This is Busted Pencils, fully-ledded education talk.
Here are your hosts, Dr. Tim Slecker, and Dr. Johnny Lupinacci,
educated educators talking education.
Yes, it's Busted Pencils fully-ledded education talk.
Educated educators talking education.
Saturday, one full hour, so happy.
Always love the Saturday show.
Get to really, you know, kind of lay it out there.
Johnny Jess, you know, get to spend more time with you guys,
which is always exciting.
I'm gonna start with Jess, so Jess, how's your day going?
My day's been a little bit busy, you know?
But that is okay.
Tim, I gotta tell you, I have been hearing some huge props
for our Wednesday class in session
about the opt-out movement, and I gotta tell you,
that has been, it's been some trending news.
Nice, nice.
Well, you know, we had a special guest on that show.
Yeah, Lacey Slecker, my daughter, so that's awesome.
We'll have to talk more about that.
So, for Johnny, how you doing, man?
I'm doing great, it's been a week.
You know, we're full steam into like mid,
almost end of February, and so things are cooking.
A lot of good things happen, and it's my favorite season
for what we call on busted pencils, you know,
essential activities.
But many refer to it as extracurriculars and sports,
but winter sports are my favorite, and so, you know,
hockey season is at peak time here,
and you know, campus is buzzing.
And we've gotten a lot of snow,
so it was a late winter here at Washington State.
But, you know, we're covering snow,
it's been snowing every day this week.
So, it's feeling a little bit more like winter.
That's always fun.
So, it's been a good week, Tim.
It's good to be here with.
And how are you, Sam?
Hey, I am doing great.
Just greater than great.
I just leave it at that.
You know, nothing to announce here yet,
but just everybody out there listening.
I am doing better than I've done in a long time.
Let's just leave it at that.
And so happy to be here.
Loving the fact that we've got two great guests today.
Oh, really?
Yeah, you know, digging into something,
it's just gonna jump right in.
First, he's a visionary in the world of aquaponics,
turning hands on learning into a tool for transformation.
He's the co-founder and executive director of 100 Gardens,
and has spent the last 12 years
installing aquaponics systems in schools,
correctional centers, and communities across the US and Haiti.
And welcome to Busted Pencils.
Sam Fleming, Sam, how are you?
What's up, Tim?
Thanks for having us.
Appreciate it.
Hey, let's get your partner there.
She is the champion of hands-on real world learning,
ensuring that students don't just learn about sustainability.
They live it.
She is the education director at 100 Gardens
and works directly with teachers and students
to integrate aquaponics into the classrooms,
blending science, nutrition, and environmental stewardship
into an experience that sticks.
Welcome to Busted Pencils, Kelly Howe.
Kelly Howe, are you?
Hey guys, I'm doing well.
This evening, hope you guys are.
We're excited to be here.
Talk about fish.
Talk about fish.
Love it.
OK.
So Sam, before we get into the hard questions,
we're Johnny and I.
We dig in deep and we try to know.
100 Gardens, aquaponics, give us a 101.
All right, well, let's start with aquaponics.
So have you heard of hydroponics before?
Yeah, yeah.
All right, so for the laymen, hydroponics
is growing plants without soil using fertilizers,
mixed with water.
But in an aquaponics system, we're combining hydroponics
with aquaculture systems or fish farming systems.
So we grow edible freshwater fish
and then their waste provides fertilizer
for hydroponic lead growing vegetables.
And then the vegetables use up the nutrients
returning clean water back to the fish.
So we call it a symbiotic ecosystem
that really demonstrates a lot of nature's systems
and allows for people to get a deeper understanding
of how the world works.
It also produces food.
And you can teach just about anything
from an aquaponics system.
OK.
And so then that leads to the 100 gardens.
What's 100 gardens all about?
You want the hayster?
You want the, you want the, you want the, you want the, you want the,
a quick 101.
I mean, you know, again, what we're there,
we're going to spend a lot more time
though really digging into 100 gardens.
But just, you know, as you have an opportunity right here.
So aquaponics 100 gardens, the connection there maybe.
All right. Great.
So, you know, our mission is to empower communities
to become smarter, healthier, and more compassionate.
