It is coming up to three years since Green Shoots Foundation held their first teacher training, or Training of Trainers session, in Samrong town, Odar Meanchay Province NW Cambodia. Part of their Agriculture Skills in Public Schools (ASPUS) Project.

I first arrived in Samrong in October 2013. It was small, nondescript and dusty- however; in just a few years it has become one of the most beloved locations on my travel calendar.

In September 2014 Green Shoots Foundation, along with our local partners CIDO, finalized a Training of Trainers program for teachers in 42 local schools to introduce skills for setting up and maintaining vegetable gardens. Not only that, we made sure the training schedule included information on how to impart this knowledge to their students and measure the progress of each garden. Teacher feedback on training: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cPXmNZ_Q-ec

Each school signed a three year contract stating that (annually) they would have at least three batches of 30-35 students, they will grow 5 types of vegetables and in return they would be provided with all the necessary equipment, training, technical support and have their water resources updated if needed. This is in line with Green Shoots holistic outlook of “a comprehensive approach coupled with routinely monitoring and evaluating to keep the project grounded and assess realistic impact”

http://foodtank.com/news/2015/05/growing-a-future-the-green-shoots-foundation-works-to-empower-cambodian-you

Since September 2014, 42 schools have set up vegetable gardens and selected batches of 35 students per school to be trained. Out of which, a number of schools are already on their second or third batch. Adding up the numbers shows almost 5,000 students have been trained and working on vegetable gardens. Video of students in the garden: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HTaUO47AAqM

Students have been at the core of ASPUS, taking home not only the skills learnt but also produce that is harvested. The remaining produce is sold in the local markets and each garden can earn, on average, USD 50 per harvest.

Besides students, another aspect central to this project is the community. A year into the program we can envisage the dynamic being established where the vegetable garden, with its newly dug ponds and fresh produce, could play a strong part in community cohesion and showcasing best practices. It reinforces our aim of “demonstrating to youth that a rural economy can be thriving”.

However, the past few years have not been easy. A commitment to having an organic, chemical free harvest comes at a cost- and this can at times be the morale of teachers and students. How do you keep up spirits when produce is prone to pests and disease can spread quickly?

Green Shoots Foundation focuses on building the capacity of local partners, by brainstorming and sharing knowledge we aim to improve on project delivery and keep best practices fresh. This in turn encourages teachers to experiment and seek new ways. For example, we will source and share information on improving the “recipe” for natural pesticide and herbicide. Our local partner will make, on average, 8 technical visits per quarter- checking up on health of gardens and making sure products are applied at the right time and in the correct quantities.

Another crucial success factor in vegetable gardens is a management plan – and this is truer for shared spaces such as school gardens. It is imperative for teachers to have a plan for student management. For example, dividing up students in groups to look after specific portions.

Going forward, we actively encourage small competitions within the school gardens and organizing refreshers courses for teachers to top-up skills. Trial and error is one of the most common ways of establishing a productive garden. So another ingenious solution could be “pairing up” of schools to co-develop each other’s skills. Another option could be to provide a “loan” to schools which incentivises them to preform better and then feeds into a larger revolving fund.

However, there can be gaps within local knowledge and Green Shoots is adamant to bring new skills and techniques to its partner. We both recognize that combating climate change is another key success factor. This can include, boosting our partner and subsequent vegetable gardens capacity to prepare for hot weather, lack of water and an increase in pests and disease.

What happens next?

As a program designed for youth to ensure livelihood opportunities, we plan to follow our “graduates” into the next stage of their life.

In 2018 we will be entering a new realm of agri-training. We hope to be at a stage where we can offer that plan B to motivated students interested in pursuing agriculture as a career option. This will involve not only a vocational training centre but also providing scholarships for higher education in agriculture…..so watch this space.

As a charity registered in the UK and the USA we are open to partnerships that can improve on knowledgeshare. If you are interested in sponsoring a vegetable garden, or learning more, you can contact us to help meet targets and bring skills and healthy local produce to students in Cambodia!

Thank you for your interest in helping raise funds for the Big Give Christmas Challenge 2017!

We at Green Shoots believe FUN-draising can be, well, really fun! While long-term fundraising involves meetings, application forms, and lots of admin, raising money for the Big Give challenge each year allows us to be a lot more creative.

