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Welcome to the newest 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.
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| FEATURE ARTICLE |
 Why Parks Matter
This month we had a visit from Robert Garcia, an advisor to the Collective Roots' Immigrant Health Integration and Advocacy Project, which pinpoints factors that affect the health of East Palo Alto residents. Garcia is also the founder of The City Project, a Los Angeles-based nonprofit organization that advocates for equal access to urban parks, schoolyards and open spaces. Click here to read excerpts from a conversation between Garcia and Carla Hernandez, a senior at East Palo Alto Phoenix Academy, about why parks matter.
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| FARMERS' MARKET |
 Use Fresh Checks Before Market Season Ends Dec. 19th
 The Market will close for the winter after December 19th. You won’t want to miss the last day, because we have a special celebration planned for our community and our vendors. And be sure to use up all your Fresh Checks before December 19th! Stay tuned for the announcement of the spring 2010 reopening date.
 Please Welcome Mark to the Market!
Mark Anthony Medeiros is the new Assistant Farmer’s Market Manager at Collective Roots. You will see him out in the community every week, promoting and managing the East Palo Alto Community Farmer’s Market. He recently graduated from San Jose State University with a degree in Sociology and Environmental Studies, with an emphasis on Community Change.
When not at the Market, Mark spends much of his time helping to manage the Veggielution farm, a young non-profit he co-founded which runs a one-acre community farm at Prusch Farm Park in San Jose. He has worked on a variety of issues related to the environment, land-use and poverty in the South Bay, but his passions lie in community organizing and sustainable agriculture.
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| Market Hours: |
Every Saturday, 2-5 PM, Rain or Shine!
NOTE: The Market will close for the winter after December 19th.
The Spring 2010 reopening date will be announced shortly
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| Location: |
East Palo Alto City Hall & Library, 2415 University Avenue, East Palo Alto, CA 94303 |
| Information: |
http://www.epafarmersmarket.org
Click here to read market updates online and to subscribe to weekly market updates by email (sent every Thursday.) NOTE: We will never share your personal information with outside parties. |
Remember! |
EBT/food stamps, WIC and Senior FMNP checks always accepted.
If eligible, we'll give you $5 in EPA Fresh checks to spend at the Market, click here. |
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| GARDEN WORKDAYS / OTHER EVENTS |
Next Garden Workday: Saturday, November 21st
Come out to the EPACS garden on November 21st, between 8 AM and noon, get your hands dirty in the soil, and help us ease the transition into winter. We will prepare and mulch our new garden beds, and get the greenhouse ready for new seedlings (and a new irrigation system.) We look forward to hosting parents and students from EPACS, returning community volunteers, and new VolunteerMatch volunteers! Please note: the workday will be cancelled in the case of rain. Click here to RSVP and for directions to the garden.
 Fresh Fridays: Join the Fun!
We recently started a new program to engage our neighbors, organizational supporters and the EPA community with our fantastic flagship garden at the East Palo Alto Charter School. Come one, come all, and join us for Fresh Fridays (every Friday from 1-5 PM)--come when you can, and leave when you need to! By lending a hand to our garden work projects, you will help us leverage one of our most important assets. We’ll also be offering regular educational workshops, and all volunteers will be encouraged to enjoy the fruits of your labor by tasting edibles from the garden!
No experience is necessary to participate, and people of all ages (including students from other schools) are welcome to attend. Learn more at http://www.collectiveroots.org/freshfridays, or just drop by! Click here to read about the first Fresh Friday on November 6th, when we were visited by special gardener guests, such as Steve Nielsen of Steve Nielsen Architects, who brought us a truckload of his home-made compost!
Seeds 'n' Things
Click here to read how a children’s book about creating an urban garden inspired Gaby DiMuro, a Humanities teacher from Girls Middle School in Mountain View, to bring more than 50 students to EPACS for a day of service in the garden last month.
King Corn and Fresh Screened to Packed Houses!
Nearly 100 people came out to the screening of Fresh last month, sponsored by Collective Roots, Conexions and the San Mateo Public Library. It was a packed house! Panelists from the San Mateo County Food System Alliance shared their perspectives on the good work already happening in our county. We own a copy of Fresh and we are eager to spread the message of this  fantastic film through educational screenings. If you are interested in screening Fresh for your organization, school, or office, please contact Collective Roots at 650.324.2769.
