Overall Rating Gold
Overall Score 65.09
Liaison Shane Stennes
Submission Date Jan. 11, 2023

STARS v2.2

University of Minnesota, Twin Cities
IN-7: Community Garden

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 0.50 / 0.50 Carley Rice
Sustainability Coordinator
Facilities Management
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

A brief description of the institution’s community garden:
The West Bank Community Garden
The WBCG emerged from the University of Minnesota's Living Lab program to cultivate garden education, cultural exchange, and experimentation.
Located on the University of Minnesota's West Bank Campus between the Carlson School of Management, Wilson Library and Rarig Center.
The garden has both communal and individual vegetable plots and perennial pollinator beds.
The West Bank Community Garden (WBCG) was established in 2014. Project design and implementation were led by a core group of students to create a space where faculty, community members, and students would be able to collectively design, implement and grow gardens for education and experimentation centered on healthy food and the environment. It was made possible by the acceptance of a Living Laboratory proposal through the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities Sustainability Committee.
This space can now be molded collectively with counsel from University administration. The IonE Mini Grant supported the start-up costs of this project along with guidance from University faculty, staff, and community members. The garden looks good – at least it is a start – there are many things that can be improved this upcoming year. More perennial seeds can be sewn, bunnies can be warded off, and a variety of foods can be grown.
We are developing a sustainable leadership structure. Most of the core gardeners are upperclassmen and are looking to mentor underclassmen to run the garden next spring, summer, and fall. It is easy to run the garden once introduced to the large gardening/ farming support system set up in the Twin Cities. No gardening experience is need to run it (although it would be beneficial).

Website URL where information about the community garden is available:

Optional Fields

Estimated number of individuals that use the institution’s community garden annually:
---

Additional documentation to support the submission:
---

Data source(s) and notes about the submission:
---

The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.