NYC Schools Teach Farming On Rooftops

The Fifth Street Farm

There's a bit of a revolution going on in urban rooftop vegetable gardens. Here's an article in the New York Times about schools in the Big Apple that are using the gardens to teach not only gardening and nutrition, but also subjects as varied as science, art, mathematics and social studies.

In the past two years the number of school based garden have soared from 40 to 232. Perhaps the biggest is the 2,400-square-foot garden at Avenue B and Fifth Street in the East Village, on top of a red-brick building that houses three public schools: the Earth School, Public School 64 and Tompkins Square Middle School called the Fifth Street Farm.

Its goal "is to create a large green roof farm accessible to children of all ages on the Robert Simon Complex in New York City's East Village. We hope this initiative will lead to greater awareness and understanding for our children of the natural world, especially the vital role plants play in our lives."