Hopkins Senior Service Week

Senior Service Week

by Kelsey Sullivan, Resident Engagement AmeriCorps VISTA

On Monday, June 1 in the NHS Demonstration Garden, the Hopkins’ volunteer week started off with a lot of hard work and manual labor. Despite the steady drizzle and unseasonably cold temperatures, about fifteen students worked diligently in the garden all day, and completed some serious landscaping!

Three new shrubs were planted near the entrance of the garden, hosta plants were harvested from where they had sprung up along the southern fence, and a pile of refuse wood was broken down and removed from the rear of the garden. In the afternoon, two of the Hopkins teams hopped on the school bus to the Ivy Street garden. One enthusiastic crew dug out a deep trench along the rear fence of the garden, while others raked, weeded, and helped to organize materials inside the greenhouse. 

 

On Tuesday two Hopkins groups again took to the demonstration garden in the morning rain. This was another highly productive morning! One crew took on the laborious task of digging out the driveway and installing large stone slabs to make an attractive walkway. In the rear of the garden, another group layered cardboard to act as a weed guard over future planting areas which were then covered with leaf mold material. Finally, the remaining students diligently worked to install plastic edging around the planting areas, taking painstaking effort to shape the lining correctly.

 

 

In the afternoon I took a small group of volunteers to sweep and pick up garbage along Shelton Avenue between the Ivy Street Garden and the Shelton Avenue Community Wall next to Cerda’s Market. At the wall, the group stopped to collect two very heavy stone blocks and carry them back to the garden entrance to be installed among the new hosta plants as stepping-stones. Meanwhile, a few students and a determined Hopkins teacher collaborated to devise a way to fix a small break in the greenhouse roof.

On Wednesday I spent the entire work day with a Hopkins group at the Davenport Community Garden with the garden coordinator, Chris Prokop. The change that the students implemented in this garden in just one day was incredible! In the morning, the garden was composed of six or seven raised beds that had definitely seen better days. Many wooden boards were deteriorating, some of the sideboards were warped and bulging outwards, and the beds were full of weeds. Furthermore, the beds had been installed some years ago in a crooked pattern that was visually interesting, but that made the task of mowing the grass very challenging for Chris! By the time the students ended work in the afternoon, ten brand new garden beds had been constructed on-site, placed in neat rows and filled with topsoil.

 

The students even partially mulched the pathways with material that a neighborhood resident unexpectedly donated! The result was a dramatic visual change in the garden, and we hope that this workday marks the beginning of an exciting season for the Davenport Community Garden!  

 

 

 

On Thursday I again accompanied two of the volunteer groups to Ivy Street. The students were only with us until noon, but they still managed to complete an impressive amount of work! Some students used saws and loppers to prune trees and remove sturdy weeds, while many others cleared the garden areas of smaller weeds. Additionally, a group of students made fantastic progress with building up a new planting row along the garden’s south fence. The students worked with focus and enthusiasm right up until they boarded the school bus for the final time. 

 

 

 

We appreciate the positive attitudes, dedication, and transformative contributions made by these students, to three of New Haven’s gardens! Great work Hopkins class of 2015- we wish you the best in your future endeavors!