Junior Master Gardener training helps teachers, others grow youth gardening interest

Paul Schattenberg, 210-859-5752, paschattenberg@ag.tamu.edu

Contact: Ruby Zavala, 210-631-0400, Ruby.Zavala@ag.tamu.edu

Randy Seagraves, 979-845-3107, seagraves@tamu.edu

SAN ANTONIO – Thirty-five teachers, Master Gardeners and others from Texas, Nevada and Maryland recently completed a three-day Junior Master Gardener adult leader training held at the Texas A&M AgriLife Extension Service office in San Antonio.

“This training is designed to teach adult educators and others interested in instructing youth about the basics and benefits of gardening,” said Ruby Zavala, AgriLife Extension youth gardens program coordinator. “The goal is to give them the resources and confidence they need to implement and sustain a successful youth gardening program in their school or community.”

Zavala said the Junior Master Gardener program, administered by AgriLife Extension, has the mission of “growing good kids by igniting a passion for learning, success and service through a unique gardening education.”

At the training, participants learned how to establish and maintain a youth garden and create their own Junior Master Gardener program. Instructional topics included plant parts, composting, fruit and vegetable gardening, metamorphosis, fruit and vegetable gardening, cactus, Texas Superstar plants, Monarch butterfly gardens, rainwater harvesting, vermiculture, herbs, resource conservation, and how to design and create a classroom garden.

“I came to the training because Maryland doesn’t have a Junior Master Gardener program,” said Kristin Sparkman, director of administration for the Lillie May Carroll Jackson charter school in Baltimore — an all-girl middle school. “Baltimore has a great need for a program to show our youth about gardening and nutrition. When I found out about the Junior Master Gardener program, I had to come to the training in San Antonio to find out more.”

Sparkman, who is also the chair for the school and youth gardens program for the Baltimore City Master Gardener association, said it’s important to get young people interested in gardening and healthy eating as early as possible.

“Since we’re in an urban environment, we have to be creative about how we talk to kids about gardening and show them how you can grow things in small spaces,” she said. “You also have to catch them while they’re young and make gardening ‘cool’ by making it interesting to them. This training has shown me how to make gardening fun and enjoyable for kids, especially using the hands-on arts and crafts activities from the Junior Master Gardener curriculum.”

Jesse Valdez, a Bexar County Master Gardener, was also among the training participants.

“I volunteer with the San Antonio public library system and am the president of the Friends group for the Pan American Branch Library,” Valdez said. “As a Master Gardener, I became aware of and enthusiastic about the Junior Master Gardener program as a way to get kids involved in nature. In my experience, if you can get kids involved in nature, it’s easier to get them involved in science.”

Valdez said he wants to export the Junior Master Gardener program to the Pan American branch and have it serve as a “pilot” site for spreading the program throughout the city’s entire public library system.

At the recent training, attendees also heard from Randy Seagraves, AgriLife Extension program specialist and Junior Master Gardener program curriculum director. Seagraves told attendees of the importance of the program as a means of bringing students, teachers and families together and about its “multiplier effect.”

“If you look at this group of 35 people here for this training and realize each of them will likely reach out to a hundred kids or more at their school or in some other educational situation. Then you see you’re really talking about thousands of kids ultimately getting involved in the program,” he said. “And these kids will share their experiences and knowledge with their families, making the effect even greater.”

That multiplier effect is at work with AgriLife Extension’s youth gardens programs in Bexar County, Zavala noted.

“Currently we’re at 80 schools throughout Bexar County and are reaching more than 4,000 kids,” she said. “The kids are not only learning about gardening and science, they are also learning about responsibility, teamwork and other useful life skills. These gardens and the Junior Master Gardener program really are helping grow good kids.”