PEOPLE WANT TO BECOME SELF-SUFFICIENT GARDENERS: THE BEGINNINGS WITH YOUTH

The garden, HILLTOP, an urban nature center-garden oriented is noted for its leadership training program in a university–based outdoor science education project.
It receives the continuing support of the Indiana University Department of Biology, the Bloomington Department of Parks and Recreation and the Bloomington Garden Club.
Competent and responsible leadership is provided for the nation’s schools and municipal recreation centers.

Over five thousand youths, ages nine through fourteen years and, in its leadership training program, more than one thousand student–instructors have been involved in its three decades of service.

Hilltop is a synthesis of many minds and hands.
The artisan relates it to a center of gardening arts.
The scientist conceives of it as a complex of garden ecosystems, a disciplined environment where youth begins to understand biological concepts, ecological principles and conservation of natural resources.
In this outdoor setting there is not only an opportunity for youth to find answers to some of life’s questions but also to learn industry and patience, something about man’s relation to his environment and a reverance for life.

Symposium on Horticulture for the People, XX IHC

B. Shalucha

https://doi.org/10.17660/ActaHortic.1981.105.4