And we use aquaponics as the medium to do that.
So we're a nonprofit based out of Charlotte, North Carolina.
And we partner with schools and correctional facilities
and even just communities such as Indigenous nations.
And we partner with them.
And then we build an aquaponic garden
that could range anywhere from a classroom size
all the way up to a full production size greenhouse.
And then after the garden is installed,
we provide professional development.
We develop lesson plans and learning resources
that teachers can use.
And then we provide ongoing technical support
on sort of an annual contract basis.
That's cool.
So right now we're in 24 schools.
We have programs in 24 schools and three correctional facilities.
Wow. A lot of work going on there.
Johnny, you though, just throw in there.
You've had some experience in this field
or in this realm a little bit.
I mean, remind me of your connection to food
and what you were doing in Detroit.
Oh, well, I love this.
This is a special guest for us to have on here today, Tim,
because I'm like, we're going to be preaching to the choir
in terms of what this group does,
especially in partnership with schools and community.
Because I got to see firsthand how this kind of learning
really benefits your school and your neighborhood community.
And it's, you know, we talk a lot about this
unbusted pencils as like real life learning, you know,
class and session this week, you know,
we had special guest Lacey talking about the opt out
of her standardized tests and the kinds of things
she was doing in place of taking tests on those days.
Well, you know, I was lucky enough to be part of a school
community that had school gardens and had a full, you know,
transition from a learning food garden,
curricula aquaponics and that system
into my math and science classroom.
So it was like really awesome firsthand big believer in it
because we started, you know, learning math
and all of our science stuff related to issues in our community.
Then as a Detroit teacher, food security,
I mean, it's understood is we grew up and live
and we're learning in our school in a food desert.
So there was like not access to healthy food, fresh food,
let alone that also being culturally relevant.
Foods that mattered to our community
that were part of the recipes like our grandmother's
would want to be teaching us to carry on
and kinds of those fun, healthy, you know,
food can be comforting, can be unifying,
but it also gives us sustenance for our learning.
So it was really natural for us to start doing that kind
of those kinds of mini lessons
and it just took off like wildfire
and you know, culminated to a full aquaponics, you know,
food garden, almost like a urban farm school.
So I got to see really firsthand how awesome that was,
but also as our guests will talk about know
is also a whole lot of shifts and changes
and how we do school and what that teaching looked like
and the labor and the way it brought our community together.
And I'm gonna say it like, I don't need to bury the lead
on this, they'll probably give testimony to this.
It really changed how I worked as a teacher for the butter.
I mean, I had all these hesitations
really like, oh man, what's going to happen in the summer?
Oh man, what's it going to be like?
How is it going to fit into my school day?
But it did and it changed the way we got together
in our school place.
So the garden and the fish and everything
and all the systems we added started to really vibe
with our energy and our energy with that kind of system
of almost like we had permaculturalists come in
and help us design our curriculum too.
So it was like, there was a whole philosophical shift
that happened around food.
That was aligned to our content learning and math
that made my day balanced.
It really made my day feel not only meaningful
in a traditional teaching way,
but also that like, hey, we were eating really well
and we were learning life skills.
Like it turned into a lot of entrepreneurial opportunity
for local small businesses.
A lot of our graduates went into that profession
in some capacity, like whether it was distribution, marketing,
food systems are a whole economic dimension
that lifts up and empowers our whole community.
And bonus, we were learning our math and science
right alongside it and it worked well.
So this is right up my alley, Tim,
when you brought these guests on.
Yes, this is my jam, I love this.
Well, speaking of all the things you're saying,
so Kelly, you know, before 100 gardens,
you were a principal and so you were in this
and reading some of the press on 100 gardens,
actually you were involved as a principal
bringing in 100 gardens.
And now you're, you know, give us a little bit of that,
like what can, is Johnny making this stuff up
or is this what really happens?
I mean, it's what really happens.
I was looking for a way to rehabilitate
the old dilapidated greenhouse at the school
that I had been assigned to principal
and I was looking for something, you know, kind of new
and exciting, not just, you know, to grow firms and plants.
And I happened across a newspaper article
about 100 gardens and thought, wow, this is,
this is really incredible.
