Greenhouse
Abington Heights Middle School has recently hired a new science and technology teacher. The classes provide a hands-on approach to learning fundamental science concepts. The courses are designed to be fun and educational, allowing students to learn in a manner not restricted to standard classroom leaning. In both 6th grade Ecology and Pollution and 7th grade Plant Biology, students grow plants as part of the curriculum. Incorporating plants into a school curriculum provides for more than simply an understanding of plant biology. Students who work with plants develop an appreciation for living things that they can not learn from books alone. However, the plant activities that can be performed indoors are very restrictive, in that the indoor growing environment is often lacking the proper temperature and lighting required of many plants to grow and flourish.
The AEIO will purchase and install a 16' x 20' permanent greenhouse structure on the grounds of the Abington Heights Middle School. In addition to supplementing and improving the curriculum for the two new courses at the Middle School, the greenhouse will be used for after school activities. One idea is to involve the students in a program where the students raise crops and run a farmer's market to learn teamwork, entrepreneurial skills, and nutrition. These students also raise plants to sell as a fundraiser activity along with learning responsibility.
A further possible expansion of programs using the GHS would be to have students become members of The Growing Connection, which is an international program of the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization. In this program, students around the world grow food to fight hunger, poverty, and malnutrition, or in the United States, to learn horticulture and entrepreneurial skills. More importantly, groups from the United States are paired up with student groups from other countries of the world to share growing stories and to participate in cultural exchange.
The number of students to benefit from the GHS includes approximately 450 students annually during class and 15 - 20 students willing to work with the greenhouse on a consistent basis throughout the school year. These students attend the Abington Heights Middle School.