The Farm at Walker Jones is an emerging one acre school farm located in the heart of the District of Columbia. It is the first urban farm attached to a school in the District and serves as a resource to the students, their families, the surrounding community and the network of school garden programs across the city.

Student engagement with the farm consists of hands on farming activities and tastings. In order to further connect students to the food they have a hand in growing we are building a teaching kitchen.

The project will fund the purchase of a quarter of the supplies needed to create one culinary workstation in the kitchen that will be shared by 4 students. This workstation will be used on a monthly basis by all 21 classes at the school.

Children in the District of Columbia are at risk of serious health problems stemming from hunger, poor nutrition, inadequate physical activity, and environmental degradation in our community. Meanwhile, poor nutrition and lack of physical activity are the second leading cause of preventable death in D.C.
These statistics give a snapshot of the issues:
- 40.6% of households with children reported that in 2009 they were unable to afford enough food in the last year.
- 43% of all D.C. school-age children are obese or overweight.
- 81% of children do not get the USDA-recommended 5 fruits and vegetables a day.
- Only about 30% of District children do the CDC-recommended 60 minutes of physical activity per day.
- Estimated annual health care costs associated with obesity in D.C. are $372 million and rising.

Walker Jones is a Title 1 school. 91% of families are classifies as high poverty. 100% of our students receive free meals as per USDA determinates. 72 % of our families reside in single head of household dwellings, the majority of those single heads being women. 68% of our family population receives some form of public assistance.

Community member details not available yet.

Direct Impact of Your Project

There are 450 students at The Walker Jones Educational Campus. Each project will supply one student per class or a quarter of the tools needed at a 4 student shared workstation. There are 21 classes in the school who will rotate through the program each month. So each project will impact 21 students every month.

Extended Impact on Your Partner Community

In addition, each of the 21 students impacted will share their knowledge with their families.