Parkway School Gardens
Located near Deep Gap and along the Blue Ridge Parkway, the Parkway Elementary School Gardens feature the largest school garden in our county with several garden areas and a state-of-the-art passive solar greenhouse and an Ecology area with a nature trail. Students across the Pre-K to 8th grade span utilize both the greenhouse and garden areas. Parkway School is a booming school with a 7th-8th grade Horticulture exploratory and multiple areas used by students to learn and grow.
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About the Garden
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In 2001, a special type of research and educational greenhouse was constructed at Parkway Elementary School. The sun is the only heat source for this passive solar greenhouse in the winter. South facing angled glazing, thermal storage, and adequate insulation are utilized in this unique design to maintain a year-round growing environment without the use of fossil fuels. This SunCatcher provides a very special opportunity for our students to experience a sustainable alternative for extending our short growing season. It was designed by faculty in the Sustainable Development Department (was the Sustainable Development Program in 2001). At the same time a 3/4 acre area was developed called the Parkway Ecology Project (PEP). It was a student-led grant that brought native plants, raised beds, a pond with water feature and a short nature trail with information plaques along the way with information on native trees growing in that space.
Richard Tidyman received a Watauga Education Foundation grant to help build the four raised beds outside his career and technology classroom. Which has not been increased to six raised beds. This garden is located in the front of the school where all visitors, parents, and teachers can easily see what's growing. Other garden beds are located near the playground and in the preschool area. A foodscape was added at the entrance and two pollinator gardens have been created. Shannon Carroll received several grants including Lowe's Home Heroes and the Captain Planet grant to help build onto and improve existing structures. She worked tirelessly to bring students into the garden and teach them lifelong garden skills. She partnered with volunteers from Appalachian State University, Master Gardeners, and Blue Ridge Women in Agriculture. Today, Danielle Tipton (a certified Master Gardener) has continued the work of others. She is currently working to improve upon our PEP area and the school's interior gardens with student-led projects. We have received several grants including ASAP (Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Program), Grow Watauga and Farm Credit Grant (from BRWIA) to implement a 3-bin compost system, repairing existing raised beds, and purchasing garden gloves and hand tools for all our Horticulture students to use on our campus during the school year. She has created labels for all our plants with binomial and common names in both English and Spanish and QR codes that link directly to the NC State Plant Database. With the help and direction of Appalachian State University's Environmental Science Department, they have started a new bi-lingual afterschool garden club called GeoDetectives. It will be the first in our school district. She still partners with Appalachian State University Environmental Science Department, Watauga Extension Agents, Master Gardeners and ReGeneration Church. |
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What's Growing?
The school garden features multiple raised beds that grow a variety of produce depending on the time of year. In spring, the beds are overflowing with lettuce and other greens. In the summer, tomatoes, peppers, squash, potatoes, green beans and cabbage are typically found growing. In the fall, students plant garlic and greens to tend until spring. The greenhouse is used to grow vegetables and starts year-round. We have blueberry bushes, thorn-less blackberries and June-bearing strawberries in addition to mammoth sunflowers, lots of native plants and tons of pollinators.
Our 7th grade Horticulture exploratory class has set aside 6 raised garden beds to Plant A Row for the Hungry. All produce collected from these beds are donated directly to Watauga County Health & Hunger Coalition. This produce is then given out to those in need in our community. They have also designed and budgeted our rain garden in our interior space to help with storm water runoff that floods our walkways to and from the bus lot.
Our 7th grade Horticulture exploratory class has set aside 6 raised garden beds to Plant A Row for the Hungry. All produce collected from these beds are donated directly to Watauga County Health & Hunger Coalition. This produce is then given out to those in need in our community. They have also designed and budgeted our rain garden in our interior space to help with storm water runoff that floods our walkways to and from the bus lot.