As a former middle school teacher,
I was in the integration of all kinds of subject matter
together and I thought this is,
this is really a great way to do it.
And for my particular case at that school,
I needed vocational training for my students.
So it just, it looked to me like a beautiful marriage
of all the things I needed.
And so happy that we did it.
And that school is still thriving today.
Their aquaponics system is still thriving today,
seven years later.
So I would say that it worked out well.
Well, that's great.
I mean, you know, thinking about this too
and, you know, just reminding, you know,
the opt-out movement of putting this forward,
you know, one of the reasons my daughter,
now she's a senior in college and my son, you know,
but we started taking them out of the high-stake standardized
testing because of essentially the focus on that
at the expense of real learning, quality learning,
interest in engaging and the types of work that you have here.
And in fact, I know after this break,
you know, kind of give this to both you and Sam
to think about it during the commercial here is, you know,
how hard is it for you, Kelly, as a principal or somebody
to work with somebody like Sam and then address the realities
where teachers are, but when are we gonna teach this
and when are we gonna do that?
And what about the standardized test?
It's busted pencils, fully-ledded, education talk.
More when we get back.
So, she's a senior student, our taste on precious and so few.
We know, we probably have a deal.
But to this guy, no longer blue, we bring him to another
or the deal, we drown him, we drown him, we drown him.
But I'll be out.
I'm doing a little dancing, it's busted pencils,
fully-ledded, education talk, educated educators talking, education.
Yes, I know my dancing should be outlawed.
But, you know, occasionally that's what we like to do here.
Our guest, Sam and Kelly, from 100 Gardens, aquaponics,
just breaking in, just kind of looking at this, going into schools.
But Sam, I want to give an opportunity, though,
to give a little bit more of the kind of history and the origins.
And so the idea here, 100 Gardens, it was an experiment at first.
And I was just wondering at what point, you know, when did you go
wait a minute, there's more here, this has real deep education implications.
You know, how did that all come about?
So, when I first met Ron Morgan, who was our founder,
he was, had just gotten back from Haiti back in 2010,
an earthquake that killed 200,000 people.
And Ron was an urban planner and developer architect.
So he was taken down there by a church to come up with an idea
for rebuilding. And he couldn't get past the idea of like,
when the aid runs out, what are these people going to do?
So, you know anything about the history of Haiti has been deforested.
It's really hard to farm there.
So he heard about hydroponics and ended up at the store that I was working at.
I was managing this hydroponic store.
So, fast forward a little, me and him become friends.
And we built an aquaponic garden in his yard that was going to be the prototype
of what we thought we could send to Haiti.
And so, as we're operating at kids all around the neighborhood are like,
oh, I want to play with the fish blah, blah, blah.
And they're coming over.
So we start teaching these kids what an aquaponics system is.
And they're like, well, can we come by and feed it?
And I'm like, well, I guess.
So here's this clipboard.
And I need you to record this pH level.
And each of you to write down with a water temperature.
Because we just gave them like a couple simple tasks.
And for we knew it, you know, they were coming over regularly and taking water quality tests.
Mighty, they're like eight, nine years old.
And then they started taking vegetables home because they were like,
oh, you know, I've been seeing it grow.
Can I take this home?
They didn't know what mustard greens were any of this stuff.
So, but then we start getting comments from parents on like,
what are you guys doing with like the kids in the neighborhood?
Because our kids are talking about science and stuff.
And then they're bringing home vegetables and demanding that we make salads.
And now when Ron was like, oh, my God, like, guys, this is it.
Like we've, we didn't mean to do this, but here we are.
So the original idea was, okay, not only are we going to send a garden to Haiti.
We're going to build one here in the Charlotte North Carolina region.
And we're going to kind of make them sort of like sister cities, if you will.
Connect to school in Charlotte with a garden.
And Haiti and have a conversation go back and forth.
And so that's really where it started.
And then the weird turn of events.
The last week that I was working in the hydroponic store,
the North Carolina Department of Public Safety called wanting an irrigation system for that,
an old greenhouse similar to Kelly's greenhouse story.
And I let Ron know and he's like,
Sam, let's see if they want to build a aquaponics system.
And then we'll train kids and we'll send them to Haiti and we'll change our life.
