Eagan Students Give Back Through 'Giving Garden'

EAGAN, MN — What began as a small project of growing vegetables under a grow light in three high school students' basements has now become a community project.

The Eagan High School Interact Club Giving Garden, unveiled Wednesday, is a community garden, with all the fruits and vegetables being donated to The Open Door.

The Open Door is a food pantry that works to connect those in need with nutritious foods, according to its Eagan website.

The trio behind the project — Rachel Wilson, Katie Wong and Emily Wong — are Eagan High School students and members of EHS Interact Club, a club for community service and volunteering. They first came up with the idea at the beginning of the pandemic.

“We were trying to come up with ways we could help our community, something outside and safe with the pandemic,” Wilson told Patch. “We came up with gardening and growing plants to give to other people.”

Katie Wong said the three students knew of other giving gardens through Open Door and thought it would be a great way to give back to the community.

“We contacted Open Door and asked what vegetables they wanted and which they needed, and then we just grew them,” Katie Wong said.

The first step to get the project up-and-running was growing seedlings in March of this year, Emily Wong said. The three girls grew vegetables such as cauliflower, tomatoes, broccoli and eggplants in their own homes with grow lights, she said.

Next, the girls said they told Bill Wirsbinski, a math teacher at Eagan High School and the Interact Club's advisor, about their idea. Then, Interact Club got involved in the project as well.

The project quickly became a community effort.

“It brought a bunch of us together, there were a bunch of volunteers and people from our school,” Emily Wong said. “We hadn’t seen each other in a year so it was nice to see familiar faces and see everybody come together.”

David Loeffler, a science teacher at the school, helped the girls with building the garden, they said.

Interact Club also collaborated with other clubs and organizations for the project. The National Art Honors Society designed the sign for the garden, and the sign was engraved by somebody from the school’s woodshop, the girls said.

Eagan Kickstart Rotary also gave a grant to Interact Club for this project.

The physical labor — which included weeding the area, building the garden beds, digging and planting and building the fence — was split into three six-hour sessions, the girls said.

Before becoming a giving garden, the area was used as a flower garden, but the idea to convert it was approved within a week, the girls said.

Wilson said something the group likes about the garden is future students can work on it.

Wirsbinski praised the girls for getting the Eagan community involved for the garden.

“The cool thing is that this was a student-driven project,” Wirsbinski said. “It was their idea and they made it happen.”

Patch has partnered with Feeding America to help raise awareness on behalf of the millions of Americans facing hunger. Feeding America, which supports 200 food banks across the country, estimates that in 2021, about 42 million Americans may not have enough nutritious food to eat due to the effects of the coronavirus pandemic. This is a Patch social good project; Feeding America receives 100 percent of donations. Find out how you can donate in your community or find a food pantry near you.