From The Roots Up

The American Community Gardening Association 

Call for Participation

From The Roots Up (FTRU) is seeking participation from community organizations engaged in community development and organizing in a variety of settings to help participate in the evaluation of the Growing Communities: How to Build Community through Community Gardening curriculum.

Growing Communities is being developed to train organizations to function as catalysts for environmental advocacy and community development. The curriculum is designed to provide a model for community building in a new way. It provides a set of principles, tools and strategies for community building as well as workshops and resources for implementing this approach.

Growing Communities is grounded in a participatory approach and we are seeking community-based organizations that have been active in community development (both in community gardening and in general community organizing) to participate in a Peer Group evaluation of the draft curriculum.

The evaluation will take place from March 12-28, 2001.We estimate the evaluation process will require a minimum 10 hour commitment.   It will involve participation from organizations in two ways:

• A Peer Group Facilitator from each organization will be selected to help assemble members of the organizations staff (approximately 5-10 members) to read the curriculum and conduct a group review session within the organization.
• The Peer Group Facilitator will then participate in a conference call review session with Peer Group Facilitators from other organizations and FTRU staff.

We invite all organizations interested in participating in this exciting project to contact FTRU at f*@bellsouth.net. to request an application. (include your phone, postal, email and fax)

We will send you a list of questions to answer for participation in the evaluation process. We look forward to hearing from you and we thank you for your interest.