A partnership of the General Services Administration (GSA), the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the FAA (DOT) Child Development Center, Inc.’s Board of Directors, and the American Farm Bureau Foundation for Agriculture marked the dedication of the newly planted garden for the FAA (DOT) Child Development Center at the FAA building in Washington, DC on Tuesday, June 7th.    This project started in the summer of 2010, when Brad Twinam, the GSA Property Manager for the two FAA buildings on Independence Avenue, returned from the annual GSA Child Care Conference. At the conference, Brad heard Darren DeStefano, a GSA Horticulturist, talk about the benefits of children’s gardens. Brad asked the staff of the FAA (DOT) Child Development Center (operated by Children’s Choice Learning Center) if they were interested in starting a children’s garden. Sharleen Smith, the Director of the FAA (DOT) Child Development Center, told Brad that the American Farm Bureau, which is across the street from the center, had already been sending volunteers to do educational lessons with the preschool about planting and farming, so the garden would be a perfect extension of that educational experience.

The children plant and maintain the garden as part of their curriculum on nutrition and health.  The children will do the bulk of the work in the garden, but a group of adult volunteers will help them with organizing, weeding and watering on the weekends and holidays, when the children will not be on site.

The garden consists of four planting beds, 24×2.48 feet, so there is about 192 square feet of garden. During the first year, the emphasis will be on planting a sensory garden. There will also be a “roly poly pig” composter to teach the children valuable lessons about sustainability.   The first planting day was held on March 29, and volunteers from the partners involved in the project developed several stations for the children to rotate through and actually do the planting. After the dedication of the garden on June 7th, the planting was completed, and the children participated in several stations to teach them more about composting and gardening.  The children also presented the volunteers with a thank you gift that they had made and Property Management then sponsored a cookout in the garden to thank all of the federal and community volunteers for their help.

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