This year Rock Point School has expanded our gardening program to include an indoor tower garden. For years students and staff have grown food in the outdoor gardens on the Rock Point property as well as in the hoop house on campus. In 2021, the school was awarded a grant from the Whole Kids Foundation to invest in a tower garden that could be used year-round by students to grow food. The Whole Kids Foundation targets their grants for schools, particularly those with gardening and bees as part of their curriculum.
This fall, students in Biology set up the tower in the dining hall, making it available for the community to use for meals. In biology class, students learned how to plant seeds and maintain the garden to optimize it for growth. PaisleighAva, a 9th grader, says, “I like starting the seeds in the rock wool, testing the pH of the water, and mixing the nutrients. I didn’t know how to do that before.”
So far, students have grown and harvested kale, green leaf lettuce, arugula, swiss chard, and a lettuce mix. Growing greens has encouraged students and staff to try some new vegetables, in addition to learning about the growth cycle of different plants.
We are hoping to expand this program with another, larger tower in the future! With an additional tower we could grow some larger plants like squash, tomatoes, and peppers.