally, Growing Together will be working in partnership with WCCUSD Nutrition Services to expand district-wide garden/nutrition education pilot programs, delivering hands-on lessons (promoting fresh foods from gardens, and farm-to-table menus) at multiple schools across the district. We will be supplementing introductory lessons with teacher professional development, including training workshops that use our NGSS (Next Generation Science Standards) curriculum and expert technical assistance, with the goal of facilitating the regular use of school gardens for teaching hands-on lessons.
4. Scope of Services (Maximum 1500 words): Describe in detail the proposed services including: (1) number of total projected unduplicated clients, number of projected unduplicated clients who are San Pablo residents (if different from the total number, and categorized by age range as outlined below); (2) projected dosage of services (dosage is defined as number of participation hours for unduplicated clients; may vary depending on activities proposed); and (3) schedules and timelines as appropriate (see Example Table below); If services are co-located in a school, include how proposed services align and specifically support that school community’s goals.
During the 2023-4 school year (August 2023 to June 2024), through the funding proposed, we intend to achieve the following measurable outcomes, by developing and operating garden/education programs in the two focus schools (Bayview Elementary and Dover Elementary):
1. Construction of a learning garden of adequate size and scope to support regular use by all of the school’s K-5 teachers & after school staff, with their students
1. Procurement of all tools, supplies, and materials needed to support both during-school classes and after-school hands-on stewardship activities on an ongoing basis
2. Leading a set of eight introductory during-school hands-on garden/nutrition classes with all of each school’s 16 K-5 classrooms, a total of 800 unduplicated student participants
3. Leading weekly after-school hands-on stewardship activities (planting, harvesting, cooking, etc.), a total of 180 unduplicated student participants
4. Leading 5 total professional development workshops for during-school teachers and after-school staff, supplemented by technical assistance and one-to-one mentoring - a total of 30 adult participants.
At both schools, for the past two years, garden/nutrition education has been taking place on a regular (weekly) basis, through the array of support provided by Growing Together, working with stakeholders at each school. This support has included: 1) building school garden infrastructure (Bayview), or restoring and expanding an existing garden (Dover); 2) providing tools, materials, garden/nutrition education supplies (such as cooking and planting kits), and garden stewardship supplies (such as compost, mulch, seeds, etc.); 3) providing regular maintenance support such as installing irrigation, amending planting beds, removing weeds, etc; 4) providing group trainings 1-3 times per semester for the after-school site director and line staff, with demonstrations of hands-on lessons, as well as one-to-one site consultations whenever needed; 5) beginning this Spring, providing a specialist instructor once per week, who co-leads hands-on activities alongside the after-school director and staff. Working closely with the school stakeholders and having a popular, successful program has led to growing teacher interest, and a high level of administrator (principal) & community schools manager support for developing and expanding this program area to reach more students. Both schools have expressed that the garden/nutrition program area is in alignment with goals articulated in their school site plan, including student health/wellness, engagement of in-need students, engagement of English learners, and STEM proficiency. In addition, WCCUSD’s Extended Learning department has been a consistent supporter of providing garden/nutrition education as a regular offering for all of its Title 1 partner sites, collaborating with Growing Together to organize the Garden “Professional Learning Community”, which has grown from 8 program participants in 2020 to 20 this school year.
If Growing Together is awarded funding, in July/August of this year, our Program Specialist and Co-Director will meet with the principals at both sites to plan outreach to teachers and other stakeholders, create a master program schedule, plan professional development sessions, and arrange the use of space that will be used for programming. In August, when teachers return from break, the Program Specialist will take part in before-school teacher planning sessions, and make a presentation at the main staff gathering, to introduce the program and facilitate their sign-ups in the master schedule. In addition, The Specialist will prepare the garden area for full programming (expanding planting and seating space, as necessary), and procure all the supplies, tools, and materials which will be needed for teaching and garden stewardship.
Throughout the Fall semester, the Specialist will teach a series of 8 hands-on garden/nutrition lessons of 60-75 minutes each at one of the partner schools (TBD) through a bi-weekly (A- week, B-week) class schedule, using a standards-aligned curriculum specially designed for giving a basic introduction to students and teachers of all grade levels who are new to this program area. In addition, once per week, the Specialist will work with the after-school program director and staff to provide a hands-on activity - in garden stewardship or cooking - for three student groups, for 60-75 minutes each. During-school teachers and after school staff will be active participants in the delivery of lessons, and the Specialist will develop a collaborative relationship with the goal of encouraging teacher leadership and ownership in this program area. Once per semester, the Specialist will lead professional development workshops for
during-school K-5 teachers, with the goal of facilitating their use of the garden for teaching outdoors, at times outside of the program. These hands-on group training sessions will include demonstrations of lessons in our teacher-friendly curriculum, outdoor classroom management strategies, alignment with standards and other curriculum such as FOSS, and other tools designed to support ongoing use of the garden for various subject areas. This strategy will lead to increased teacher buy-in and increased time for students doing program-related activities, while supporting long-term program sustainability. At the conclusion of the 16-week semester period, the Specialist will carry out the surveys and gather the other information needed to evaluate the program’s achievement of its intended measurable outcomes (see chart in section 2). In the following semester (Spring 2024), the Specialist will repeat all of these activities at the second school.
