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| volume 2, number 4 |
April 2009 |
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Welcome to the eleventh issue of The Root of the Matter. Through our monthly electronic communication, Collective Roots will keep you informed about recent successes, new initiatives, upcoming events, and ways you can get involved with our work for food system change in East Palo Alto. One way in which you can support us is to volunteer as a writer for The Root of the Matter. Please contact CRNews@collectiveroots.org if this is of interest to you.
HAPPY EARTH DAY
Wishing you a wonderful Earth Day 2009. Remember, EVERY day should be Earth Day!
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 Collective Roots is always grateful for financial contributions that allow us to continue and expand our programs. You can make a secure online donation here. To contribute by mail, or for more information on matching gifts or in kind donations, click here. If you have additional questions, please do not hesitate to call us at 650.283.7530.
New Urban Agriculture Center In the Works
We are pleased to announce that Collective Roots has received a generous in-kind contribution from PageMill Properties that will enable the development of a new center for urban agriculture in a neighborhood of East Palo Alto that suffers from a profound lack of access to gardens and open space. The property will also provide much needed office space for our staff and volunteers. Look out for updates in the coming months as this project develops.
Meanwhile, we are looking for in-kind donations, including furniture and other office supplies. If you would like to lend your support, please click here to read our wish list, or feel free to contact us at 650.283.7530 for more information.
Funding Announcements
We are grateful for $25,000 from the Brin Foundation that will support the East Palo Alto Community Farmers Market. Come visit the market's new location (to be announced shortly) when it reopens in a few weeks, and see how we are putting this funding to good use!
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| EAST PALO ALTO 101 |
Thank you to our readers who submitted answers for last month's quiz. The correct answers are:
1. East Palo Alto
2. Rose Jacobs-Gibson (click here to read her bio)
3. Three feet of water
This month's trivia questions:
1. The City of East Palo Alto has been known by a number of different names over the years. Tell us at least one.
2. The first Latino mayor of East Palo Alto was born in Jalisco, Mexico. What is his name?
3. She was a Stanford graduate and mother of seven, born and raised in San Francisco. Her father, president of the NAACP in San Francisco in the 1920s, taught her to stand up to injustice and fight for equality. She moved to East Palo Alto as an adult, took an interest in local politics when she saw inequalities between the education that African American and white children received. She was the founding Mayor of East Palo Alto. Who was she?
The first person to submit all three correct answers to CRNews@collectiveroots.org will receive a Green Zebra Coupon Book. Please write "East Palo Alto Quiz" in the subject line of your email.
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| PROGRAMS |
GARDEN-BASED LEARNING: K-5 PROGRAM
Introducing Katie Gadsby, Our New Staff Member
Students at EPACS and Girls to Women met our new K-5 Garden Teacher, Katie Gadsby, this week. Katie recently completed an M.S in Nutrition and Public Health from Teachers College, Columbia University. She is also a registered dietitian and completed the culinary training program from the Natural Gourmet Institute in New York City.
Katie is inspired by the transformation that occurs in children when they reconnect to their food source and build a healthy relationship to food through garden-based learning, because children will eat what they grow. Katie is an advocate for school gardens and is very excited about the opportunity to work with Collective Roots to teach and create partnerships for garden-based learning with other local schools and programs.
Bryden Johnson, the previous K-5 garden teacher, and beloved outgoing-member of our staff, is continuing to support Collective Roots by providing training to Katie and finishing up outstanding projects that she developed.
East Palo Alto Charter School
Each grade at EPACS participated in a different garden-based lesson last month. Kindergarteners recently enjoyed preparing a six plant-part salad, complete with roots, stems, leaves, flowers, fruit and seeds! Students loved their nutritious snack and a few even licked their plates! First graders participated in a food chain relay. Made up of five teams, each team member represented the passing of energy from the sun to plant to deer to mountain lion. Fourth graders learned how to make a successful compost pile. They also harvested compost, prepared new garden beds with their compost, and added freshly pulled weeds to the pile.
