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EcoRadio KC
EcoRadio KC is a magazine show, including live segments, prerecorded stories, and interviews. The weekly explores our interdependence with the rest of the world, showing the connections between the ways we choose to live and the health of the whole community of life.
On this episode of EcoRadio KC we hear from young people who are growing food in Kansas City. We have interviews from kids at the KC Farm School at Gibbs Road who share their experience in this summers’ Farm Camp, one of only a few area camps that were able to adapt to hands-on and virtual learning. We also talk with Grow Guerrilla Grow, a new organization dedicated to using vacant lots for food production in areas that need more fresh produce.
The KC Farm School
With Wyandotte County and metro-wide support, KC Farm School at Gibbs Road is growing a community around food by presenting the natural world to youth and adult alike, inviting them outside to connect to land and soil. The farm is a laboratory for their learning, the soil is their guide.
Food: We grow a lot of food on our 3 acre urban lot in Wyandotte County. To grow great food, we build our soil using regenerative and organic agriculture practices. To learn more about the land we walk on, visit our mission page. Our food is distributed through Community Supported Agriculture shares, at our Pay What You Please on-farm market, wholesale through our membership in the Kansas City Food Hub, through barter agreements for skilled trades and to gleaning organizations.
Education: The farm is at the center of the community and as a living laboratory, we teach and learn together. We invite all to the farm for employment opportunities, job skills training, volunteerism, curricular experiences and to simply walk, stretch and learn from the land. Through our collaborations, we are developing curriculum for pre-k through high school in regenerative agriculture, culinary arts, waste management, and climate resilience. Lessons to Go are being developed for those unable to visit the farm, as is job skills training for students interested in gaining skills to carry them to their future vocation, ag related or not. Our systems of berms and swales, native meadows, perennial tree fruit crops, gathering space and a wildland playground provide opportunity to climb, explore and connect. Visit this page to learn with us.
Community: Community is a simple word steeped in complexity. As we seek to grow community around food, we look not only to the geographic position we hold but to the larger idea of connection and interdependence. As a community of farmers, neighbors, teachers and friends we share. We share food, seed, greenhouse space, tools and ideas. We share our talents with each other and grow into leaders, builders, growers, farmers and change-makers. We’re inclusive. All are welcome to the farm ecosystem and all have a role to fill. As Geoff Lawton says, “You can solve all the world’s problems in a garden.”
