Save the Date!!! June 21st School Garden Workshop!

Save the date for Monday, June 21st from 10 am until approximately 4 pm at the Lakehouse at the Clemson Sandhills Research Center in Columbia. We will have presentations from the current grant recipients of the Eat Smart... It's in the Garden grant program, as well as other valuable information. More details in the near future!!

Under Secretary Concannon Visits Riverside for Farmers’ Market Salad Bar Program 5th Anniversary

USDA Under Secretary Kevin Concannon chats with Emerson Elementary School’s Green Team students.
The salad bar program at the Riverside Unified School District provides a unique opportunity for students to not only enjoy fresh fruits and vegetables from local farmers but to also grow their own produce. The partnership among schools, community, and local and state government is essential to building healthy dietary behaviors for our nation’s next generation.

The Farm to School program at Riverside Unified School District is not just limited to the lunch tray—students also learn from a registered dietician about the benefits of eating fresh fruits and vegetables. Local farmers also visit and help students understand how and where healthy foods come from.
As part of the USDA’s Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food initiative, members from the USDA Farm to School Team will visit Riverside Unified School District. During their visit, the team will work with local farmers, local and state authorities, school districts, and community partners to learn about Riverside’s farm to school efforts, including how the activities first began, the relationship between growers and the school district, what obstacles exist or were faced along the way, and the benefits the activities have had on the school and the community.

Pepsi Refresh Grant Projects

We want to encourage ALL the school gardens to submit an application for funding to help their school garden projects. Especially if you are planning to donate your produce to the local food bank, open your school gardens to community members, or just using it as a tool to help children to develop healthy eating habits and a taste for fresh produce.
The Pepsi Refresh Project is looking for people, businesses, and non-profits with ideas that will have a positive impact. Look around your community and think about how you want to change it.
The First step is to submit your idea (anybody can submit their idea.)and then vote for your favorite ideas (You should recruit your friends to vote for you idea too!!). Applications will be accepted from the 1st through the 15th, or until we receive 1,000 ideas, whichever comes first. Starting February 1st, vote for up to 10 of your favorite ideas every day. If you submitted an idea, feel free to vote for your own. Ideas chosen by users to receive grants will be announced at the end of every month. Then the whole process starts over. We're Awarding Grants of All Sizes: $5,000, $25,000, $50,000, $250,000. For more details please visit: http://www.refresheverything.com/how-it-works

More pictures of Okatie elementary school

This is one of the side of the garden showing irrigation

In this picture we can see one side of the garden.

In this picture we can see another side of the garden.

More pictures of Okatie elementary school children!

In these pictures we can see the 2nd graders reading the books on healthy eating and plants.
Today we finally got a tractor and driver. We repotted many tomatoes.

Okatie Elementary School

In the first and second pictures we can see the tomato plants in the window ready to get move to the greenhouse.
In the third picture we can see the 5th graders putting tomato plants in greenhouse
In the 4th picture we can see the 5th graders getting rocks to repot tomatoe plants.

Bee Week!

There were 247 kids come through Bee Week this week!
Bee Week is hosted by volunteer beekeepers from the Edisto, Aiken and Mid-Carolina Beekeepers association, who host this event to educate youth about the importance of bees and the art of beekeeping.
Since 2001, 2,706 second grade students from Bamberg, Barnwell, Aiken and Hampton Counties have attended 4-H Animal Science Week.
For more information about Bee Week, please contact Mindy Sandifer with the Barnwell County Career Center & FFA Program.