Students from the German-American School in Menlo Park came to visit the garden in March. This is the third annual visit of the school's kindergarten class. Fifth graders led the young students throughout a series of garden stations including compost sifting, watering, weeding and planting sunflowers in recycled newspaper pots. We look forward to the German-American School's visits each year.
Girls to Women
Girls planted their garden bed with lettuce and experimented with a new form of snail control by placing mulch around the bed. Fingers crossed! The girls also prepared and enjoyed delicious smoothies made of mixed berries, yogurt, soy milk and bananas.
GARDEN-BASED LEARNING: MIDDLE SCHOOL ELECTIVE
EPACS Middle Schoolers Celebrate Earth Day
Sixth graders in Garden Elective have been busy preparing their school for Earth Day. They brainstormed tips on how to be friendly to the earth and wrote them on cards to hang in the school hallways. The cards were laminated so we can use them year after year!
 In the garden, the 6th graders have also been busy finishing the willow tunnel and planting sunflowers and other pollinator-friendly plants, in honor of the migration of the Painted Lady butterfly over East Palo Alto.
College Track
College Track students prepared a delicious black bean salad for their Open House on April 17th. With delicious avocados now in season, plus fresh onions and cilantro from the Collective Roots garden, the simple recipe was a hit with tortilla chips! Click here for instructions on how to make it at home.
49ers Academy
Middle School students at the 49ers Academy have been planting lettuce, cucumbers, sage and squash in their Earth Boxes. Because the boxes are in a sheltered area that is free of pests such as birds and snails, these plants have been looking great! Their recent culinary adventure was to create a vegetable wrap made of the six plant parts: roots (carrots), stalks/stems (celery), leaves (lettuce), fruit (avocado), seeds (chickpea hummous), and flowers (broccoli). Educational and delicious!
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FOOD SYSTEM CHANGE |
The Road Show Gets Refined
The Stanford Population Health group of medical students presented the second implementation of the Food System Change Road Show at the Dance for Health event on April 4th. Participating kids enjoyed a Green Team salad relay race, fishing for fruits game, and bicycle blender smoothies. Click here to see more photos from the day.
YOUTH DEVELOPMENT
New Youth Internship Program To Begin This Summer
Collective Roots is excited to launch the Food Justice Leaders internship program this summer. Thanks to stimulus package money trickling down to local communities for youth service and the support of key partners in the community, we will be able to offer four part-time paid positions for youth ages 14 - 24 to work on a variety of projects during June, July and August. Interns will learn about agriculture, business, public health and community work through the Collective Roots garden, and at the East Palo Alto Community Farmers' Market. Applications are currently being accepted. Click here for more information.
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| MONTHLY GARDEN WORKDAYS |
Upcoming Workday: April 25th
The next garden workday will be held on Saturday, April 25th, from 9 AM – noon. It is a beautiful time to be in the garden! Lots of spring flowers are in bloom, and summer vegetables are going in the ground. The wisteria is blossoming and smells heavenly! This workday will be an opportunity for us to prepare for irrigation to support new fruit trees. We will also be weeding, turning compost, planting and mulching.
We'd love you to join us! Click here for more information and directions. To sign up to be a team leader, call 650.324.2769 or email volunteer@collectiveroots.org.
Past Work Days
Castelleja School came out to the garden on March 24th to help with tree projects which they partially funded through the Castilleja Arts with A Heart program! During the day, students helped plant native plants, plant avocado and persimmon trees, create several new flowerbeds, and complete the willow tunnel. Many thanks!
The Community Work Day on March 28th was also a great success! With EPACS parents and students, plus students from Lynbrook High School's California Scholarship Federation (CSF), we were able to transplant a plum tree, create new garden beds, dig a trench for irrigation, paint the posts in the outdoor kitchen, and weed and mulch! A big thank you to all who joined in!
Corporate Workdays
Collective Roots has emerged as a leading provider of environmental service opportunities in the region, and we are grateful for the numerous corporate and academic work groups that are planning service projects in the upcoming months. Many kudos to Eron Sandler, Collective Roots Garden Educator and Manager, who coordinates all of our events!
 Hewlett Packard
Today (which is EARTH DAY!), EPACS students will be working with volunteers from Hewlett Packard to plant marigolds and over 15 varieties of tomatoes from our greenhouse!
