Students at James Wilson Young Middle School are learning about horticulture and developing their green thumbs through tending to an aeroponic tower garden in their classroom. The tower garden was donated by the PTA and comes equipped with its own watering and lighting systems, which the students worked hard to assemble. They then planted all the seeds necessary to grow various vegetables and herbs and have since been busy checking the garden’s PH regularly and making weekly observations.

The students plan to use the food they’ve grown to set up a farmer’s market in their classroom café and look forward to incorporating it into recipes of their choice. According to teacher Rachel Kelly, they are very excited about the project and “being able to watch something they created grow – and grow pretty quickly — has been really beneficial for them.”