Executive Director Wolfram Alderson also spoke to a room full of food-interested folks at a showing of the 2007 documentary film, King Corn at World Centric. Read more about this film and Wolfram’s comments as guest speaker at that event here.
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| PROGRAMS |
Garden-Based Learning: Elementary
Last month students from the elementary program at EPACS were busy studying seeds, bird evolution and adaptation, and also did some bird watching in the Baylands adjacent to the school. Older students investigated the water cycle and ideas for conserving water. Clifford Elementary students held their first Farmer’s Market at the school! Read more about baking with Girls to Women, making paper pots with Earth Club, and all our elementary school garden-based learning activities here.
Garden-Based Learning: Middle School
Our middle schoolers from EPACS, 49ers Academy and College Track were busy harvesting and cooking seasonal meals, and exploring the Baylands last month! Read all about our middle school gardening programs right here.
Integrated Programs
Last month we reported that CR staffers are working on the development of a Health Career Pipeline Project for youth in East Palo Alto. Now the network is expanding thanks to the help of Dr. Mindy Ju, a pediatric resident at Stanford who has agreed to recruit more health professionals to mentor our students. Click here to read more about the Pipeline project, and find out about plans to launch the new website for the Healthy Development Measurement Tool in the next few months.
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| STAFF NEWS |
 Seeking Six Passionate Part-Timers To Promote
Food System Change!
Collective Roots is actively interviewing for six quarter-time paid positions available through Americorps. The application process begins with the Health Trust. If you have some free time in your schedule, and you are interested in promoting our goal bring fresh fruits, vegetables and education to residents of Santa Clara and San Mateo counties, please visit our website to read the job descriptions. We urge you to apply today!
 Cathy Harkness is so excited to be volunteering with Collective Roots where she can tap into her passion for teaching kids about the environmental and health benefits of growing and eating local, sustainable food. She currently works at Camp Campbell Outdoor Science School as a Field Teacher, where she teaches her students “why pirates wear eye patches, and kiss banana slugs.” Her school and community gardening experience includes being a Master Composter, through Santa Clara County; she also worked for two years as the Garden Coordinator and GREEN club president, with students at Santa Clara University. In her free time, Cathy enjoys growing vegetables in her front yard garden (this year she grew 17 pumpkins that took over the front lawn!), and playing with her lovely black lab, Macie.
 Seeking Volunteer Engineers
We are currently seeking volunteer engineers to help us design and build a mobile farmer’s market! Imagine a human-powered rickshaw of sorts—a farm stand on wheels that can pack up in the back of a Prius, or maybe even be pulled behind a bicycle? We plan to use the “edible vehicle” to sell veggies at our partner charter schools, and to sell produce from the Backyard Gardener’s Network at the EPA Community Farmer’s Market. We’ll also take it to schools as part of the Food System Change Road Show. If you are interested and have the skills to make our vision happen, please find out more and submit an application.
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| FEATURED PARTNER |
 This month we recognize the 49ers Academy, a public middle school in East Palo Alto, as our Featured Partner. This unique institution is a public school, supported by a private non-profit agency, Communities in Schools. And for the past year, they have offered an after school gardening program called “Green Club”, thanks to a partnership with Collective Roots!
Students in Green Club are excitedly anticipating the construction of the quarter-acre garden at their school. The garden will feature herb and vegetable  patches, and solar power, and we are thrilled to announce that fruit trees are also on the way, thanks to a grant and collaboration with Canopy Trees! We’ll keep you posted on upcoming opportunities to help with the fruit tree planting in January! Also in the works is a Green Dome, donated and built by Vance Brown Builders. We are grateful to the Academy for this partnership, which allows Collective Roots to bring our garden-based science curriculum to more students in East Palo Alto.
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| WHAT'S GROWING |
 The Garden is full of delicious and nutritious collards, which are not letting the shortened days slow them down! On your next visit to the garden you may notice that we have been busy planting fruit trees and with great pleasure announce the arrival of our first avocado! We look forward to enjoying the bounty of our new trees.
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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.
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To read past newsletters, go to http://collectiveroots.org/news/newsletters.
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