The Radical Root
Actionable examples of grassroots gardening, food sovereignty, and equitable food justice initiatives, empowering communities to cultivate sustainable change.
The Radical Root
School Gardens as Dynamic Learning Spaces
Discover the transformative potential of school gardens with us as Amarina Guerrero, program director of the Youth Grow program at Growing Gardens, shares her inspiring journey with our listeners. From her early days in Oregon, where she developed a deep bond with nature, to her college years that unveiled her passion for school gardens, Amarina’s story is both a personal journey and a professional mission. She recounts a pivotal moment in a school garden that sparked her dedication to bringing these green spaces to all schools. Through innovative activities like wheelbarrow relays, Amarina has seen how school gardens cultivate not only plants but team spirit, problem-solving skills, and inclusive learning environments.
Witness the evolution of the Youth Grow program as it adapts to meet the diverse needs of students and educators. Amarina discusses the creation of a dynamic 72-lesson curriculum tailored for K-5 students, emphasizing life skills and cultural relevance. The pandemic era posed challenges that reshaped their approach, prompting a focus on social-emotional learning and the power of adaptability. Learn about engaging initiatives like classroom baby chicks, and discover the resources available for those eager to start their own programs, including the School Garden Coordinator Certificate Training. Together, we emphasize the essential role of community collaboration in transforming gardens into vibrant educational landscapes. Join us and be inspired to cultivate change, one garden at a time.
Welcome to the Radical Root podcast hosted by the 501c3 nonprofit Growing Gardens, your go-to resource for all things radical gardening and food system advocacy. Welcome to the Radical Root. My name is Bea, I'm the development manager here at Growing Gardens and I'll be your host for today's episode. This month on the Radical Root, our topic is creative approaches to radical gardening, and the idea is that you don't even have to grow a garden to make an impact. We've lined up some amazing interviews with our team just to share some ideas. We've lined up some amazing interviews with our team just to share some ideas and highlight the many different approaches that you can take if you want to get involved in radical gardening. Food system sovereignty, food system equity there's so many different paths that can take you there.
Speaker 1:Today, I'm joined by Ann Marina of our Youth Grow program to talk about one of the foundational cornerstones of the work that we do here at Growing Gardens and of radical gardening in general, and that is knowledge sharing. So we're really excited to jump in and just share a little bit about our Youth Grow program. I'm so happy to have you here with us today, amarina. Let's go ahead and hop right in. Why don't we get started with just telling us a bit about yourself your name, your pronouns and your role here at Growing Gardens.
Speaker 2:A bit about yourself, your name, your pronouns and your role here at Growing Gardens. Hi Bea, thanks for having me. My name is Amarina Guerrero I use she and they pronouns and I'm the program director for our youth grow program at Growing Gardens.
Speaker 1:I'm so excited we're able to meet today because I know Amarina's job is a big old job. Being a program director for multiple school gardens is a feat, and we're going to dig in a little bit more to what that looks like overall and just all the stuff that goes into it. It's a really big job, so it's really great to be able to connect with you today for this podcast. I'd like to start, though, with hearing just about your background. You know everyone at Growing Gardens. I always like to say this in our episodes that everyone who's here and a part of the team we all come from such diverse places in life. You know we all just have an amazing tapestry and wealth of information and knowledge and just colorful backgrounds, so I always love to hear that to get started. So can you just tell us a little bit about yourself, your personal and professional experiences, and what was the path that really led you to growing gardens?
Speaker 2:Sure, so I was born in the Willamette Valley in Oregon and grew up largely outside with my family. We didn't have a lot of money like financial resource, but we did have a lot of rich experiences right, and so part of that was growing up outside, whether that be in the backyard or somewhere in the house or out and about, and so, you know, some of my kind of formative memories from when I was a child were using my hands outside, whether that be with a garden or working with bricks like I was just allowed that kind of space outside, so working with bricks Like I was just allowed that kind of space outside, so working with bricks to make a little patio when I was eight, you know, and and or being outside in a big rain and being allowed to do that allowed to explore that, encouraged to explore that, and that was all I feel like. That was stuff that definitely helped me just learn to connect with the outdoors, the world around me, and feel comfortable in those spaces. When I was in college I took a course, however, called School Gardens, and it was a landscape architecture course through the University of Oregon, and during that course and I had never heard of a school garden we didn't have them growing up. We did have a small garden in our own home. But when I took that course there was a requirement to do about six hours of volunteer time within different afterschool programs down in Eugene.
