Whole Kids Foundation is built on a spirit of collaboration, and we act as a catalyst for change by investing in partnerships with respected experts in the fields of nutrition and education.

Together, we amplify each other’s efforts to improve children's nutrition and wellness.

Throughout 2023, we are spotlighting our current partners and how these organizations are growing the next generation of healthy eaters.

Green Our Planet inspires growth in people and communities through educational conservation programs and believes every big idea, big movement, or big change starts with a single small seed.

They know that with the right tools and education, a seed can grow from the soil to the stars! Through their programs, Green Our Planet supports educators in establishing STEM laboratories within and outside of their schools enabling them to integrate experiential education directly into their classrooms so students can learn about and connect with the living world around them.

Whole Kids Foundation and Green Our Planet first met when we awarded several Garden Grants to gardens in Las Vegas that were supported by the Green Our Planet team. Over the years, we have been thrilled to support their vision to train educators across the Las Vegas area and their efforts toward scaling their work with the development of the Green Our Planet Culturally Responsive Hydroponics Framework and the Middle/High School Hydroponics curriculum. Whole Kids Foundation continues to be an avid supporter of the Green Our Planet work and mission and looks forward to a continued partnership.

We reached out to Ciara Byrne, Co-Founder & Co-CEO of Green Our Planet, to get the scoop on how they are helping kids learn to love fresh, nutritious, whole foods.

WHOLE KIDS FOUNDATION (WKF): WHAT IS GREEN OUR PLANET’S APPROACH TO ADVANCING CHILDREN’S NUTRITION AND WELLNESS?

At Green Our Planet we are helping build a movement to create Joy and Justice in education by empowering teachers, students and families to grow food and connect to the magic and majesty of the Universe. A core goal of the movement is to positively impact the health, wellness and futures of students, communities and the planet as a whole.

We do this in a holistic way by providing schools two turnkey programs: GardenConnect is our outdoor garden program and HydroConnect is our indoor hydroponics program. Teachers receive everything they need to implement these programs at their schools - gardens, hydroponics systems, K-12 STEM, Nutrition and Conservation curricula to Next Gen Science Standards, training, coaching from the Green Our Planet staff, etc.

Our vision is that students’ nutrition and wellness will be impacted in a more positive way the more times students connect with the gardens or hydroponics systems. So, while we train teachers to use the gardens to teach students about nutrition and wellness, we believe that students should see the gardens as more than that.

We want students to use the gardens to learn STEM, conservation and how to turn their garden into a business through the Farmpreneur program. 5th grade, middle and high school students run farmers markets at their schools as well as at Giant Student Farmers Markets. This holistic approach continually reminds students about where their food comes from and that they can learn STEM skills to help them get a good job after school as well as create successful businesses selling healthy food. Therefore, in combination, all of these efforts will advance student’s nutrition and wellness. It’s simple. When we plant a seed, we ignite growth and spark curiosity. Whether it’s a seed of knowledge or hope or a real seed in the ground, we are changing the future of our students, our communities and our world.

HOW DO YOUR PROGRAMS RAISE ENVIRONMENTAL AWARENESS AND CREATE CONSCIOUSNESS AMONG YOUTH AROUND THE ISSUES THAT AFFECT THE EARTH?

At Green Our Planet, we know every big idea, big movement, big change starts with a single small seed. From an accidental school garden program in Las Vegas, we bloomed into a national non-profit organization currently working in 37 states, dedicated to igniting curiosity, creating connections to the natural world and positively impacting the futures of students, communities and the world. We inspire growth in people and communities through educational conservation programs, and we account for every detail down to, well, the seeds. We wake up every day to share our passion, ideas and knowhow with people of all ages, so they too can explore the gateway to the magic and majesty of the universe.

We do this through our STEMWORKS-accredited outdoor garden program (GardenConnect), our indoor hydroponics laboratories (HydroConnect), and our Virtual Academy filled with video lessons for all ages. Our science, technology, engineering and math education programs also teach nutrition, financial literacy and conservation education in PreK-12 schools to send change rippling through communities across the country. Our goal is to make education magical. We spark curiosity. We inspire growth. Because we know that with the right tools and education, a seed can grow from the soil to the stars.