And it was just this crazy idea.
And so we invited the representatives from the,
the juvenile correction facility.
Town to see this garden that we had built in Rons yard.
And Ron sat there and he sold into program.
And we got a contract with the North Carolina Department of Public Safety to teach this in juvenile corrections.
And that was our first project.
And it went really well and we got a lot of press.
And then more school started inquiring about working with us.
And what's kind of crazy is not until like our sixth year doing this,
we're already in probably six or seven schools.
We that whole time we have zero curriculum, zero lesson plans.
We would just work with the school and they would kind of figure it out.
So then we were able to build the organization slowly and hire wonderful people like Kelly,
who have made us a legitimate player in the education field.
And so that's kind of the short story how we got here.
Nice.
So thinking about that is just really, you know,
the idea of the kind of that moment where you went,
okay, there's more here than, than just this.
And Kelly, I was thinking about you at what point to how, you know,
you see this, you know, because we were talking about this,
school can be really irrelevant to a lot of kids.
And what I'm hearing here is what what Sam kind of found out by, you know, accident was, wow,
they're really interested and they're really learning and it goes forward.
How you as an educator, you know, kind of look at this and see this realm.
And, you know, potentially too.
What are some of the complications?
Well, I killed all the fish.
I mean, I think maybe our first month of having our first small aquaponic system.
So there was that was a complication.
Getting other, getting the staff members and the teachers over, I think,
like Johnny shock of, oh my gosh, how am I going to do this in addition to everything else that I have to do.
And in my particular school, all of our students have IEPs and severe needs.
And so there was a lot of convincing them that, you know,
number one of the validity of the program and then number two,
how they could work IEP goals into an aquaponic system.
And it was a lot of trust.
So I think that once people saw the value of it and really took a minute to like wrap their mind around it.
It's, it's really explains itself and the kids, of course, are in love with taking care of fish and seeing things grow.
Like themselves.
And it, they just took such a shine to it that it was hard for anybody who was involved not to see that excitement.
And it was just contagious.
So, um, learning, if we just watch the kids, they show us what's important.
So that, um, really, it really just kind of organically grew.
Pun intended, I guess.
Yeah.
And I'm digging it pun intended.
This is awesome.
You know, there's so many great things about this and I know we're coming up on a break here.
So as we go into the break, I'm just thinking we come back.
If you can both share with our listeners.
One story like, like Sam already shared a little story.
Kelly, you've shared some stories.
But think of one story of a learn, an example of the learning that really stands out for you for our listeners to hear.
Because we've been plugging this kind of learning on busted pencils.
And I've been lucky enough to be part of it to see it really work.
And, you know, Tim and Lacey were on a class in session this week talking about opt out in the ways that real life learning.
Just just clicks and classrooms for kids, everything's, you know, dialed in.
So think of those stories and be ready to share them with our listeners.
We're here, busted pencils fully let it education talk.
Hey listener, if you ever want to join the conversation though, remember that you can call or text us or if you have a comment or a question call or text us at 608 557 8577.
We love to hear from you more busted pencils and more of this awesome organic stuff listeners.
You can dig with us here at busted pencils and a hundred gardens.
I've been up all down the line my goals is meeting.
My love is churning and I love the way that's crossed my eyes and to the point.
Because she's 2000 my years away.
And she helped my man life so I know, never let go.
And she's 2000 my years away.
Yes I will.
Oh, I'll be back.
We let it education talk educated educators talk in education.
Yeah, we're doing it for the cause love that song.
I could just keep having it play and listen to it.
But we got to get back to this awesome conversation, not unrelated to the cause.
Everybody eats and everybody, especially in schools, should be learning.
And there's learning and learning about what we eat and how we get our food and the importance of food production and all of the steps of when things grow.
And they get harvested and they get prepared and we eat them and we are our healthiest best selves.
It's all important. It's all part of being in a community in democracy.
Love this learning. We have special guests with us today from a hundred gardens chilling on this chilly Saturday.
So hopefully listener, you're staying warm and chilling with us.
But Kelly and Sam, Sam, you start, but I asked you before he went to break the think of a kind of a standout story from your work with hundred gardens.
