The recent Atlantic magazine article,  Cultivating Failure by Caitlin Flanagan has fueled impassioned discussions among food advocates and educators over Flanagan’s assertions that schools should focus on teaching basic math and reading rather than having school garden programs.  Her biased argument, racial putdowns, and righteous attacks seem more like Fox News than The Atlantic.

I’ve spent the last six months visiting school gardens throughout Washington State and watched children learn science, art, math, and writing through garden participation. Perhaps Tom Philipott said it best in Grist:

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The sustainable-food movement has matured enough and gained enough force that it’s coming under withering criticism from a variety of quarters. That’s good for the movement—hard questions need to be asked, assumptions questioned, received ideas reconsidered. And authors who perform those tasks will find a market from editors desperate to generate attention with contrarian poses. But I wish we could expect more thoughtfulness, and less hack work, from such critics.

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We are very excited to be launching R2E’s first publishing project—a book on school gardens—due out later this year. Stay tuned and we’ll keep you posted on our progress.