Organic school garden dream grows

“Kids love and thrive in a natural setting,” says Carmen Donez, teacher extraordinaire. Donez guides and instructs several grade levels at Fallbrook Street Elementary in the arts and sciences of life. Included in her repertoire, and fundamental to her teachings, lies the sustainable, organic garden she has created outside her classroom.

Teaching children the essence of coexisting with nature, Donez inspires “sharing, nurturing and caring citizens” from her own memories of working the earth as a child. Catalyzed by her parents and naturalist Cesar Chavez, she can’t imagine life without a garden...