Speaker 2:And when I went to my first volunteer day I was tasked with moving a gigantic pile of bark chips with students that was about a football field away to the garden using wheelbarrows and these were third graders and I didn't know the kids at all, and I was. I hadn't. I had worked a little bit with kids, but not in a formal setting, and I just had no idea how this was going to work. And I said, okay, well, what are we going to do? What do kids like? They like competition, they like to like have fun together. Make it a team effort. And so we made a team effort and we did these wheelbarrow relays.
Speaker 2:And I just remember like seeing them be so proud and so excited and working together and problem solving and figuring out how do I get this heavy wheelbarrow down the path to the garden, and they had a blast and I just remember sitting there thinking why is this not in every school? You know, this was just a simple activity, of course, but I saw it get to the physical, like the kids were using their bodies, they were getting stronger, they were working together, they were problem solving. They had to have fine motor skills to balance that wheelbarrow and they had to work together to do it because it was so big skills to balance that wheelbarrow and they had to work together to do it because it was so big, why not in every school? And so that was kind of at that point I know now I've been doing this work about 23 years and I know now there are a lot of barriers to school gardens. But at that moment it was like this is what I want to do, I want to get this because I didn't have this.
Speaker 2:And I'll add to like those were just a few of the students in the club, other students were sitting on stumps and like looking at little bugs or eating their snack, and it provided that opportunity. What I saw was not just the active kids. I also saw it provided opportunity for kids who were quieter, who wanted to do something on their own or in small groups, and it just seemed like such a rich environment. And so I've dedicated my career, and it's my career has taken different pathways, but I've dedicated my career to really coming back to that. How can we make these spaces available for kids so that they can learn in the ways that are authentic to themselves?
Speaker 1:That's amazing. Thank you so much. I love that. There are sometimes just those moments where you know one experience and it all clicks and you're like, wow, this is the direction I need to be going. That's so inspiring to hear. So you mentioned you've been doing this work for around 23 years you said Mm-hmm and that has had a lot of different incarnations or has looked a lot of different ways, but you've been in school gardens for quite a while, so you've seen it all kind of, at this point, like you 've definitely experienced a great deal when it comes to school gardens and school garden just outdoor school programs. So now that you're at Growing Gardens, how did you know that we needed to do something different or that you know we can have a unique approach or a different entryway to this particular type of education?
Speaker 2:That's such a big question, I think you know. I think what I really saw I came to Growing Gardens a little over six years ago and knew that this is the work I wanted to do. We were relocating to Portland and so was already in school garden based work in Eugene and when I moved up here. So this is really the work I want to be doing and what I saw was actually, when I was in Eugene, the opportunity I had was kind of narrow. It was very focused on taking the kids out outside for specific lessons and we weren't really pushing into the cafeteria or doing a lot of food education work or able to dive into deep relationships. And while the program was amazing but what I saw when I came up here was an opportunity, the way that Youth Grow program wanted to operate, intended to operate, was and is now doing was really making our work as culturally relevant to our students as possible through these highly cultural practices of being. How do we be outside? How do we relate to the outdoors? You know from our different cultural lenses, how do we relate to food? And we didn't shy away from really jumping into like we're going to work with food with kids. We need to do it in a way that's responsive, and so that was an opportunity I saw.
Speaker 2:Another opportunity I really saw and I have seen through these six years is and partially through COVID as well, and some of the isolation and now coming back together is that as a society and this very much impacts our youth and adults that our connections to one another and to food and to the world around us, those connections are fragile at this point and we have an opportunity through Youth Grow to do more.
Speaker 2:It's more than just like let's get kids out in gardens or let's get kids learning with foods.
Speaker 2:We have an opportunity to really engage kids in food and gardening to allow them to develop really strong interconnectedness and connections with one another, with their own identity, with food and with the world around them through gardens, and so that's just such a powerful opportunity that really moves us and motivates us as a program to say what can we do with this?
