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Green Corps is a work/study program founded by Cleveland Botanical Garden in 1996. High school students earn as they learn, transforming vacant lots into flourishing urban farms. Green Corps students grow fruits, vegetables, and flowers -- as well as job skills, leadership, and a healthier, greener community for themselves and their neighbors. Ultimately, these young people learn to appreciate the earth’s capacity for abundance and, in the process, begin to realize their own abundant potential.
Work
Green Corps students work 16–20 hours a week in their “home base” neighborhood farm. Working in teams, students spend their time planting, weeding, pruning, harvesting, and preparing crops for market. Students take turns selling the produce at farmers markets. The work of the summer culminates in a busy two weeks of preparing Ripe from Downtown® salsa. For most students, this is their first job and first paycheck. Through this “rite of passage," students learn valuable job skills that carry with them in the future.
Green Corps hires 9th and 10th graders from Cleveland Metropolitan Schools to complete the first year of the program. As a student matures, he or she may progress through the three years offered by Green Corps. Returning students become leaders for new students and build upon learning from the previous year.
Learn
Students who apply for a job with Green Corps walk away with more than just a paycheck. Through the work, they develop important interpersonal skills with peers and adults like communication, conflict resolution, and cooperation. Through the summer, students complete a curriculum focusing on gardening and ecology, life skills, and sustainability.
Green Corps uses hands-on, experiential methods of teaching. Students plan and plant their own backyard-sized farm plot. They work with Cleveland Clinic educators to taste healthier food alternatives and experiment with exercise options. They practice communication though hosting tours and going through weekly evaluations with staff. They build math and business skills by selling products directly to customers at markets. To learn ecology and plant-based science, they build compost, discover and identify bugs, and plant seeds and seedlings. The farms become a living classroom where students are part of the biological system.
Serve
In growing lush farms on formerly vacant lots, students are serving their neighbors and the entire Cleveland community. They are creating green space and a source of healthy, local food. Additionally, each farm hosts educational programming and completes an off-site service project. In 2008, students cleaned up a large bus stop garden, helped build a playground and garden for the neighborhood, painted a mural, and maintained a rain garden.