Permaculture Garden
To obtain a minor in Sustainability Studies at Roger Williams University, one must complete Sustainability 401. During the fall semester of 2023, my team and I researched, designed, and planted a permaculture garden on campus. In an effort to promote permacultural practices among the student body, we learned how plants play an important roll in our ecosystems and how they can provide for one another and us as humans.

Multiple learning objectives and goals were set for this semester-long project. One was to bring life to the selected garden space, where this low-maintenance permaculture garden can provide food to students, carbon sequestration, and habitats for various species. Using a regenerative design, plants were placed strategically to benefit not only the health of the soil but also to support the other plants in the garden.

Creating signage and purchasing the plants required fundraising. We held multiple fundraising events to raise enough money to buy everything we needed. Anything extra was passed on to the sustainability club on campus. We designed, laser cut, and sealed the wooden sign to be placed in the garden. It took time to plan out where all of the plants would be located to maximize efficiency. We learned that while sea kale and strawberries are great perennials, the two should not be planted near each other because they would compete for nutrients.
We proposed a plan for where each individual plant should go. As the days got shorter and colder, we did most of our planting in the dark hoping to get everything in the ground before it froze. The sustainable practices that we were able to implement in the campus community not only changed how I thought about gardens, but how you can make little changes in your life for a more sustainable lifestyle.
The permaculture garden goes beyond just providing food using regenerative design. It helps restore the landscape, provides biodiversity, and works to improve the ecosystems on campus.