Speaker 2:Like, how can we offer that to more people in the world, to more students? So another opportunity that I've really seen throughout the six years I've been here, that's developed and in part because of the experience we had through COVID with social isolation is that I've been here that's developed, and in part because of the experience we had through COVID with social isolation is that I've seen an opportunity around really addressing the reality and this is a reality for kids very much so, and also for adults that our connections to one another, to our food and to the world around us, they're really fragile right now, and we have an opportunity through our program to really help kids strengthen those connections to themselves, to other people, to the world around them and to food through the work we do, and so that's really the big opportunity that I see with our program.
Speaker 1:That's so beautiful that it goes beyond just like, hey, let's put a garden in the school and let the kids play with it. You know, there's so many ways that gardening can be educational, healing and really connect us to ourselves, to our culture. So there's so many more lessons that we can gain from that experience. So it sounds like that was something that was just so obvious through your experience of like, yeah, gardening is great, get little hands out in the garden, that's wonderful, but you know, it could be so much more dynamic than this, and I'm really glad you're able to explore that here with us at Growing Gardens. What are some of the steps that you took? Because that sounds like a big you know you're like, hey, this could be so much more dynamic. Look at all these ways we can really really utilize this. Now what? So? What were some of the steps that you took, or we took as an organization with the Youth Grow program, to approach the school garden space from a new perspective?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So about when I came into Youth Grow about six years ago, the program was well established and had some school day programming, after school programming and also some teacher trainings to support other educators within the community to be able to do school garden and engage kids with school garden, school garden work. And so what's changed in that time and the way we've approached it really is that we realized we needed a richer curriculum. We needed more of a base to support our students consistently with learning standards, with making sure we were doing great hands-on learning, and also a curriculum that was flexible enough to meet the students' needs, because the schools that we work in are highly culturally diverse, so from one community to a next might be working with a totally different group of kids, and so the curriculum needed to reflect our students, reflect their interests and needs, and without the curriculum being flexible we couldn't do that. And so we embarked about, I want to say, four years ago on developing four or five years ago, developing a 72 lesson curriculum for K through five, fifth grade that really hit those different points the learning standards, the hands-on learning, also life skills I didn't mention earlier, so gardening skills, cooking skills, and then that there was human centered and centered on the students we were working with, and so that was a lot of what we did and invested a lot of time in was creating that. And then COVID came right and we had to totally shift and we did a lot of online learning and when we came back from COVID, what we saw was that our students had a really strong need for social, emotional, skill building support, and so we've been able to one of the things that I think is unique to Youth Grow and maybe not maybe other organizations also do this, but I'm very proud of what we've done prioritized asking that question of what do our students need, what does the community need, and try to use the venue or avenue of the school garden and of the opportunities we have to work with students to address those needs. And so that's what we did.
Speaker 2:After COVID, a lot of our educators really got trauma-informed care training and really looked at how can I use this space to support my students and meet them where they're at, and so some of the lessons shifted to where there was more integration and embedding of lessons around self-worth or around how we talk to one another or empathy with a worm right or a bee and like or like, like. How do I learn to provide space to others? And so, using bees as an example of that, how do I create a safe space? How do I sense what I need in my body?
Speaker 2:And so we're using the gardens not just to hit those learning standards, but also to do all of that, and we're trying to help others to do that as well. So we do that through working with 10 different elementary schools and also early childhood, ed and high school teenage level programming. But we're also looking at how can we support others, because we only have so much capacity to go in depth at school sites and partner sites. We want other students to be able to also have similar experiences in outdoor learning spaces and learning with food. So that's a whole nother side of what we're doing, as well as supporting other school garden advocates to do this work.
Speaker 1:It sounds like the overall theme that I hear, really listening to this and taking this in, is that you have created a new approach wherein you can be agile, you can be flexible, you can kind of take their lead and see, okay, this, this deserves more attention, or more strategy. You know and add curriculum as you go and really make it accessible to the learner, be them a little you know, one of the kids in the playground, or be it a teacher who is in this totally different space in their life.
Speaker 1:So, with that in mind, like this agility or this, like ability to shift when things come up COVID was a really great example of this. What are some other kind of unexpected challenges that have come up for you guys in the Youth Grow program, maybe that you've faced in the past and have overcome, or challenges that you currently face that are just inherent to the role?
