Gardeneers cultivates customized school garden programs to ensure each space, and the students and communities who care for them, connect with healthy food and grow to their full potential. Gardeneers was founded in 2014 to provide more equitable access to healthy food and food education for Chicago youth living in food desert communities. We currently serve a network of 20 partner schools in low income, high crime rate communities of Chicago that are also food insecure, where residents do not have convenient or affordable access to fresh healthy foods.
Gardeneers provides direct service weekly garden education programs for students K-12th grade. The pillars of our experiential, STEM based programs are Supporting Student Nutrition, Connecting with Community, and Experiencing Nature. In 2019 Gardeneers served over 2,000 students per week in our hands on garden education programs.