Course:LFS350/Projects/2015T2/LMRP

From UBC Wiki

Project Summary

Little Mountain Riley Park Neighbourhood Food Network is looking for help in developing (1) to create a year-round growing plan for the garden that starts in September 2016 (2) to create the Education Program Plan for the Community Garden. Students working on the project will make recommendations to maximize production in the space provided and on the design created, and will research other gardens and best practices, to recommend a series of seasonal workshops and education for various ages and cultures. This project is especially relevant for students in the global resource systems program, or majoring in food and the environment or food nutrition and health, and/or interested in learning more about community gardens, educational programming, and building community capacity. This project builds on a Fall 2015 project.

Organization Information

Name

Little Mountain Riley Park Neighbourhood Food Network (LM-RP NFN)

Mission

LM-RP NFN is sponsored by Little Mountain Neighbourhood House. Visit www.lmnhs.bc.ca for more information on the role and mission of NH’s.
The Little Mountain Riley Park (LM-RP) Neighbourhood Food Network works with community members, businesses, and organizations to ensure that all our residents have access to healthy, affordable, culturally appropriate and nutritious food. Together, we are growing the community – one connection at a time. Growing food, eating together, sharing around the table connects us to each other and to our community.
LM-RP NFN is a member of the VNFN (Vancouver Neighbourhoood Food Network). NFN’s are part of the Greenest City action plan as a strategy to increase access to local food.
We have three priorities: the RP-LM Community Garden Project, the Food Asset Map and increasing community awareness around our work and food security issues.

Primary Contact

Project Description

This project continues the work of past UBC LFS projects, a bibliography from the UBC Community Engagement Librarian, UBC Global Engineering Student project and community engagement notes/ charette.

  1. To create a year-round growing plan for the garden that starts in September 2016; and
  2. To create the Education Program Plan for the Community Garden.


Background and Deliverables:

  • Year-Round Garden Growing Plan: Starting with our site possession in the Fall, 2016, to make recommendations to maximize production in the space provided and on the design created; to recommend multi-cultural, native, bee-friendly plants.
  • Education Program Plan for Community Garden: Based on research from other gardens and best practices, to recommend a series of seasonal workshops and education for various ages and cultures to take place in the garden that use the produce grown. The research would include a list of organizations and people in the community who offer garden, food and cooking related activity with details of their offerings.

LM-RP Community Garden: We are building a garden (phase 1) of the Riley Park Redevelopment. Site possession is the Fall 2016. Through a community consultation process, residents told us that they want a garden that is:

  • community based
  • builds on our existing gardens, allowing us to share our collective knowledge and expertise, contributing to our resilient, healthy community
  • is accessible and inclusive for all members of LM-RP

Skills Preferred

  • Knowledge of community kitchens, commissaries and/or community gardens.
  • Outgoing and capacity to make phone calls, setup meetings and gather information from community members.
  • Capacity for research to learn and apply best practices for our food-hub and education programs.


Skills to Be Developed

  • Research of models, processes, systems, best practices as it relates to the project
  • Community capacity building
  • Community engagement, dialogues and outreach

Project Location

Project will take place in Little Mountain Riley Park with great public access and bike paths (NH is at 24th and Main St). Other gardens are in the area. Some work is done on the phone and email.

Preferred Days of Week and Hours

Some evening meetings and weekend. The project scope should fit the hours for the course.

Experiential Learning Opportunities

  • Help at the Nat Bailey Farmers Market Donation Station as our local food programs are the recipients twice/month of donations from farmers and shoppers.
  • Work on the Tupper High School Food Sustainability in Schools Conference in a capacity to be determined. The conference is for elementary and high school kids with the focus to address the issues of kids coming to school hungry and to increase the food grown on school land thereby reducing food costs and increasing healthy food consumption. The LM RP NFN is working with Tupper on their new garden to be built in the Spring 2016 and a past group of UBC LFS 350 students in Fall of 2015 conducted a survey of Tupper Feeder School gardens.
  • Work to update the food assets, the businesses in our area, and faith based contact lists.

Expected Outcomes

Learning Outcomes

  • Knowledge of community organizations offering food, garden and education programs
  • Community engagement that includes a broad based gathering, working with stakeholders and partners
  • The steps and process to get a community garden up and running.

Organizational Outcomes

  • Recommendations for year-round production in the garden.
  • Directory of workshops, education and food skills to be taught throughout the year.
  • Strengthening relationships in the community around our food security issues and strategies.
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