Speaker 2:It was a real challenge. Obviously, covid was a real challenge in that we worked in person in schools with students every single day of the school year and in the summer, and so how do you do your work when you can't be in those spaces together? And I was incredibly impressed and humbled and so proud of the education team. At that point I had stepped out of being an educator myself and was supporting the team and just so proud of the team for their ability to be agile and responsive and flexible and not be afraid of that. Really lean into. How can we be there for our students? That is always the question I think that we come back to and we have faced several challenges since then as well, one of them being coming back into the schools and seeing the hurt and seeing the need for skill building, as I mentioned before. And so you know, I think one way we've addressed the challenge, and something that I think is really special about being a nonprofit that supports multiple school garden sites, is that team members that work at individual schools are not isolated in this work, and so they can come back to and we did, and we do come back to one another and say this is what we're experiencing Like. Is anybody else having a really hard time with just seeing so much more signs of students not knowing how to navigate the social space? And what did you do? And so we have that team, and that makes all the difference.
Speaker 2:Having others to talk with and learn with about the challenges we face allows us to be responsive. So many folks in the school garden world and field are working a little bit more in isolation. While they might be at a school, they're the only person maybe doing school garden-based work, so they may not be able to talk about how it specifically impacts. Everybody at the school might be experiencing a similar challenge, and so they can definitely talk with their colleagues, but how does that work in the school garden setting? How do we address that and what are our opportunities, again, to utilize this space to really have a positive impact and address this need? And so that was a huge challenge was the social emotional I'll come back to that Supporting the social emotional space for students. So I think we did a good job of changing how we use the garden space to do, and there's been other challenges as well along the way, but I think the biggest practice we've utilized is coming back to one another and our connection as a team with our teammates.
Speaker 1:I love that and that it was really just to each other and really come back together collectively in community. That connection again to ourselves, to each other.
Speaker 2:And can I add to there? I would love to add to the students, to each other and really thinking about who is the community right? And so we also make an effort to listen to teachers. But one of the community groups that our organization had had a really hard time connecting with was families and parents, and there's always been a light connection because we show up Even though we're not a part of the school staff. We would show up to family nights and host work parties in the garden at times, but we would find that that was kind of a light connection, and so we really wanted to hear from families, because those are the kids we're working with, are their kids right? And so we want to make sure that what we're doing meets the expectations and best wishes of family members and caregivers for what their students are experiencing in schools.
Speaker 2:And so about two years back, another thing we did was reach out really, really intentionally and worked hard to center voices within the community that are the voices that are least heard, voices within the community that are the voices that are least heard.
Speaker 2:So in school communities there's so many folks that really are not heard through PTA or maybe have a hard time getting to the schools because of their modes of transportation, or someone in the family is alter abled and doesn't have the ability to navigate that school space or get there easily, or they're working right.
Speaker 2:Families are working, so it's hard, it's really really hard for a lot of families to be able to show up in those spaces and then to feel heard or appreciated when families do take that effort to do so.
Speaker 2:And so we reached out to families and did a family survey in several languages and also did roundtables with families to really listening sessions. So the reason I thought of that is because, bea, you mentioned that theme of listening, and so that's something we tried to do two years back and are planning to do again, have more, because we only were able to reach four schools through that process, and so we want to do more listening sessions with another three schools this year and also add a youth grow advisory group paid family members. So we'll be paying family members, teachers and some students to help us to inform our program and provide in-depth input into how we run our program and what we teach. And so that's another area I feel like we are working to address some of the challenges we see, one being that sometimes this education might not be relevant, and so how do we really make it relevant and meaningful?
Speaker 1:thinking that you know, oh, I have this great idea for a project. You know we're going to do this and it's going to solve all these problems. Like you really have to take the time to ask the community directly what their needs are and understand where they're coming from and hear how they want to communicate and, you know, learn their language, like literally and figuratively, and figure out how to get that across in the best possible way.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and be willing to make the adjustments, like be willing to listen and act on what people are sharing, because they're taking that time and effort and providing that trust in you that you will make a change, if need be, to what you're doing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and just taking the time to sit and listen to like that, that in and of itself is such a powerful trust building activity that really lays the foundation. So, knowing this, knowing that you came from a background in school gardens and shifted into growing gardens, where we already had a curriculum in place and then we just kind of opened things up really to circumstance, we listened to the students and the parents and the teachers and we responded to that through our curriculum and the services that we offered. You have this unique perspective. How do we know that what we're doing in Growing Gardens is going in the right direction? How do we know that we we're doing in growing gardens is going in the right direction? How do we know that we're on the right track?
