It was last school year in May when Hannah Limon first attended a work day devoted to developing Santa Maria’s first ever pumpkin patch.
Limon, a student at Pioneer Valley High School, had heard a lot about the program from one of her agriculture teachers–about how participants would learn to grow and harvest pumpkins and corn, how they’d get community service hours and be eligible for a scholarship, and how they’d get out of the classroom and into the outdoors.
“He made it sound really exciting, which it really is,” Limon, now a sophomore, said on Oct. 18 while sitting at a picnic table at the now up and running pumpkin patch in Los Flores Ranch Park, concisely titled “The Patch.”
Limon loved the program immediately, and since her first day of work at The Patch she said she’s put in too many hours to count. She’s spent nearly every day of some weeks volunteering at The Patch, growing corn, directing parking, teaching younger kids about agriculture, and leading field trips.
It’s easy to see why more than 80 local high school students are participating. The park is beautiful, the distant mountains are just in sight, the air smells like fresh corn, and the consensus for most student volunteers seems to be that no matter how hard the work gets, it’s definitely better than sitting in a stuffy classroom all day.
“I got to meet students from other schools and from Pioneer Valley,” Limon said. “We’ve built a lot of relationships with one another and it’s really great.”
Although The Patch officially opened on Sept. 29, students have been working on it for months, and community members have been developing the idea for even longer.
The idea to create and run a pumpkin patch and corn maze in Santa Maria came about a year and a half ago, according to Tyler Dickinson, student involvement coordinator for The Patch and agriculture teacher at Pioneer Valley High School. He and three of his friends, also Santa Maria natives, wanted to give back to the community that’s given them so much, Dickinson said.
They saw a need for students to get outside, gain leadership skills, work with their hands, and learn about agriculture, Santa Maria’s largest industry. They also thought Santa Maria could use more autumn-themed activities, Dickinson said.
“Really, we’re the largest city in Santa Barbara County and we don’t have an annual pumpkin patch?”
Dickinson and his friends worked for nearly a year to gather community partners and sponsors to support the program, and launched it last school year.
In May, participating students planted nearly 13,000 pumpkin seeds–donated by Santa Maria Seeds–in greenhouses at Plantel Nurseries. A month later they transplanted those seedlings onto 5 acres of farmland at Betteravia Farms, and eventually harvested those pumpkins and brought them to Los Flores, where they now sit, waiting to be taken home and carved.
Students took part in a similar process to grow large stalks of corn, which now stand tall at Los Flores, acting as leafy walls for the lengthy–and very tricky–corn maze.
Now that the growing and harvesting is mostly finished, Dickinson said students help run the pumpkin patch. They take money for parking at the entrance, lead field trips for elementary and junior high school students, sell pumpkins, and lead agricultural exhibits, where community members learn about bees, pollination, and all the products that use corn as an essential base.
“These students have their hands in every aspect of production,” Dickinson said. “From seed all the way to sale.”
Not only are participating students learning about agriculture, teamwork, outreach, and leadership, but they’re earning community service hours and will be eligible for scholarships through the city’s nonprofit organization, People for Leisure and Youth. The scholarships will likely go to students who have put the most hours into The Patch–some have logged more than 180 hours–and will be funded by the program’s proceeds.
“Some of them have never had this experience before,” Dickinson said. “They’ve never worked with their hands, they’ve never grown corn, they’ve never had the privilege to do that type of activity, and that’s part of the reason we wanted to do this. It’s reconnecting with our agricultural roots.”
“The future of agriculture is firsthand what you’re witnessing here at The Patch,” he added.
Staff Writer Kasey Bubnash writes School Scene each week. Information can be sent to the Sun via mail, fax, or email at mail@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Oct 25 – Nov 1, 2018.