Kitchen Garden Program improves tertiary welfare

Since its commencement in 2022, the Australian National University (ANU) Kitchen Garden Program has facilitated weekly gardening, cooking and regenerative farming sessions for tertiary students with the support of the Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation. 

The ANU Kitchen Garden Program was designed to improve nutrition and cooking skills among young adults, help overcome experiences of social isolation, reduce financial stress and connect students with support services. 

During 2022, the Foundation acted as a consultant on the project, providing on-campus professional development for the facilitators, access to our online professional development, and sharing our 20 years of expertise in delivering pleasurable food education to primary schools and adapting the original program model to early childhood services, secondary schools and international students.

The learning sessions at ANU occur in their campus community garden during and in between semesters. A flexible drop-in system allows students to participate as often and as much as they want. Through facilitated sessions with ANU’s Wellbeing Team, students and staff build connections with one another and nature and gain the confidence and capacity to grow, harvest, prepare and share nutritious, organic food grown using regenerative practices. 

As one student explains, the highlights of these experiences are "the new people I've met, the new skills I'm learning, and the amount of encouragement and freedom we get to evolve the garden and cooking sessions. I get to talk to people I would have never met and learn about gardening and food practices.”

The impact of the campus garden has made the ANU Kitchen Garden Program the first-ever recipient of the Vice-Chancellor's Award for Sustainability in 2023 and a Green Gown Award for Student Engagement in 2023. By winning the latter award, the program automatically went through as a finalist to the 2024 International Green Gown Awards.

The Stephanie Alexander Kitchen Garden Foundation congratulates the ANU pilot and sees enormous potential in constructing a Kitchen Garden Program for young adult students attending university. We believe an evaluated, scalable model would be ground-breaking in Australia and worldwide. Seeing ANU’s demonstrated commitment and capacity to develop the model makes us delighted to have been their consultative partner on the project.

For 20 years, we have been the number 1 provider of hands-on food education in Australia, equipping Australian children and young people with health, wellbeing, sustainability, and learning skills that will last a lifetime. You can support our life-changing impact by becoming a member, donating to our charity or partnering with us. 

Image source via ANU