And I think listeners would love to hear it.
So Sam, you share us a story first, then we'll kick it to Kelly.
It's a story that kind of changed the way that I thought about our mission was was early on when I started teaching in the juvenile correctional facility.
We had a kid named Bradley and Bradley was on an IEP and was on like an alternate path to toward his diploma.
And he was always really lazy in his classes and he would say is because I'm stupid. That's what he would always save.
I knew that at least I knew teaching them that he was probably more just lazy and disinterested, but he had been on an IEP his whole life.
And he shines so much in the aquaponics program that when the assistant principal came down to saw him work and she was like, we need to reassess like how we classify this kid.
And they took him out and they put him in the reg ed classes and within a year and a half he had his high school diploma.
And his entire life he had been deemed like a, you know, a lower performing student who may not have the faculty to to go the regular route.
And when he shines so much in the aquaponics system, it really like changed everybody viewed him and he ended up getting his high school diploma.
And I referenced him in my TED talk because he's the one who said I want to open a motorcycle shop when I get out of here.
Not because and when people asked him like, why would you want to do that when you have all these great aquaponics skills.
And he wasn't interested at aquaponics, but he realized for the first time in his life that he could do complex things and he could make something happen he could create something.
And he wasn't a motorcycles and it changed his outlook on life.
So that was an amazing transformation. I saw was seeing him get his high school diploma being taken off the IEP and then, you know, having, having that testimonial at the end.
Man, I love that. That's, that's, you know, music to my ears and to I'm sure listeners.
You know, some testimonies, some good story around how when we change how we do school, start to learn different things that we probably might have had a hunch about our students, but then seeing them be successful because, you know, we moved away from the traditional curriculum and into something that was meaningful, engaging.
And let's just call it what it is.
Yeah. Right. So that's, that's awesome. Sam. Love that story. Kelly, stand out story for you to share with listeners.
I have, I have so many, because now I've worked in different levels, different, you know, elementary all the way to post secondary with aquaponics systems, but one that I'd like to share is about an intern.
We had our first high school interns a year ago last spring semester. And at the end of the internship, we had a little celebration.
And the two of our interns that were speaking, one of them was a two sport high school varsity athlete, a wrestler football player.
He had been in turning with us and working that to in two of our different aquaponics gardens, one at his school and one at another location we have.
And when they asked him to share a few words about what the internship had meant for him, he said, when I go into the greenhouse, when I am working with the fish and the plants, he said, I'm just so calm.
It's, it's like I forget, I forget about all of my stress. I, I'm not thinking about wrestling. I'm not necessarily thinking about football. I'm not thinking about what am I going to do in a graduate. He said it allows me to just relax and be in the moment.
And of course, this was post post COVID post remote learning post all those things. And for me to hear, you know, a high school junior, a male talking about the way that he felt and how he was more self aware, just from being in and around the garden.
There it is right there. I mean, it's that to me was just so moving that number one, he had that awareness and number two that he felt comfortable in sharing that.
If you spend any time with high school students, that's not a response you get a lot of time. So that was, that's one of the standout moments for me.
You know, Kelly and Sam and so these testimonials, they make me really think about then to it's kind of like, you know, this big question.
So why do we continue though to insist on, you know, what Johnny and I say, you know, schooling, you know, the curriculum, the rows of desks, the separating kids by ability levels, the siloed curriculum.
I mean, I know that's like a, you know, in one way, a hard question, but at the same time, it, you know, it's just because the power of just those two testimonials.
What would you would think would move people to go, well, then we need to reimagine everything or think about this because, you know, the idea of a student who, you know, they, it wasn't an IEP, they were disinterested and they were telling us loud and clear, we might not have been listening the right way until we saw this.
You said, you know, an area of stress reduction, we have a partnership with some other podcasters, educators amplified and they're always really coming out is going, you know, why is school so stressful, we add to the stress that these kids bring to their daily lives with these academic initiatives, the, you know, again, back to the off that movement, my daughter and my son, that stress of performing.
Could be kind of meaningless academic tasks by those who are in control versus what I'm hearing, you know, Sam, you and Kelly kind of talking about, you know, again, so i'm going to go to Kelly first this time and then we'll come back to Sam Kelly just thoughts about my kind of random using there.
