L'augmentation du goût de la vie
École secondaire Hélène-de-Champlain

We often hear about community-based interventions as a means of fighting poverty. When this type of intervention is initiated in a school community by young people with a need to feel useful, it becomes obvious that commitment and learning do go hand in hand. Thus, thanks to their pedagogical, collective vegetable garden, the students at Hélène-de-Champlain high school have managed among other things to donate 2,000 pounds of organic vegetables to more than 130 underprivileged families. A sure sign that young people can indeed make a difference.

When Les mains de Champlain – a cooperative run entirely by students – established from scratch the extracurricular project L’augmentation du goût de la vie, it immediately had a major impact on the community. Covering an area of 6,000 square feet, the vegetable garden is not only a learning laboratory for young students, it has also become an intergenerational meeting place. In fact, the garden is now regarded as a kind of oasis of calm for neighbourhood residents who voluntarily stop by to lend the students a hand and even share their expertise in the area of horticulture.

“Our cooperative was looking to espouse a social cause which at the same time would provide the school with a rallying project. In setting up the garden in collaboration with the school board, the city of Longueuil and the L’entraide chez nous organization, which redistributes vegetables to families, the students discovered the rewards of volunteer work and created a synergy the upshot of which is that they are now more present at school and work together for a good cause,” recounts Daniel Lefebvre, one of the teachers in charge of the project.

As the school is a vocational training centre attended by young people suffering from behaviour disorders and learning disabilities, the daily absenteeism rate often reached 50%, but ever since the project was launched, this rate has dropped significantly and is now just over 10%. And as the school teaches gardening, woodworking and cooking, every single student can do their share in the garden’s development. Some students oversee every aspect from beginning to end such as the sowing and fertilizing, as well as preparing and transplanting the seedlings, watering, weeding and finally harvesting, while others such as those taking woodworking have designed and set up a pond area and created outdoor urban furniture. As for the cooking students, they have the chance to develop their techniques using the vegetables harvested from the garden, which they make into meals served in the school cafeteria.

“In addition to higher student attendance and a decrease in undesirable behaviour, I have also noticed that, because of this innovative project, the students can now benefit from enriched learning experiences. It is a rallying project for the entire team and for our students who can now have a say in the realities they face,” recounts school principal Benoît Miousse.

The project has truly had a tangible impact on young people. It’s almost as though the vegetable garden has become a safe haven where young people naturally go to wind down. “For example, we have a privilege system for the students at school that rewards them for good behaviour,” Mr. Lefebvre explains. “This year, when students are granted a privilege, most of the time, they choose to go and work in the garden. It just goes to show how important it is to them. The only thing is, they feel so useful that sometimes you feel like telling them to stop working.”

A member of Québec’s network of collective gardens, the vegetable garden established by the students at Hélène-de-Champlain high school is currently in the process of obtaining its organic certification. And because the results are more than positive, plans to double the size of the garden by summer 2010 are currently under way.

At the young age of 14, the Coopérative’s president Maxime Landreville asserts that the launch of the vegetable garden has changed many things for many people including himself. “I could never seem to find the motivation to go to school but now it’s the complete opposite. I have come to realize that I have the power to help others and I have gained a lot of self-confidence. It has also been a huge lesson in humanitarian aid and this is something that will stay with me all my life.”

L'augmentation du goût de la vie
École secondaire Hélène-de-Champlain