Community and school gardens do not magically bring plentiful benefits

Although it is common knowledge that society and school Gardening has countless health, well-being and educational benefits.it is significant to realize that these benefits are not magically appear as gardens take root.

For the past six years I have worked closely with educators, social workers, activists and community members. Tio’tia:ke/Montreal creating, financing and maintaining gardens and gardening teams in schools and social organizations.

We have set up adult education placements to provide hands-on gardening and teaching support to explore the extent to which gardens act as forums for people to address social and environmental justice issues. Some participants have experienced barriers to employment, food insecurity, and homelessness.

This research and community work has shown how significant it is to advocate for broader structural changes in the social, urban and educational spheres to support the work of community gardens – and how significant it is to understand the importance of having realistic expectations about what people can achieve in and through gardens.

Who are the benefits intended for?

In Tio’tia:ke/Montréal, community gardening occurs in many different ways, including gardening in community organizations and in city-run gardens.

There are significant waiting lists to access a garden plot in the city, which is made more tough by the fact that community gardens are historically more accessible to people who own property.

According to the mayor of Montreal, “For many people, community gardens are more than just a hobby. They provide a way to feed their families and get fresh produce at a low cost..”

Such statements concealed more convoluted issues. around who controls and has access to community gardens and deep-rooted social inequalities related to land rights in capitalist settler-colonial society that privileges property, whiteness, and hierarchical modes of relating.

Link to food insecurity

My findings challenge the claims that suggest community gardening is by nature an activity This reduces food insecurity in communities.

Reflecting on my efforts to grow food for organizations working with people experiencing food insecurity through a project called Gardening for Food Security, I cannot say that gardening has helped alleviate the concerns of people experiencing food insecurity in any measurable way.

This was despite huge amounts of food being collected every week or two in 2018 and 2019 from delayed June to early November.

Although the gardens flourished, the organization never confined its food order to Montreal’s largest food bank. This may be because, although participants ate from the garden’s produce, their dependence on it did not reduce their need for other foods. The Gardening for Food Security project did, however, modestly support the food bank and the weekly meal service.

Differential impacts on communities and individuals

As we have cultivated and invested in gardens for a variety of social, educational, and environmental reasons in rapidly gentrifying neighborhoods, we have contributed to the appreciation of land values ​​in a process described as green gentrification.

Despite these criticisms, the project also delivered the following benefits:

• offering appropriate paid employment to adolescent adults who experience barriers to employment, food insecurity and homelessness;

• providing mentoring and opportunities for self-expression (through art, photography, music, filmgardening);

• facilitating partnerships between schools and organizations with a mission of social and environmental justice for mutual benefit;

• obtaining long-term financial, educational and human resource support for teachers, students, social workers and community members, while developing ethical relationships and cooperation to achieve common goals.

The last three types of benefits are tough for financiers to quantify.

Problems with school gardens

Gardening as a part of environmental education is not compulsory curriculum in Quebec. School gardening often takes place outside of formal school hours, during lunch or after school. In total, providing gardening activities for students in most public schools adds extra work to already overworked and under-supported educators.

For gardening to be relevant and educational for both teachers and students, gardens need to be integrated into every core subject (French, English, maths, etc.), and not just used before or after school hours and during lunchtimes.

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Read more: School and community gardens plant seeds of change in the fight against global warming

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Many of my co-teachers have said they are fully committed to and interested in creating garden-based learning experiences for their students. However, getting the permits is an administrative chore. This can take away from organizing other significant aspects of creating a garden, such as fundraising, building relationships with co-workers, or creating programmatic connections, etc.

A Little Community Change

Tio’tia:ke/Montréal, like many Canadian cities, has a long winter and a compact, intense summer. For school gardens to operate, planning, administrative work, and permitting for the spring garden must be done early in the school year to account for the inevitable delays.

If teachers or members of the public wish to financially and financially support school gardens, I strongly encourage students to take the lead in the creation, development, and, more importantly, evaluation of the garden as a project.

When gardens are premature appreciated for achieving expected results If we do not pay more attention to how convoluted issues impact health, well-being and food security, we stand to lose much.

This includes the well-being of teachers who put in a ton of work doing something they believe in with confined institutional support, as well as affordable living spaces for people who have been displaced from their homes, communities, and networks by green gentrification.

No plain solutions

There are no plain solutions to the social and environmental problems associated with schools, community gardening or greening.

Teachers and community members often want and need a garden, but what they need more of is: financial support, instructional support, staff support, more time, fewer students, curricular freedom, appropriate professional development, and land that is not part of a larger capitalist system of private property or burdened by bureaucracy.

Even tiny changes in a community take time and sustained, collective effort.

This is an updated version of an article originally published on August 4, 2022. The earlier article said the gardens were reserved for property owners, not that they were more accessible to them.