STEPS Summer Program

During the summer of 2008 Drury High School received a grant to institute a program to help incoming freshmen transition to the high school environment more easily. This four-week program was designed around the Strategies for Success with Literacy: A Learning Curriculum that Serves, a program developed by Cathryn Berger Kaye who led a three-day institute on how to deliver this curriculum for our school district. When the planning team met to organize the summer, the staff was struck by the book, Seedfolks, and all of the service opportunities available. Right around the same time, garden beds were being built in the back of the high school. These beds were the collaborative effort of several teachers at Drury. We decided to focus on Seedfolks and the endless possibilities surrounding the garden as a service-learning concept.

After a week into the course, guest speakers came in to introduce the gardens and the connections between what the students could do and how they would help the community. Three different projects happened because of these speakers. First, students harvested the garden and donated to The Northern Berkshire Food Project, a free, community meal program. They prepared and served the food to the patrons. The second group used tomatoes from the garden and worked with an elderly home to make spaghetti sauce. The last group advocated for the use of gardens by creating a manual on "How To Start Your Own Community Garden." This book was presented to local agencies for their own use. The community response was overwhelming and we were invited back to participate next summer.