 Life Technologies
On May 13th, Life Technologies will begin developing Collective Roots’ new ¼ acre garden site at the 49ers Academy! With 100 volunteers participating over the course of the day, the site will be cleaned up and ready for irrigation and planting!
 Intuit and Stanford
On May 15th and 16th, 250 Stanford University students and Intuit volunteers will be at the Collective Roots garden and out in the EPACS play field. Garden projects and a major playfield clean-up are on the line-up!
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| FARMERS MARKET |
 The EPA Community Farmers' Market is preparing for its big spring re-launch at both a new time and a new location, to be announced very soon--we just don't want to jinx the contract before it is signed!
There has been a lot keeping us busy behind the scenes, and the end result will definitely be a better market. We expect to launch the market's new website next week. The site will provide useful information and interactive features for the community. Also, the market is one of the only in the nation to have a Twitter account! Follow our "tweets" online for the very latest updates, including new crops at the market, special events, and schedule changes. More info at: twitter.com/epamarket
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| FEATURED PARTNER |
EPA.net
One of the missions of EPA.net, an online community resource center that provides East Palo Alto families, businesses and community-based organizations with online tools that increase their capacity to serve their local community, is to engage youth to develop multi media stories from their own perspective. Last year, Ana Soto and Mario Trujillo, two youth reporters from EPA.net, produced You Are the Food System, a documentary about food system change in East Palo Alto.
With the help of the Get Fit Collaborative (of which Collective Roots is a member), EPA.net recently launched a new website dedicated to community fitness and nutrition, with content contributed entirely by youth. After three years of development, the site has now launched. Check it out at http://www.getfitepa.org.
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| WHAT'S GROWING |
Students have been eagerly awaiting the garden's strawberries. The numerous strawberry blossoms that have recent presented themselves bode well for a bountiful harvest! Click here for a simply delicious Arugula and Strawberry Salad you can make quickly at home.
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THE BOOKSHELF |
 Periodically we read or hear about a book that really resonates with our mission, and we feel compelled to share it. This is the space where we will do just that. Are you currently reading a great book that we might appreciate? We welcome your recommendations and would be happy to feature your book in a future column. Please click here to email us.
This month, Collective Roots' Executive Director Wolfram Alderson is reading Eating the Sun, a new book about photosynthesis by Oliver Morton. The book details the past, present and future of plants: the scientific discovery of photosynthesis, the development of plant life, and how global warming jeopardizes this process. But at 480 pages, this tome might not be for everyone. Click here to read more about the book or to buy a copy through Amazon Marketplace. (If you make a purchase through this link, Collective Roots will receive a donation from Amazon.)
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| FOOD SYSTEM NEWS |
 On our website we gather an abundance of articles on issues related to our work in food system change, children's diet and health, the environment, the green tech economy in Silicon Valley and beyond, as well as other articles of interest. Click here to read recent news on these topics.
Staff Blogs
The Collective Roots staff has been blogging about their daily activities and other events of interest. Click on staff members' names below to check out their writing, and feel free to make comments of your own!
Eron Sandler, Garden Educator and Manager
David Kane, Food System Change Coordinator
Wolfram Alderson, Executive Director
Connecting the Global with the Local
A number of headlines last month reflected our work with food system change, gardening and community health and nutrition:
- Maria Shriver is planting a garden at the State Capitol in Sacramento.
- A Columbia University/University of California study finds that a student's weight is influenced by their school's proximity to fast food (a no brainer!). This data finally corroborates the instrumental theory behind our organization--that food systems have a measurable impact on the health of local youth.
- Today, it takes 10 calories of energy to produce a single calorie of food at a commercial supermarket, as compared to 2.3 calories in 1940. Growing your own food is a much more efficient equation!
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NOTE: This newsletter employs hyperlinks that act as shortcuts to related documents or web pages. Click on the green underlined words in the articles above to find out more information.
If someone forwarded you this newsletter, please click here to add your name to our mailing list.
To read past newsletters, go to http://collectiveroots.org/news/newsletters.
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