Wednesday, October 4, 2017 was an amazing night to celebrate 23 years of CommunityGrows and Barbara Wenger's upcoming retirement as founder and Executive Director. The African American Arts and Culture Complex (AAACC) was abuzz with activity from early morning, setting up the Hall of Culture and firming up last minute details. Barbara …
On September 29, 2017 volunteers from Bain and Co and Gateway High School joined CommunityGrows for a workday in Koshland Garden. Melissa Tang, our new CommunityGrows Director of Programs, working with Adrian Almquist, Garden Programs Manager, led the day and assigned tasks. These great crews turned the compost, prepped beds …
On September 14, 2017 the after-school class of the Western Addition Beacon kids arrived in Koshland Garden full of enthusiasm to be outdoors. CommunityGrows Gardens Program Manager, Adrian Almquist, corralled the mostly kindergarten and first graders together to start a lesson on the what plants need to survive. Dirt... water... …
On Saturday, September 9, 2017, CommunityGrows kicked off its partnership with Rosa Parks Elementary by literally moving over 40 cubic feet of beautiful soil into the two school gardens. Parents and students, many from the Green Team of the PTA, began arriving around 10am and pitched in where needed. It …
Wednesday September 6, 2017, CommunityGrows held its second annual fundraiser at Joey the Cat, an event space and arcade game rental company in the Mission District. The event was sponsored by Kaiser-Permanente and it was a blast! Our wonderful Advisory Board put tons of work into raffle prizes and invited …
On Friday, September 8th, volunteers from GAP joined CommunityGrows in Buchanan Mall and the AAACC to help us get the gardens in shape for the Fall season. We started our afternoon with a visit from two Citizen Film representatives. They shared the story of how the community came together to create, …
This month we are saying farewell to one of our beloved Garden Educators, Jay "Jackfruit" Jordan. Jay came to CommunityGrows in 2015 as a recent graduate of Northwestern University’s African American Studies program. Since then he has managed four of our community gardens, including the ones at Rosa Parks Elementary School …
On Saturday, August 26th there were a lot of rallies going on in San Francisco. In fact, two blocks away from our office and Buchanan Mall, thousands of people mobilized around Alamo Square to show their disdain for white supremacy. Months before these rallies developed, our Western Addition community came …
CommunityGrows has won a $3,000 grant from the District Attorney's Office Neighborhood Justice Award. The award will help CommunityGrows build neighborhood cohesion, by employing the BEETS (Band of Environmentally Educated and Employable Teens) to beautify a community garden at the African American Arts and Culture Complex and maintain Buchanan Mall …
This summer CommunityGrows' Rec Connect class has met with cooking class coordinator Crystal Leon with a theme of summer simplicity that will also be able to carry students throughout the school year. That theme is: After School Snack. With the goal of putting together a series of lessons that included all …