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's a great question and really important. We think about who are we accountable to right? How do we know that there's an impact that's positive through the work we're doing? And what I would say is that I kind of want to use an example. So earlier I shared about how students were really saying or not saying, they were showing excuse me, they were really showing hurt. They were showing the need to relearn and learn and develop skills around how to be with one another and interact with one another.
Speaker 2:And so a couple of our educators, one in particular, carla Manuel, who was a food court service member at the time with us and now is on staff said my kids need help with learning care, to learn how to handle safely chicks. But also, just, you know, what it did so authentically was give students and teachers really this opportunity to just have like unfettered love and gentle energy and in holding these small little creatures. And it was so beautiful when I see the pictures, when I see the videos, hear the stories and see the smiles on the kids and, like I said, teachers' faces, the teachers really needed it. And so, in seeing that, that was a good sign, right, that was a sign that, yeah, we're on the right track. This is not in our curriculum to bring in baby chicks. But how do we do that, do that safely and do it well, to address the needs of the folks that we are connected with in community through the schools.
Speaker 2:And then when we one of the things we do, it's not. You know, it's great to hear the stories it's invaluable and to see the pictures, but we also want to ask directly, and so we do ask students, teachers and families about their, their, the learning experiences that are happening and what's working and what's not. And when we ask the students, by far and away, the chicks came, the chicks got to visit two different schools with our educators and by far and away, even though it was only at two of our 10 schools, when we asked what was your favorite part, they all said the chicks like just having that experience of holding that little being, that little warm, being in their hands. And so that's an example where you know, how do we know? We notice through the experience. We share that with one another on our team. Then we also ask, we ask the community and we listen.
Speaker 2:And so that was one and it was a lot of work but it was well worth it, and I'll say too the other way we really know is that when we ask and we do our surveys and our discussions with family members, with teachers and with students, the vast majority of folks say we want more, we want this opportunity more. What we do right now is come in anywhere from every other week to work with a class to once a month working with a class, and we have parents asking why can't you go in weekly or even multiple times a week? And we don't really have the capacity to do that right now, and that's why, you know, one of the things we're working toward right now is how can we create more of these outdoor learning experiences and garden-based learning experiences on a regular basis through working with teachers to really support them, to have the resource and training they need to feel comfortable to do that.
Speaker 1:That's such a good call-in, actually, and leads me right into our next question. Now, for those folks out there who are listening, who may want to do this kind of work, who are currently teachers and they want to bring a garden to their school, or they're currently gardeners and they know that they want to be working with children in this capacity, what's some advice that you can give?
Speaker 2:yeah, um, what I'll say is that there are a lot of resources out there, first of all, to support those of us who are kind of at beginning stages, saying I know that this is valuable, I want to share this with my students or with my kids or my community. And one of those resources that I want to call in, because we share more through it, is our school garden coordinator certificate training, which is an online program that has six learning modules to kind of cover. It really is just the tip of the iceberg, but it's all the basics around. How do you start a program, a school garden based program, how do you create the space, how do you engage the community, how do you teach in that space? And then how do you sustain it over time, both through funding and, again, keeping it relevant, you know, utilizing the space in a way that is meaningful for the specific audience, the group you're working with. So I want to call that in because that is a great kind of survey course or overview course that can really point folks in the right direction and because it's online, people can attend from anywhere, not just in the country but in the world, and we run that course spring, fall and then sometimes in the winter, but spring and fall are our main runs and it's through OSU Pace. So if people Google OSU Pace school garden, it will pop up and OSU is Oregon State University, so we run it in collaboration with Oregon State University.
Speaker 2:But what else I'd say is, yeah, like put your like, start asking. Right, just start like talking to the other folks around you, because garden spaces, especially school gardens or community gardens, they are not. Gardens are not just plants, right, gardens are not just a set of rules on how you grow something. They're really this beautiful dance between people, plants and the environment, the place we're in. So I like to imagine people, or say people, plants and place, and so getting to know your place, getting to know your people, and then the plants come last. So you know, just start talking to the folks around and see who else is interested and then looking for those resources like our school garden coordinator certificate training or other organizations such as Kids Gardening, and their site is just kidsgardeningorg. They have amazing resources and there's a whole other suite of resources that we could maybe share in the podcast notes.