I think and listening to Johnny speak as well and something that at 100 gardens that that we're always trying to like really wrap our minds around is that once you have exposed the students to an experience like aquaponics where they're managing an ecosystem.
They see the park they play, they see the interdependence of the fish on the plants and the plants on the fish, then it really does cause them to have a new way of thinking.
About themselves about their place in society, about the role they play in and food production and the sustainability of the earth.
Of them sales and it causes them to have that thought that maybe they've never had before we see this even in our elementary students that you would never think that a first grader can explain in their own language.
The process is of how an aquaponics system works and and you know they can do it and they get to say the word poop a lot which makes them all happy and makes us laugh.
But just just the fact that they have this recognition much like what Darren had in his internship program that there is another way to think about myself.
And where I fit in and what my impact is on the environment and other people around me.
So I think to me that's really the remarkable thing that I've found in aquaponics.
Sam you know so and you're coming at this like you said totally different not the non educator role and just kind of seeing this you know the critique I was kind of putting out of traditional academic education.
You know where maybe let's make this a little bit of autobiographical you know where were you as a student and is this kind of makes sense you know the discovery learning or however we want to frame it you know did you did you have these feelings when you were a student you know learning all the academics you know give me your sense of the world.
Yeah I think somewhat you know I was by the time I was a decent student I had somewhere between A's and C's all the way up through grade and then it went to season F's 11th and 12th grade.
And you know when I really reflect on it you know part of me like wants to be hyper critical of the way our school environment was but at least back then we still had like band and they were like lots of like club activities and the humanities were a little bit more part of schools when I was in there.
But you know I didn't I didn't go to college because I was so fed up with being in school and it is funny to say this but I was so eager to start working I wanted to get my life started right away at a high school and so I think like you know there's a lot of good things about school.
And there's and we've come a long way and literacy and all that compared to 100 years ago it's kind of going backwards now but I think like you know it would be I think bringing more hands on activities is obviously really important and schools also just kind of long I mean it's a long day for kids and I think not to get too deep into like societal stuff but like it's we're also babysitting.
Children for the full work day of both parents being at work all the time and you know so school has taken on a different function than what it used to be 50 years ago so it I think there's a lot of things like bigger things that impact education.
Yeah yeah I mean yeah for sure and we know that in that sense you know here's now there's a big transition it's not a Tim bomb just and Johnny so relax I'm not.
But just thinking about this you know so we have a list you know a listener out there right now there are principle there are building leader there are school board member and they're like getting jazz they're like wow I mean they're talking about this.
I want to bring it to my school and I think some of the questions and let's be real practical like you know so what does it take what does the school need to do what are what is the infrastructure required and how much does it cost and holy crap just really work.
Oh my goodness.
So so here's the thing there's basically two ways you can do this the first and that that we support the first one is if you have a greenhouse we can put a system in there that's going to all in be about $30,000 for the hardware you're going to get an awesome piece of an awesome garden that gives that increases the brand of your school.
And then it costs about $10,000 a year to maintain a program get all the professional development support access to materials and we actually assign a staff member to your school to really give you the care.
If you don't have a greenhouse you want to put it in your school we put large systems in schools and that system cost about $16,000 and the support package is the same but here's where the real value is.
We're committed that to finding schools who want to create smarter healthier and more compassionate kids period and if you have that same goal in mind we can help you get there we have the training figured out we got the hardware figured out we have the support figured out so we're really looking for mission aligned partners that we can work with.
And I'll stop there and you can find this.
Yeah I was going to say we're going to make sure that you know the link in the podcast 100 gardens.org if they're thinking about it reach out to Sam Kelly will also have their emails so that you can get them.
Sam Kelly 100 gardens thanks for busting pencils with us.
Thank you guys.
Thank you very much we appreciate you guys and what you do awesome hey Johnny Tim and Jess break it down when we get back.
What are we doing this for the cars.
We're just doing it for the cars.
The cars.
We're just doing it for the cars.
It's busted pencils fully let it education talk.
We've created educators talking education great guests Sam and Kelly from 100 gardens aquaponics.
