Planting Seeds
Published in Garden Compass March/April 2004
Once a week Ruthie Murray’s nine and ten-year-old students leave their classroom in Rolando Park Elementary School and walk for half-an-hour. During their trek the kids wonder aloud what awaits them at the end of their journey. Will they have another encounter with bat guano? Will they get to taste sugar cane again?
The man with the answers greets the students at the Salvation Army Ray and Joan Kroc Corps Community Center laden with brown bags filled with mysterious contents. His name is Paul Maschka and he is their volunteer organic gardening teacher as well as one of San Diego Zoo’s senior gardeners and the Natural History Museum’s Natural Gardening Series instructor.
Mr. Maschka, Mrs. Murray and the 31 gardeners-in-training gather in the Kroc Center’s garden to teach and learn ways of gardening that support the environment as well as to examine a variety of weird and wonderful plants. The Kroc Center’s beautiful garden environment, which includes a 2 million dollar Henry Moore sculpture and is bordered by Garden Compass September Mourn roses (proceeds from which are donated to the Salvation Army Disaster Relief Fund), serves as inspiration for the students.
The Kroc Center has spent $700 to date on supplies to help Rolando Park students meet their applied science requirements and the children are grateful. Student Kayla Escolano says, “This class is so cool because we get to do things we’ve never done before, like plant sweet peas. It was really fun and now I’ll know how to do it again.”