What this program is about

People Matter’s Pop-up Community Garden program pays Chicago Public Schools’ POC middle and high schoolers to learn about healthy food and eating, community gardens, and environmental justice. Garden Fellows will learn about how to improve their community’s food and health.

This program exists to fight against food deserts and develop the next leaders of environmental justice The idea came from our Public Safety Commission which seeks to reduce gun violence.

Goals

• To build pop-up community gardens to combat food deserts in low-income POC communities

• To keep Black and Brown at-risk teenagers safe and provide a healing and supportive space

• To organize youth around environmental justice issues

Achievements

• Provided 38 low-income POC families with fresh, local groceries for cooking healthy meals

• Taught Garden Fellows about How to be Stewards of Land, How to organize peers around a cause, Socio-emotional Learning and Coping Mechanisms, as well as How to Garden

• Creating 2 Pop-up Community Gardens to distribute fresh vegetables, flowers, and herbs to local communities

• Pays High Schoolers a living wage to support themselves and their families