#63 100 Gardens | Sam Fleming

In this episode of “The Charter School Connection” Dallan speaks with Sam Fleming, Co-Founder and Executive Director from 100 Gardens. We met Sam at the NCAPCS Conference in July in Wilmington and thought it would make a different but interesting podcast. 100 Gardens is an educational non-profit company with a goal of building 100 aquaponic gardens in schools. Their mission is to empower school communities and students to be smarter, healthier and more compassionate. Smarter by having hands-on applied learning; healthier by growing your own fruits and vegetables year round; more compassionate by understanding the world's ecosystems and cycles better. Learn how they got started in the TED talk in the show notes. 100 Gardens works well with charter schools because of charter schools' entrepreneurial spirit and accessibility for all people. Especially in STEM based schools, the methodology behind aquaponics is great for hands-on STEM learning. What students eat up to the age of 12 determines their eating habits for life and 50% of what a student eats is done at school. So by changing how students eat at school, can change public health as a whole. If you are interested in starting an aquaponic garden at your school, visit the 100 gardens website and send in an application. A meeting will be sent up to make sure the schools mission aligns with 100 gardens. To finish the episode, Sam shares some things he learned at the NCAPCS conference from the keynote speaker, Ron Clark. Time Stamps: 00:50 What is 100 Gardens? 3:25 How did 100 Gardens get started? 6:00 Charter Schools and 100 Gardens 10:26 Next Steps for Admins wanting to start aquaponics. Show Notes: 100 Gardens https://www.100gardens.org/ Ted Talk ​​https://youtu.be/df5OrJptsWU?feature=shared Ron Clark https://www.ronclarkacademy.com/