STOP THE VIOLENCE START THE GARDEN: GARDEN DEDICATION AND FOOD DISTRIBUTION EVENT
Wicomico Partnership for Families and Children recently received a $1,200 grant from The Governor’s Office on Service and Volunteerism to support the Stop the Violence – Start the Garden Project. This event will be held September 11, 2014 from 4:00 to 6:00pm at Stop the Violence’s youth drop-in center, 509 Calloway St., Salisbury MD.
Wicomico Partnership for Families and Children, Stop the Violence Wicomico County, Salisbury University and University of Maryland Eastern Shore will collaborate on the project, which will offer classroom nutritional instruction for 10-15 local children in third through sixth grades. Sessions will be based on the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s “A Yummy Curriculum” program. On September 11, the youth will have the opportunity to apply what they learned by planting a community garden at Stop the Violence’s youth drop-in center. The initiative will commemorate this year’s September 11 Day of Service and Remembrance; not only remembering the tragic 2001 terrorist attacks that took place that day, but working with local children to make a difference in the community as well.
Approximately 40 students from Salisbury University and University of Maryland Eastern Shore will serve as volunteers for this project. Volunteers will continue to work on a weekly basis to assist the youth in tending to the garden, to include fall crops such as beets, broccoli, cabbage, lettuce and cauliflower. The garden’s yield will help provide healthy meals to children attending Stop the Violence programs. Youth planting the garden will be allowed to take excess vegetables home to their families.
As part of the September 11 event, families who reside in the local community may visit the Stop the Violence campus to receive a bag of donated food items from Maryland Food Bank. Distribution of food items to community families will take place at the Stop the Violence center from 3:30pm to 6pm on September 11, or while supplies last.
Stop the Violence — Start the Garden project is funded through Wicomico Partnership for Families and Children with funding from the Governor’s Office on Service and Volunteerism and the Governor’s Office for Children. For more information or to sign up to receive food items contact Janese Weathers at 410-546-5400 Ext 14 or Lisa Campbell ext.13.
