School/Classroom wide — Maximum points: 400 (1 entry per school)
YOUR CHALLENGE: With the population in urban areas increasing and available space becoming more limited, growing fresh, healthy food is challenging. One idea to combat this is by growing up and creating a vertical garden. Not only does it save space, but it can be easier to maintain. Identify a location within your schoolyard or community where a garden would make sense. Design an edible garden using vertical gardening techniques either by designing something new and innovative or with premade kits. Choose your plants and see what you can grow! Produce a short video aimed for social media sharing your edible garden from planting to plate to highlight the healthy and nutritious options available for consumption. In addition, craft a recipe card that could be made available to the public featuring an ingredient from the edible, vertical garden. Downloadable PDF
ENTRY SUBMISSION: Monday, April 24, 2023 to Sunday, April 30, 2023
Electronically submit the following:
| ✓ Entry Requirements: |
| | Video and recipe card includes school name and list of participating students/classes |
| | Video showcases the designing, building, and tending of the garden with images and footage of students and teachers at work |
| | Video showcases what is/will be growing in the garden and ideas for how those edible plants can be used in cooking |
| | Video is 3 minutes or less, uploaded on YouTube and Video URL added to entry form |
| | Recipe card lists ingredients and step-by-step instructions for featured dish. |
| | Recipes cards should be submitted on a 8.5” x 11” size drawing that will be shrunk to half size. All details on recipe card to be visible when shrunk to size (8.5″ x 5.5″). |
| | Physical garden incorporates elements of vertical gardening with edible plants as the main feature |
| | On-time entry submission (late entries may not receive points) |
ADDITIONAL INFORMATION:
The Fairchild Challenge offers competitive garden grants to assist with your school garden efforts. The grant application is available at the beginning of the school year. Priority is given to schools with limited resources. Application deadline: Friday, October 21, 2022. All recipients must submit an entry for Challenge 6 to be eligible for a Garden Grant.
OPTIONAL TEACHER WORKSHOP: Wednesday, October 5 from 10:00 am to 3:00 pm
Join Fairchild staff for the School Garden Workshop specially designed for teachers wanting to start a garden at home or at school. Visit our Teacher Workshops page for more information.
EVALUATION CRITERIA:
For more information on how your submission will be evaluated, see Challenge 6 Evaluation Sheet
STATE ACADEMIC STANDARDS:
This Challenge meets various state standards, visit Challenge 6 Benchmarks
CHALLENGE RESOURCES:
Introduce the Challenge to your students: School Garden – Growing Up
Eutopia: Social media in education – Toolkit
Eutopia: Student-created videos in the classroom
Recip.ly: What are the main parts of a recipe?
TCK Publishing: How to write a recipe: The 4 key elements of a great cookbook recipe
UF/IFAS: Vertical gardening
Green Education Foundation: Vertical gardening
Examples of pre-made kits: Hanging Planter, Self Watering, Stackable, Wall Mounted, Free Standing
Creating and Growing Edible Schoolyards
Design Thinking Paper Techniques: Templates
