Status: COMPLETE March 2018 - November 2018
The Permaculture Garden Resource Coordinator project aims to establish a Garden Coordinator position for The Macdonald Showcase Permaculture Garden, to act as a vector for community involvement. The Macdonald Showcase Permaculture Garden originated as an SPF-funded sustainable agriculture project in 2017. The project is entering its second phase, in which the project aims to facilitate faculty collaboration and student involvement/learning opportunities in the garden in order to strengthen the community around the garden and ensure continuity.
Using an open source concept, the garden aims to serve as a door for new and innovative projects in which students and faculty at McGill are able to apply systems thinking approaches towards interdisciplinary fields of research. This project is expected to expose people to alternative and sustainable agricultural systems. The garden is meant to portray an exemplary model of a field designed using the 12 Permaculture Principles, therefore we are hoping that it serves as an outlet for people to creatively expand on the principles as they see fit. The overall involvement from students and faculty in the garden is designed and expected to create a community surrounding the project, and to further overall education about permaculture at McGill.
This project will then become institutionalized through the creation of a Garden Committee Toolkit. The toolkit will include all information pertaining the garden: resources, contacts, etc. With this toolkit, newly interested students will be able to undertake research projects in preceding years without the need or help of a Garden Coordinator. The Garden Coordinator will be continuing the process of transforming the garden from an annual to perennial one. This will further reduce the garden's dependence on external funding.
Resources from the SPF will be used to compensate the part-time garden coordinator.
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