The NHC Community Allotment is supported by North Hertfordshire College and based at the Stevenage campus. The project is designed to encourage local people, especially young people, to:
We seek to engage with significant numbers of young people across Stevenage, using the College’s own students as a starting point.
The NHC Community Allotment is designed to train young people to understand and advocate healthy living in the local area, before providing opportunities to take this knowledge into the community.
We do this by:
"The allotment project has enhanced the students' skills enormously. Holistically improving the students' mental wellbeing and their personal social development more than I could ever have imagined. Seeing them using their communication skills to share their knowledge and sell their home-grown produce was a complete joy. In my opinion, the project has been hugely successful and I wish more students could benefit from it."
"It is great to see how some students 'come alive' on the allotment project. For many students, it is their first experience of growing things and they take great pride in their achievements."
"What a treat to be able to take our Year 1 children to North Hertfordshire College to support our learning of plants and their needs. An informative and hands-on afternoon that we all enjoyed and a great immersive hook to start our science topic. A huge thanks to the team for organising such creative activities - see you again next year!"
"Allotment lessons cater for people who are complete beginners, through to those with experience. Lessons are broken into manageable chunks, enabling you to confidently retain what's shown and pick up some great hands-on experience along the way!"
"Year 2 enjoyed working with the students from NHC to launch their science topic, The Apprentice Gardener. It was fantastic to work in partnership with people with some expertise who could guide us in preparing the beds and choosing the right tools and plants to cultivate. The children loved planting vegetables ready for us to observe and care for as they grow."
If you are an employer, community group, school, or charity, we’d love to hear from you. Collaboration is at the heart of the NHC Community Allotment and we welcome discussions regarding sharing our skills and knowledge with the wider community.
Get in touch for a chat about how we can work together.
Students from NHC’s Child Development Studies courses spent two days at Roebuck Academy to help renovate their allotment and run sessions for the pupils. The children learnt how plants grow and had a chance to get their hands dirty, sowing seeds and planting out vegetables. NHC’s students also taught the pupils about the different parts of plants and their importance, as well as how to create compost, and how to use different gardening tools.
Roebuck Academy’s pupils can now look after plants and reap their vegetable harvest in the coming months.
The project also provides benefits for NHC’s students, who volunteer in the allotment as an extension of their core course. They gain practical experience working with children on a key part of the Key Stage 1 Science curriculum, giving them a head start when it comes to starting their careers in the childcare and early years education sector.