Speaker 1:Yeah, absolutely. For anyone listening here, you can absolutely find links to our certificate, to any other resources that we've mentioned today. This is also where I like to add that you can reach out to us directly. You can go to our website, growing-gardensorg, hit the contact us tab and just tell us what you have going on. It will usually go to me and then I will direct it to anyone on the team who is available and has the bandwidth to work with you or provide resources of where you can go in your own neighborhood.
Speaker 1:I would also say, you know, tune in. We're going to have a lot more interviews, have a lot more interviews and a lot more interaction with Youth Grow right here on the Radical Root podcast. So if you just kind of want to hear from other educators that are out there currently doing the work, the projects they're doing, the problems they're coming up against, the creative solutions that they are finding along the way, definitely tune in to the Radical Root as well. Thank you so much. There's just a few more questions, actually two more questions that I always love to ask as we wrap up the podcast here, and the first one is Amarina can you please share your most useful or fun gardening factoid?
Speaker 2:A factoid. Well, this is just a fact. It's not specific. I'm not going to tell you like this plant family or that. What I'm going to say is my fact is that just through spending time in the garden, you can learn from your plants. You can learn about plants, I should say you can learn from the world around you, and I find some of those like most meaningful things that I acknowledge that I hold from my garden space is from being out there and just having that energy to be receptive and kind of, for example, I might see how a plant unfurls over time or I might learn what pollinators love a certain plant and their flowers.
Speaker 2:But I don't, I'm not going to be learning that through a book, right. I'm going to be learning that from really being in that space and watching. And there's just so many secrets and there's that wisdom out there. There's the cultural wisdom about plants, about just the natural world and how we relate to it. There's scientific wisdom and knowledge as well and those are so valuable. But in conjunction with those, I just really urge all the listeners and I know most of you probably already do this or know but to take that space, that quiet space, to just be in community with the plants and animals in your outdoors, outdoor spaces that you are a part of, and that you'll learn a lot from that outdoor spaces that you are a part of and that you'll learn a lot from that so important Just plant sitting.
Speaker 1:I love that. I live out in the Olympic Peninsula, out here, and you know I've learned so much from the forest just being alone in the trees Like there's. There's nothing like it, there's no teacher like it. Thank you so much for for calling that in. Is there anything else, before we hop off, that you would?
Speaker 2:like to add.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'd just like to share that as, bea, as you were sharing about different resources that we'll have available and that we have to offer.
Speaker 2:One thing I had forgotten to mention is that Growing Gardens is the Portland Metro Area's regional hub lead for education, for farm to school education. There's a statewide network called Oregon Farm to School and School Garden Network, and that network supports regional hub leads in different areas throughout the state of Oregon, and so my part of my role actually is to be a support person for the folks in the Portland area. So if you're listening, you're in the Portland area and you don't know where to start, I actually have some funding in time set aside in my role to support you, and so we can do 30 to 60 minute consults on the phone. We can come out and do a site visit. If you do have a garden site you want some advice with a school garden site and I can also connect you with other resources throughout the Portland area, including plant starts, seeds, educational materials and so on. So do contact us. We're happy to hear from you.
Speaker 1:Thank you so much for mentioning that and again, pop over, check out our show notes. All of these links will be in here. You can check out our certificate training kids gardening, the school to farm network any of the things that we've mentioned. You can even go to our website, check out Youth Grow and see pictures of Chickie Week and those adorable little chickies with their adorable little teachers and students Really really fun content over there. If you don't follow us on social media, we're always posting cute school garden pictures on our Instagram and Facebook as well.
Speaker 1:Visit us at growing-gardensorg, Find us on social media at Growing Gardens, PDX, and we really do hope to hear from you. Amarina, it was so nice connecting. Thank you so much for being here and chatting with me today. It was a pleasure to be here. Thanks for having me, Absolutely All right. We'll see you in the next Radical Root podcast. Thank you for tuning in to the Radical Root podcast hosted by the 501c3 nonprofit Growing Gardens. To learn more about our work or to donate to keep our programs and services thriving. Please visit us at growing-gardensorg. While you're there, don't forget to download your free copy of the Radical Gardening Resource Guide, your step-by-step action path to a greener future for us all.