Course talk:LFS350/Projects/2014W1/T17/Proposal

Hey Lucy/person interested in status updates:

Please check out our blog for weekly and biweekly status updates: http://blogs.ubc.ca/lfs350team17gnhherbgarden/

The blog looks great! Thanks!

Best,

Lucy TA, LFS 350

Hey guys,

So it looks like we need to integrate the toolkit into our research question a little bit better. Meagan suggested:

"How effective is the Gorden Neighbourhood House herb garden model at impacting the food preparation and consumption habits of its visitors, and how can this model be extended to other communities?"

which seems to tie it all together. Essentially, we need to argue that our report will collect data on behavioural shifts, create recommendations, prove why a herb farm is necessary and good and serve as a lead-in to the toolkit, which will be a guide to facilitating our recommendations and observations (kind of.

So a new research question would need to assess whether or not the herb farm is serving GNH's mandate and food philosophy in terms of food behavioural shifts and explore if any changes need to be made.

In light of this, how about we shift gears a little and add some interview questions in with staff regarding how well the herb farm is running and any improvements which could be made, especially in light of the construction of the new herb farm.

Ideas?

I think this is a really good approach Ning - thanks for articulating! I have already found out from Susanna that she puts out a herb line every Friday and that the majority are gone by Monday, maybe 3 or so left (always different ones). She also said that people are starting to go on their own to the herb farm now that there is a sign explaining anyone can take them. This is the kind of thing that speaks to how well the herb farm is currently running, and I think that we should schedule an interview with her (either next week or the following week) to ask her further questions about the logistics of collecting quantitative data and conducting interviews with visitors.. and also hopefully get a look at the herb garden itself and take some photos.

As far as other staff members/stakeholders, we could ask them questions that are specific to their role in the operations of the garden. Seeing as staff members other than Susanna probably won't have a clear picture about how the herb farm is impacting the residents (which is something we will hopefully be able to give them a clearer picture of through our research), asking more logistical questions about the operations of the herb farm will probably be our best indicator of the current success of the herb farm in that respect (ie asking about specific systems relationships that exist to help keep the garden operating, and how effective they think theses systems are).

I think if we are assessing the effectiveness of the operations of the GNH Herb farm, in addition to the impact that it has on the residents, then this will allow us to assess the MODEL itself as well. Maybe we can re-word the research question to better tie this in..

"How do the specific operations of the Gordon Neighborhood House herb garden model influence its effectiveness in altering the food preparations and consumption habits of its visitors? How can this model be extended to other communities?"

I'm having troubles getting this into one sentence (maybe it doesn't need to be one sentence..). Does it sound like I'm getting too detailed here or is this the direction we might want to go?