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Final week and reflections:

Well, these past four weeks have been quite a rush. We arrived in northwest Cambodia one month ago and had no idea what to expect of our experience living and working there. It took us some time to get acclimated (especially our stomachs) and learn our way around town. Our Khmer has remained very limited, so we mostly communicated with gestures and smiles. We felt warmly welcomed by everyone at CIDO and really enjoyed spending time with them. We celebrated the completion of our mission there with a small party with delicious food, drinks and the entertainment of dancing children.

During our last few days, Kyle compiled an interactive map using GPS coordinates and photos he and staff took of every school gate *visit the Green Shoots website soon for that update*

In addition, we began collaborating on our final evaluation which will include analyzing survey responses from about 15 schools.

On Monday, we had the opportunity to visit the Anjali House Center for Street Children in Siem Reap for the certificate ceremony marking the successful completion of garden training for about 20 students. The garden here has just been developed in the last year.

Some challenges they’ve dealt with are poor soil structure and fertility, since the soil was just filled in after construction. However, Anjali House students and staff are brainstorming strategies to improve for the next season. The students spoke great English and shared with us their experiences raising a crop and what they’ve learned. They are divided into about five groups- each overseeing a particular crop, such as eggplant, cucumbers, and tomatoes. Most of them are enthusiastic about continuing to grow vegetables and providing healthy food for all the students at Anjali House.

Overall, our work assignments challenged us and gave us purpose. We are very grateful for the opportunity to do meaningful work with a passionate team, and contribute in some small way to improving the health of people and the environment in Cambodia. We feel that the program goal of diversifying vocational skills of students and teachers is well underway and we expect to see continued improvement with each year.

We are very impressed and inspired by the scale and progress of the ASPUS project and are hopeful about its future impacts on Cambodian society.

We all need more reminders of the positive change people are making around the world, so stay in the loop to follow the evolution of the ASPUS program!

-Katie

This past week has been very full as we had 2 full-day trainings on Wednesday and Thursday with around 40 teachers total. We set up the first day in an outdoor covered space behind the CIDO office. We expressed our gratitude to teachers for the important work they’re doing to educate the next generation about growing food in an environmentally-responsible way, and thanked them for letting us visit their beautiful gardens. We are very grateful for Ratana being able to translate so much of our presentation into Khmer and provide copies to all of the teachers. We think it really helped them to understand better and have notes to take away with them.

First, Kyle lead a presentation on Integrated Pest Management, stressing the importance of prevention through maintaining healthy soil, and the various physical, biological and cultural (environmental) control methods. Sokphea, CIDO staff member, then explained briefly about the pests specific to the ASPUS gardens and how to manage them. We enjoyed some delicious baked goodies during our mid-morning “coffee break” including some fried doughnut-like snacks with banana, rice and other things inside.

After the lunch break, we held a brief discussion about the challenges in the ASPUS gardens including flooding, dirty water, animal intruders and running out of water and shared some solutions. Next, we launched into the Garden Education presentation that focused on teaching methods and specific lessons and activities. We discussed the value in student-centered learning, where teachers train students to develop critical thinking skills and find the answers on their own. And how working in the garden can improve students’ self-confidence, social skills and health as they are more likely to eat vegetables. I tried to emphasize how the garden is an opportunity for students to connect to the natural world, which is very important today since youth are becoming more immersed in technology (even in Cambodia). We took a mid-afternoon fruit break at a time when it was raining rather hard and we had to use a microphone for the teachers to hear.

Next, we presented the ideas of connecting the garden to lessons about nutrition as well as to academic activities in math, science (experiments), and creative writing through garden journals. We offered ideas of many different lessons with accompanying activities such as understanding soil composition, decomposition, germination, plant parts, “Plant Doctor” and seeds. We also suggested incorporating art, building projects and school grounds improvement into the garden activities. Overall, we received very positive responses from teachers and staff who are enthusiastic to experiment with these different lessons and broaden the scope of their garden training to students.

After the second day of our training was finished in Banteay Ampil, we took a tour with Ratana around the district visiting about 10 more schools to capture the GPS coordinates which Kyle is using to create a map.

We finished our week off with a final presentation to CIDO staff on Organic Standards (including ASEAN GAP Standards) and Best Management Practices.

As it was Friday afternoon, it was a little hard to maintain interest at some points. But staff were interested to discuss the effects they’ve observed from tillage (plowing) and are interested in experimenting with some no-till techniques, which we are thrilled about!