Providing Hope's Grow Project 2013 Catches the Attention of Local High School Students

Eatontown, NJ-based non-profit organizationProviding Hope, has been successful with providing a hands on organic gardening learning experience to Long Branch High School Students. Providing Hope designs fun, interactive programs for the students to learn the key concepts of growing organic vegetables and herbs. As the program has taken off, and the students learn about a new local food source, Providing Hope donates each harvest to local food insecure families across Monmouth County.

“Working with these students for the second year is a true joy especially witnessing their reactions while working in the garden and learning about their food source,” said Rosemary Sherman, Founder of Providing Hope.

The students gather on the grounds of the Monmouth University Community Garden and are guided by a Master Gardener. They plant, tend, and harvest fresh organic produce; reap the reward of helping others by feeding the community; and enjoy the beautiful natural setting of the garden. The students now have the opportunity to introduce a fresh vegetable source into their daily nutrition as they increase awareness for the prevention of childhood obesity.

Providing Hope acquires plots each season within various gardens to educate local students while helping feed local families. The gardens are 100% organic which offers a healthy and safe harvest for everyone. Providing Hope emphasizes working with organic gardens to promote embracing nature, soil building to include homemade compost and using only natural, non-toxic substances if intervention is required.

Students end the program with an understanding that organic methods promote a healthy ecosystem where birds, insects, plants, microorganisms, and people all reach a natural balance that is beneficial for all.

Often gardening is seen as just hard dirty work and not as education. Providing Hope’s Grow Project focuses on educating the students while they build a sense of pride while they learn how to improve their health and the wealth of their environment. Providing Hope’s vision is to expand our efforts with feeding food insecure families thru different ways of organic gardening such as hydroponic and aqua phonics while continuing to educate our youth.

Providing Hope is committed to improving the health and quality of life of children, adolescents, and families in New Jersey who are facing the many challenges associated with disability, serious illness, trauma and major personal setbacks.

Providing Hope initiates community-wide campaigns to increase awareness concerning current public health concerns. Providing Hope partners with local small businesses, school districts, and community organizations to organize and sponsor seminars and workshops to invite the interested public to get involved and unite.

Last year, Providing Hope efforts focused on health, wellness programs and education to include raising public awareness concerning our nation's problem of childhood obesity. Community-wide efforts were initiated to help feed food insecure families. The wrath of Super Storm Sandy shifted our focus to fundraising efforts to assist families affected and/or displaced by the storm.

As we entered the New Year, Providing Hope acknowledged the suffering still endured by countless local families still lost within the debris of Super Storm Sandy. Providing Hope launched a community partner campaign which not only raised funds for local families but assisted small businesses around the Jersey Shore area to increase their traffic and help rebuild the economy.

Spring has sprung and so has the Grow Project of 2013. Providing Hope’s goal is to feed more food insecure local families while engaging our youth with the outdoor learning experience of organic gardening.