A lively class legacy

Transcona

Outside the front doors of Transcona Collegiate lays a crescent-shaped corrugated steel bin filled with what looks like just plain dirt with a few blueberries resting on top. But much like the Grade 10 geography class who made the bin, there’s more buried beneath the surface.

The steel bin is one of two gardens planned, built, and delivered to the community by the Grade 10s, spearheaded by Kaylynn Seavers and Maddison Lacey, under the supervision of instructor Brandi Haider.

“It felt important for our school to have,” Seavers said. “It’s something to display and last a while.”

“It marks the legacy,” Lacey said. “I’ve noticed (while building) a community has grown around the garden. It’s nice to have a community in class.”

The smallest of the two gardens is an herb garden featuring basil, cilantro, rosemary, and other herbs the foods and nutrition program will hopefully use in the future.

The larger garden is a medicine garden with tobacco, cedar, sage, and other plants important to Indigenous traditions.

The project idea first came from a competition hosted by Ducks Unlimited and Oak Hammock Marsh across schools to give students a chance to propose and make a green solution to protect wetlands.

Even though their class didn’t win, their determination didn’t stop.

“They were disappointed they didn’t win,” Haider, an instructor for 19 years within the school division, said. “But I think they were more disappointed they couldn’t build it.”

And so, the original lesson plan for the semester was derailed and the logistical work to make a garden began.

“It sounds easy to just have a garden, but there was so much time and effort we put into it,” said Lacey, who added the project took most of the semester to complete.

“I learnt a lot from this,” Seavers said. “A lot of life skills were put into it.”

“I’m tremendously proud of them,” Haider said. “They persevered from hot weather to building, they did all that work,” she said, emphasizing it was a student-led endeavor.

As the school year wraps up, only a few plants have sprouted but nothing is ready to be harvested, so the majority of the reward will be reaped by future TCI students.

“I’m sad it’s over with the group. They might not see (the plants) right away, but someone will see it and continue it,” Haider said. “My hope is it becomes part of the fabric of the school.”

The Grade 10 class celebrated their year-end party on June 19, with pizza, a brief visit with the Grade 2 students from nearby Radisson School that was interrupted by heavy rain, and a verbal reflection of the semester.

“(Haider) encourages me to do better in school,” Seavers said. “She treated us like equals.”

When Haider shared to the class that this was her first time teaching geography and she would not be teaching the course again next year, a unison “AWE” of disappointed echoed throughout the classroom louder than the downpour outside.

“You can go to her for everything,” Lacey said. “She treats us as family.”

“Hearing 15-year-olds talk about family, it’s quite special,” Haider said.

If the best gardens are grown with love, then the Grade 10 students have set up their garden and community for success.