Album: First Plantings
An exquisite Spring day with the first crocuses up and out in their violet glory, as the skylark and mocking birds exchange songs. Luis Lemus from with NY Botanical Garden's Bronx Green Up blessed us with his presence and led the Green Team in preparing and planting the composted soil of four vegetable beds. Spinach, radishes, broccoli, chard, peas and lettuce were sown with love and care and spread with a light layer of hay mulch. A quick and easy cold frame completed the tasks, with a control bed without the plastic for us to compare growth rates. The 11th Grade Science class from Comm. School for Social Justice followed up the next day digging into the coinmpost piles and sowing more seeds of joy!

Album: Community School for Social Justice Summer Session
Continuing our school year partnership, we hosted this excellent school for the first day of Summer Session. After a re- introduction we sat in a circle and passed a talking stick (a small dolphin) sharing our names and what we appreciate ab out parks and gardens. Then there was a written assignment with math counting, height and perimeter measurements, leaf and bark rubbings and more. The some journaling, while a bunch of students learned form each other how to split wood. It will be a fun summer!

Album: Green Team 2005 with Community School for Social Justice
Today we were off to a great start of our second semester of our Internship and Mentoring program in collaboration with the exceptional Community School for Social Justice. We presented before the second half of the 10th graders the vision and activities of our project. Thanks to the previous semester's Green Team members, great enthusiasm led to the students selecting to participate in our efforts. This initiative operates every week through June.

Album: The Butterfly Project fun planting workshop!
The Butterfly Project A planting workshop led by Ursula Chanse and Chrissy Word! Adding Conservation Education Value to New York City Community Gardens. Butterflies moving through New York City face a fragmented and highly urbanized landscape with few nectar-feeding opportunities. We provide important food sources for butterflies and other beneficial insects that serve an educational role, helping gardeners and visitors learn about the importance of butterflies and other beneficial pollinator insects such as bees and stingless wasps.

Album: Green Team on TV & Meets Bronx Borough President Carrion
We were invited by the Bronx Overall Economic Development Corporation, under the leadership of Bronx Borough President Adolfo Carrion, as a part of their Energy and Environment Initiative, funded by the New York Power Authority, to a check presentation press conference at the soon to be opened Bronx Fulton Fish Market. Six teens from the Community School for Social Justice attended the event, met local leaders in the environmental realm, such as Majora Carter from Sustainable South Bronx. The students are part of our regular Mentoring collaboration with the high school where Friends of Brook Park hosts teens weekly and introduces them to the community organizing and ecological work we are engaged in to develop leadership, foster confidence and forge team building skills. The youth chronicled the event with a digital camera, learned about our part in a larger effort to improve the environment and represented themselves and our programs impeccably and were interviewed by Bronx News 12, the widely viewed channel in the borough. That link is included here: http://news12.com/BX/topstories/article?id=125480

Album: Green Team Mentoring Program Winter Spring Summer 2006
We are continuing our successful Green Team Internship and Mentoring Program. The community action experience allows the students to explore the meaning of community by working outdoors in Nature. Community service is a mandatory graduation requirement for all Community School for Social Justice students in their second year. We embrace all the elements by planting vegeatble and flowers and trees, paddling on local waterways, making camp and cooking fires and walking our labyrinth and breathing deeply.

Album: Earth Day April 2004
Our Earth Day event was a great success, with over 100 students participating in outdoor learning activities, park beautification, planting and community visioning in our tipi. Participating schools included PS 30 grammar school, and the High School for Social Justice. South Bronx Clean Air Coalition led a session with the teens encouraging them to imagine how they would like to see our neighborhood. Saint Benedict the Moor provided information on Community Supported Agriculture as well as fresh fruits and water. Later, we joined a community march to the garbage transfer stations on the waterfront to call attention to the proposed expansion and the significant environmental concerns the concentration of polluting industries in our community represents.

Album: Green Team Mentoring Program Autumn/Winter 2005
We are continuing our successful Green Team Internship and Mentoring Program. The community action experience allows the students to explore the meaning of community by working outdoors in Nature. Community service is a mandatory graduation requirement for all Community School for Social Justice students in their second year.