Hello from the greenest part of the Greenwave! The new school year is officially underway, and I am thrilled to welcome three full classes of Plant Systems students. The first week found our hallways absolutely buzzing. It is sure impressive to see so many dedicated people working so hard to make Churchill County High School the amazing place it is. Our teachers greet students before every class. It’s a super time to throw out lots of plant-themed dad jokes as students and administrators walk by. “How’s it growing?” is my favorite so far. It is wonderful to have such fantastic administrators and staff supporting this positive environment.
Inside the classroom, we are already diving into fascinating botanical topics. Students are learning about the rare and exotic corpse flower, and we are getting hands-on with Tataki-zome — the traditional Japanese technique of flower pounding and plant smashing to transfer natural pigments onto material.
Looking outside, all of our classes will collaborate this year on our ever-developing, iconic front entrance garden project. If you have been following our progress, you know that all the old grass was removed last year. We are completely transforming this area into a functional, beautiful community space.
Great progress has already been made: the concrete is poured, path lighting features are set, and the seating area is officially up. Our next steps include installing and filling the metal raised beds, which were expertly welded by our talented Ag Mechanics classes. Once established, these beds will be filled with fresh herbs, fruits, and vegetables for our culinary classes to harvest and use.
Our impact also reaches far beyond the school grounds. We are proud to be growing native Nevada plants again this year to benefit the Stillwater National Wildlife Refuge. Additionally, we are working to coordinate an exciting, collaborative pollinator planting and growing trip to the Ruby Lake National Wildlife Refuge in northeastern Nevada. This excursion will bring together our Advanced Plants students and the Outdoor Adventure class for real-world conservation work.
Of course, all of this preparation leads up to our highly anticipated annual plant sale in early May, where the community can purchase beautiful plants nurtured directly by our students.
We could not do any of this without the immense generosity of our local community partners. A big thank you goes out to Big R for its wonderful seed donation and to Louie’s Home Center for helping us get growing by supplying soil. We also want to extend a massive thank you to Churchill County Parks and Recreation and everyone who attended our recent bingo night — your support purchased an entire pallet of soil for our program!
Here’s to a fantastic, productive year of growth.
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