Bendale Market Garden, Youth Engagement Facilitator Job Description

Author: Sasha McNicoll

Posted: April 25, 2011

Categories: Edible Education Network / Food in the News

FoodShare Toronto, Bendale Market Garden, Youth Engagement Facilitator Job Description

FoodShare is looking for a Youth Engagement Facilitator at the Bendale Market Garden, a school-based market garden at Bendale Business and Technical School in Scarborough, Ontario (please see background section below for more details on the Market Garden). The position would be a contract position to support youth as they work and learn in the Market Garden. FoodShare would be open to the possibility of one candidate filling both the Farm Manager and the Youth Engagement Facilitator job positions.

Detailed job description:

• Oversee the daily operations of the Focus on Youth students, co-op students, and student volunteers: supporting them in doing the farm work and learning about food issues
• Conduct ongoing informal education throughout the work day (i.e. doing a lesson on how and why we save seeds while you are saving seeds)
• In July and August, conduct weekly workshops on a particular topic related to food justice/food security and farming, this could include field trips offsite
• In May, June, September and October, work with the horticulture and culinary arts departments and FoodShare staff to coordinate educational programming
• Communicate with the Focus on Youth funder (reporting on the students’ hours, giving feedback)
• Act as a spokesperson for the Market Garden and FoodShare in the community, with the school, and with the broader public
• Grow food in a mix-vegetable market garden
• Support running a Community Supported Agriculture program and markets

Qualifications and skills:

• Extensive experience and comfort working with youth doing experiential learning programming and community development
• Background in farming/ gardening (preferably small-scale, organic, direct marketing: CSA and markets) and community food security/ food justice
• Exceptional people management skills (good at delegating tasks, helping people feel valued)
• Strong communication and organizational skills
• Experience working with diverse communities
• Knowledge of the Dorset Park/ Scarborough community
• Willingness to do hard physical labour outside in all weather conditions
• Computer proficiency (ability to use excel spreadsheets for planning, write clear emails)
• Ability to speak multiple languages an asset
• Background in permaculture an asset
• Holding a valid Ontario Drivers License an asset
• Police check clearance neccessary (to be able to work with students)

Hours and Compensation:

• The Focus on Youth students are in the garden full time Monday through Friday (35 hours a week) from July 4 until August 19. The Youth Engagement Facilitator position is full time during this time. It is one day a week starting mid-May up until the end of June and then one-day a week at the end of August until the end of October.
• The Facilitator will be paid $14/ hour for 37.5 hours/ week during the Focus on Youth

Program and 7.5 hours/ week in May, June, September, and October

Duration: Mid-May until end of October. There may be a possibility for paid winter employment doing environmental educational programming. There would be a possibility for renewal of this position for 2012 growing season.

How to apply:

Please email your resume and a cover letter to Ian Hepburn-Aley at ian@foodshare.net. As mentioned above, if a candidate would like to combine the Farm Manager Position with the Youth Engagement Facilitator position, we would be open to discussing this as a possibility.

If you are interested and have questions please call 416-363-6441 x241. Please do not contact Bendale BTI directly. Please note: this is a FoodShare job not a Toronto District School Board job.

Deadline for applications: Monday, May 2, 2011, 5pm

Location and Neighbourhood

Bendale BTI is located 1555 Midland Avenue, just north of Lawrence in the Dorset Park neighbourhood. This community is highly diverse, with many newcomer families. Housing is primarily high-rise apartments.

The Lawrence East TTC Station is a five-minute walk from the school. If you are coming from downtown Toronto, you can take the Bloor-Danforth subway line east to Lawrence East (transfer at Kennedy Station to the Scarborough RT).

FoodShare Toronto

FoodShare is a Toronto non-profit community organization whose vision is Good Healthy Food for All. Founded 26 years ago to address hunger in our communities, FoodShare takes a unique multifaceted and long-term approach to hunger and food issues. We work to empower individuals, families and communities through food-based initiatives, while advocating for the broader public policies needed to ensure that everyone has adequate access to sustainably produced, good healthy food. Working “from field to table,” we focus on the entire system that puts food on our tables: from the growing, processing and distribution of food to its purchasing, cooking and consumption. FoodShare’s programs reach over 145,000 children and adults every single month across the city of Toronto and countless others across Canada, bringing them fresh, nutritious, affordable food, and cultivating the knowledge and skills that build healthy communities.

The Market Garden

During the 2010 growing season, FoodShare worked with Bendale’s horticulture department to turn the front and back lawns into about three quarters of an acre of production space. Because it is a high foot traffic area, all the beds are built as permanent raised beds with two by ten cedar lumber. We used lasagna gardening approaches to build soil in some of the beds and for others we brought in Arntz triple mix. Beds are all four feet wide and vary in length from twenty to forty feet long. All beds are in full sun.

Along with the beds the Market Garden includes:

• A recently planted fruit orchard and herb garden
• Asparagus, raspberry, rhubarb, and strawberry starts for planting this season
• Two small greenhouses that are looked after by the horticulture classes
• Access to a walk-in cooler for storing harvest
• Rain barrel system (six large barrels)
• Two three-bin composting systems
• Easy water access and we have twenty fifty-foot lengths of soaker hose and mulch for irrigation and water retention
• Lots of signage (banners for the market, educational signage throughout the farm, etc).
• A dedicated shed for tool storage
• An Earthway seeder, a wheel hoe, rototiller
• Hand tools: digging forks, shovels, hand hoes, trowels
• Occasional access to carpentry and plumbing tools (power saws, cordless drills, etc)
• A market tent and table
• About fifteen harvest baskets
• About thirty Rubbermaid totes for storing and transporting produce (to market or to CSA customers)
• An eight-foot modular Bikes at Work trailer for transporting produce and market supplies
• A bike, helmet, lights, lock

Educational and Food Access Mandates

Bendale is a technical high school. It offers horticulture, plumbing, carpentry, culinary arts, business and other classes. The Bendale Market garden is an educational farm, tied in with the activities of the school. During the school year, horticulture classes help maintain the garden and culinary arts students learn to cook with fresh produce. The school community is engaged and enthused about the market garden.

Because the Market Garden is on Toronto District School Board property, students need to be involved in the whole process. Last growing season, over the summer months, we were able to hire three students through a program called Focus on Youth to work full time in the garden for July and August. We also had two co-op students during the summer and three in the fall semester, full time in the garden. Other Bendale students and community members from the neighbourhood came to volunteer. We are hoping to engage all these groups during the 2011 growing season plus possibly bringing on one to three part-time farm interns, who would have a deeper background in agriculture and could exchange work for learning. The farm manager would be responsible for supporting the learning process and managing the labour of this group.

During the 2010 growing season, we ran a weekly onsite market for community members, students and staff. We sold the produce at very affordable rates because we wanted to make sure price was not a barrier to access. All the food we provided to the kitchen was free of charge because we were not yet at a volume that could offset cost of ordering from their main supplier.

FoodShare will support the Farm Manager in creating a plan that allows for generation of a living wage for the Manager while also providing access to good healthy food for the school and surrounding community.