Green Our Planet works directly with the teachers to educate students on all kinds of conservation issues connected to climate change. Here in Nevada due to our 1500-year drought we focus particularly on water conservation and making mindful choices that will benefit the earth. In partnership with the Southern Nevada Water Authority, Green Our Planet has helped 200 schools remove water-intensive lawns and replace them with vegetable gardens, saving the Clark County School District more than 50 million gallons of water each year while teaching students how to grow their own produce. By helping the students embrace new ways of saving our planet, they not only feel good about the choices they are making but creating a lasting effect on Earth. Together, we are greening our planet.

HOW CAN HAVING HYDROPONIC PROGRAMS IN ADDITION TO OR IN PLACE OF OUTDOOR GARDENS IN SCHOOLS BROADEN A STUDENT’S UNDERSTANDING OF AND CONNECT THEM WITH THE WORLD AROUND THEM?

The hydroponics program, in addition to the outdoor garden program, is an excellent resource for students to learn how to grow food in a natural laboratory right inside their classrooms. Since hydroponic gardens don’t require soil and can be kept indoors, they are perfect for schools that can’t grow plants outside in the winter. Indoor, climate-controlled hydroponic systems make food production and education possible any time of the year in any weather condition. Hydroponics also makes it possible to grow in locations where poor soil conditions, such as the Mojave Desert, or limited space prevent growing plants traditionally in soil. We believe that the best option for students is to have access to both a hydroponics and an outdoor garden program. That way students can experience both ways of growing food and at the same time can carry out all kinds of experiments to calculate the rate of growth of food using both an indoor and outdoor garden. Students will learn how to overcome the challenge of not having pollinators indoors to help pollinate the plants. Hydroponics uses 80-90% less water than traditional agriculture and can be grown vertically and so make a better use of space. Therefore, we believe that in the future, a significant amount of food will be grown hydroponically in warehouses surrounding large cities. We are getting our students ready for this future which is exciting!

WHAT CURRENT OR UPCOMING PROJECT OR PROGRAM IS YOUR TEAM EXCITED ABOUT RIGHT NOW?

The Green Our Planet team is very excited to produce the bi-annual Giant Students Farmers Market in Las Vegas and for the first time, Carson City. Founded in 2013, the student-run farmers market in Las Vegas will feature produce grown from 62 Clark County School District school gardens. Over 600 student farmers will be in attendance to sell their produce and crafts to the public with all proceeds returning to the schools to amplify and preserve the schools’ garden programs. The farmers market is set to take place on Friday, April 21 from 9:30 a.m. – 1 p.m. at Downtown Summerlin and in front of the capitol building in Carson City on May 16 from 9.30-1pm.

HOW DOES WORKING WITH VALUE-ALIGNED ORGANIZATIONS IMPACT YOUR WORK AND WHAT HAS BEEN THE IMPACT OF THE PARTNERSHIP WITH WHOLE KIDS FOUNDATION?

We couldn’t do what we do without the support of organizations such as Whole Kids Foundation. We have worked with Whole Kids since we started Green Our Planet back in 2013 when we encouraged our schools to apply for grants from Whole Kids in order to build their gardens. Since then, many of our schools have received support from Whole Kids.

Whole Kids has also assisted us in so many other ways. A recent exciting project funded by Whole Kids includes the creation of a Culturally Relevant Framework for the Hydroponics Program. This framework was created by a group of Native American, LatinX and Caucasian teachers coming together to figure out how we can best reach students through their cultural background and the environment where they live. This framework is now being used across the country by thousands of teachers and is making hydroponics more relevant to the students we serve. Meanwhile, we are just finishing up another exciting project to develop Hydroponics Curriculum for Grades 6-12. We have many middle and high schools in our hydroponics program and the teachers have been requesting STEM, nutrition and conservation curriculum for a few years now. Thanks to the generosity of Whole Kids in partnership with the Greater Good Council of Nevada, the Alice C Tyler Foundation and the Andre Agassi Foundation for Education we will have 116 lessons ready for MS and HS to be released in August 2023. In addition, we are creating video lessons to go along with each lesson. We cannot thank Whole Kids Foundation enough for their generosity to empower our work with our communities to change the world!