The table below describes the proposed scope of services:
Clients
type
# of
unduplicated
clients, total
# of
unduplicated
clients, San
Pablo residents
# of
average
dosage
hours, per
client
Brief description and
proposed schedule
Grades K-5 800 800 8 Hands-on garden/nutrition
classes for K-5 students,
bi-weekly during Fall or
Spring semester (during-
school)
Grades K-5 180 180 12 Hands-on stewardship and
cooking activities for K-5
students, weekly during
Fall or Spring semester
(after-school participants)
Teachers -
K-5
classroom
25 unknown 2 Hands-on training and
mentorship - leading
hands-on classes w their
students, once per
semester
Teachers -
after-school
staff
5 unknown 20 Hands-on training and
mentorship - leading
hands-on classes w their
students, each week +
group training
once/semester
From our experience, achieving the measurable outcomes outlined in this proposal will result in successfully completing a critical stage in each school’s program development pathway:
growing from a basic, emerging program which has a high level of interest but a limited capacity to serve students school-wide, to a fully established program in which all students have the opportunity to take part in hands-on garden education lessons, as part of their instructional program, supported by the school’s stakeholders and funded by the school’s administration.
As a result, after programming is completed next year, we expect that students at both schools will show a dramatically increased interest in growing, harvesting, preparing, and consuming fresh fruits and vegetables on a regular basis. In addition, teachers will show a dramatically increased level of interest in incorporating this area of programming into their regular practices, and school administration and other key stakeholders will provide the foundational support needed for the program to take place on an ongoing basis.
At Growing Together, we are deeply grateful to the City of San Pablo for considering our proposal to provide these services, for which we are uniquely positioned due to our extensive organizational experience in this specific program area, as well as our track record of developing supportive relationships with WCCUSD schools.
Finally, below is some of the direct feedback shared by some of after-school program directors who have taken part in our professional development and technical support program, in the past 2 years:
“I was able to integrate themes of socio-emotional learning, nutrition art, math and science with observing the garden grow. Our students asked incredible questions and had very powerful connections. Garden time was a time where they were always engaged and looked forward to.
They were excited to try new vegetables that they themselves grew. These are powerful, lifelong connections in self-care that they can bring back to their families and community”
“The students always talked emphatically about the food that they prepared, it may be in glowing terms, or not, never neutral. What I love about that is that they really gave thought to their reaction to- probably- new flavors. This experience expanded their palates”
“It was a holistic learning experience. My students understood the importance and value of the cultivation and harvesting of plants. Each time they were able to enjoy food that they had planted, it was so deeply moving for them”.
“The students had the opportunity to interact with each other in an environment different from the classroom; The students learned the benefits of healthy eating; The students learned to relationship between the earth and what it produces and the environment.”
”Teamwork was an important asset to make our Murphy Garden come to life. It showed the students that hard work and togetherness to care for something (in this case, seeds) to live to produce food that they can eat, it taught them patience and responsibilities and taught them about healthy foods and how it doesn’t just come from the store”
“Gardening made them more excited about coming to after school; they learned more about healthier options”
“They are more aware of how to take care of a garden, also how easy it is to grow a garden; it motivated them to start their own garden at home”
“Every bit of help, supplies and support is greatly appreciative. If it wasn't for the help of their team (Growing Together), Grant Garden will not be fully completed. We thank you for that!”
“{Garden Learning Community} was able to teach us lessons, get materials and help us get the garden to where it is today….we thank you”
“The most important thing to me was preparing our line staff to be successful and comfortable teaching gardening to students, and supplying staff with supplies and equipment to pull it off…(Growing Together) do a really great job at providing support to all their partners.”
5. References: Provide name and contact information of maximum of three professional references (names, email addresses, and phone numbers).
Maria Resendiz, Extended Learning Coordinator - WCCUSD
[email protected] (510)-990-1883
Randal Lane, Head Chef/Farm to School - WCCUSD
[email protected] 1-341-388-9749
Juan Alvarado, Principal, Washington ES - WCCUSD
[email protected] (510) 231-1417
Joey Sundberg, Principal, Valley View ES (formerly principal of King) - WCCUSD [email protected] 510-384-2035