ON YOUR MARK, GET SET, GROW!

Issue 24: 31/3/2023 Sustainability News

On 20th March, Mr. Rascalou, Life and Earth Sciences teacher at BPR Campus, kicked off the AgrOlympiads 2023 project with French Stream students Y11 (class 2A). We recently interviewed him about this amazing project.

What is AgrOlympiads and who created it?

I developed this concept over the last few years in my previous schools. I call it AgrOlympiads because it is both a science project on agriculture and a friendly “competition” between teams.

What inspired you and how does it work?

In middle and high school science programs, students are told that “we will need to feed more and more people in the future… but with limited soil and respecting our environment better.” AgrOlympiads is a direct application of this framework: four teams are given the same amount of soil (about 2 sqm) to produce vegetables. The “winning” team is the one with the most vegetables produced during the project.

Students build the whole project on their own and with their own resources. They:

choose the seeds to grow
make their own weekly schedule
research to find ways to optimise the growth of crops while respecting the environment
build structures using recycled materials
make their own organic pesticides

The project started in the classroom with each team presenting their three-month plans and collaborating with one another to make improvements. On March 20th they started the field part of the project, which will run until late May or early June in class (but students will be allowed to carry on the growing as long as they want).

How is the project completed?

Each student will write a report analysing the success or failure of their work, discussing all the things that she/he learned during this project, both in terms of science and personal development.

For me, the biggest reward is when they gather their ideas in a collective effort for the sake of our planet, and when they send pictures of the dishes they cooked at home with their self-produced vegetables.

No school story would be complete without hearing from the students! We asked Mr Rascalou’s students what they most like about the AgrOlympiads and what they felt they were learning and this is what they said:

What I like the most is that we have a huge amount of freedom. Indeed, it is up to us to choose the seeds that we want to plant, to choose the soil parcel, to choose the material… This gives us great autonomy when it comes to execute projects.

Thanks to AgrOlympiads, I have the feeling to know much more about plants biology, how to optimise biomass production, and at the same time in a sustainable way.

I have the feeling to learn about how to start my own vegetable garden and how to limit the impacts on the environment, as far as possible in a creative way.

What a wonderful way to resume our community gardens at BPR – with a vision, passion and getting our hands dirty!

The Sustainability Committee