With a little digging and hard work, Wrangell High School students have unearthed a grant to help grow a project.
Junior Rylee Chelette and sophomore Mia Wiederspohn used their grant-writing skills and were awarded funds to help special education teacher Ann Hilburn launch a life-skills project that revolves around starting an indoor garden and incorporating activity, science, math, planning and running a business.
“(Basic) things that … our children learn, seems to be by osmosis, but for (the special education students) it has to be hands-on, specifically taught and it has to make sense,” Hilburn said. “If they are involved in planning and we have the money in hand and we go to the store and buy what we need, what do we have left? Can we get the next thing? It helps them to understand.”
Having a step-by-step process of preparing the soil, planting the seeds, growing the plants, harvesting and then selling them gives the students a more concrete understanding of how things work. “Once they see the whole thing coming together and they did it, then it makes more sense to them,” Hilburn said.
Hilburn had approached assistant principal Bob Davis about another activity project she had in mind, while at about the same time Davis found and shared a separate gardening grant with Lisa Brooks, who teaches the grant-writing class. Hilburn decided to teach an indoor gardening class instead of her previous idea, and Chelette and Wiederspohn began the application process for two grants; one was denied and one, the 2022 Youth Gardening Grant through kidsgardening.org, was awarded.
“The grant is a value of $1,050 — $250 in cash and the rest of it in supplies,” Hilburn said. “They’ll be sending a lot of gardening supplies, seeds, tools. We’ve ordered special lighting for the room, pots and soil.”
The grant is the largest that Chelette and Wiederspohn have received since they started learning how to write grants. Since starting the class this school year, the duo has written seven grant applications, received four, including one from First Bank, and are waiting to hear back on one. “And we’re about to start another one,” Chelette said.
Outside of garnering funds for various school programs, Wiederspohn said grant writing has taught them valuable life skills like communication, research and patience.
“It depends on how much information you have to gather,” she said. “Sometimes we have to email multiple people, have meetings. And (other grants we’re writing) we can whip those out pretty fast because we know all our information from the school.”
Chelette added, “I also feel like it gives us good communication skills with other people because, even if you’re not good at that, you have to do it.”
Davis said the process has taught Chelette and Wiederspohn how to interact with their instructors differently.
“One of the things I’ve noticed is that they have to go and collect information, so they’re talking to adults on a whole other level,” Davis said. “Either with Mrs. Hilburn, trying to figure out what she wants because they’re writing the grant for her, or from the school secretary, gathering information.”
Along with the gardening grant, Hilburn was given $1,000 from the school’s Building a Supportive Environment program, operated by students to raise money for food services, inclusivity and making the school feel more welcoming. At first, it was contingent on raising money to pay back the BASE funds.
“What we would like to do, once we get the supplies and get things growing, is grow some vegetables, some flowers, some herbs, and then we would like to sell those,” Hilburn said. “I told BASE once we started selling the plants, we could half the money to pay them back. Of course, they gave us the money and told us we didn’t have to pay them back.”
The special education class, which includes five students, also received donated seeds from Ottesen’s True Value.
Hilburn and her husband grow an outdoor garden every year, but this will be the first time she’s tried her hand at indoor gardening. She’s optimistic, since Wrangell has a large network of gardening enthusiasts that can help answer any questions that might arise.
Though it is all just starting out, Hilburn’s goal is to keep the program in place.
“I want this program to be an ongoing program for kids,” she said.
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