The full deal cycle plants plants dropping nutrients to the fish the fish taking the nutrients open sending the poop back to the plants.
Okay I'm just doing my first grader impression the way Kelly talked about it.
I spot on spot right come on it's perfect you know that's the system and that's the way a first grader would explain it.
And I really liked when Kelly said that about a first grader being able to because it's going to be in a different language but the abilities that are there.
So I think it's often in schooling we've really limit what kids can do because of what we think about you know age appropriateness and all those things is like hey guess what they can do this stuff.
So I just love that Johnny but I know you have had a lot more experience with this so you know kind of break it down a little bit from your point of view.
You know I'm all about democracy I'm all about community and and when we bring those two things into the same sentence in a conversation and we mean to align our schools to that like how do we.
You know strengthen democracy and our community together you know this is one great way when we talk about things like project based learning or real life learning.
Or the kinds of ways we can engage our learners in not only skills that are you know meaningful to their life but to their career pathways.
And how that also strengthens the local right well there are two things that stood out to me as an educator you know in that in that realm and that was that everybody eats.
And so food is one of those big unifying principles around curriculum and and strengthen in community and democracy and the other one was that we are bodies of water.
And those two things aligned to all the content areas like we can do our English language arts learning around that you know we can do our science schools or science learning our math learning.
You know our social studies learning that these are large unifying principles that we can build our curriculum around and do so in partnerships with experts in our community like 100 gardens.
Came on today and we're talking about the ways they support the teachers but the ways they also provide support around those the skills that are necessary to understand and maintain.
You know and sustain an aquaponics system or like I love how Kelly talked about it a really diverse learning environment because Tim oftentimes when we think about our classrooms we think about schools.
We think about them and really human centered ways and humans learning from other humans that see the students teaching other students or the human being a teacher passing on information to their human students.
And we don't really think about diversity broadly in our classroom and Kelly touched on that interconnectedness and the way she shared a story of a high school you know junior who said you know I just feel really calm.
I feel like I can come into this space and you know and and things are moving at a different speed things are being communicated differently.
While I'm a big believer in that happens when we really embrace diversity in our classrooms and I don't just mean cultural diversity all that's really important.
I mean biodiversity you think about the ways that the plant life the diverse plant life and the diverse you know water species.
You know we can talk whether they're tilapia or whether they're salmon or the fish that are in our aquaponics system contributing to it become a really living ecosystem where we're also learning interdependence interconnection and we're learning about how to communicate together across diverse species which helps us be better democratic citizens how we learn from communicate with depend on.
And our part of a system with each other so it's a win-win-win all the way around I love what hundred gardens is doing I especially love what schools and teachers all around our country are doing hey if you're listening and you you want to connect with an organization like a hundred gardens again we have their connection in our description of the podcast you can download this after you listen to it today you can get that information you can reach out to hundred gardens they can help you with this process right that's what they're specializing in.
But wherever you are hey if you're a local Wisconsin listener right I mentioned as a Detroit teacher the excellent opportunities I've got to have teaching this well I learned it in Milwaukee from a guy you're probably familiar with locally will Allen founder of growing power that's a great organization that connects all these dots talks about when we center food in our curriculum and learning our community gets stronger right we share intergenerational knowledge across cultures we have a rich deep.
We have a rich deep history in food and the food traditions and sharing it growing it all those things so we're really spring in our curriculum all the way around and so there's lots of good opportunities I got to be part of an organization the Southeast Michigan stewardship coalition.
They have a network of schools doing this work all around the Great Lakes so it's just really good work that you know Tim does what we talk about here on bus depensals makes that shift from schooling to education where we learn together and especially not only learning together but growing together in really healthy ways.
And now for your moment of sin.
What most of us must be involved in whether we teach or write make films write films direct films play music act whatever we do has to not only make people feel good and inspired and at one with other people around them.
It also has to educate a new generation to do this very modest thing change the world.
Hey, thanks for listening to bus depensals and you can grab these podcasts and other special bus depensals content on Apple podcasts Spotify and of course on the civic media website or wherever you get your pods.
Hey, don't forget to find a home room on Monday class in session on Wednesday and free throws and face offs on Friday and keep busting pencils and keep busting them.
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