Projects 2022-23

Permaculture & Pollinators: Diversity & Interdependence from the Ground Up

We are delighted and inspired to be collaborating with the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, D.C. and St. Louis-area teachers and principals to plan, build, and maintain permaculture/regenerative gardens on the campuses of two schools in the Ferguson-Florrisant School District.

Our interrelated goals for this project are: 1) Empower youth in North St. Louis County as practicing naturalists and scientists; 2) Develop enriched, interdisciplinary project-related curriculum aligned with the content areas; 3) Collect and analyze incoming data on pollinators to be shared with other garden sites and the Smithsonian’s national data base; 4) Nurture intra-community and intercommunity relationships.

This project is driven by a shared sense of urgent moral purpose with regard to environmental and education justice, food security, and matters related to global climate-change. Locally, the project will strengthen the health of pollinators in North St. Louis County and nurture a new generation of gardeners, naturalists, and scientists. At the national level, the scientists at the Smithsonian are expecting this project to advance knowledge of urban pollinator-plant interactions in the metropolitan St. Louis region, pollinator distributions, and the environmental variables associated with species survival.

To lead this project locally, Project Lab St. Louis is delighted to have engaged Valaree Logan, an experienced gardener and co-founder of an area farm in St. Louis. Val also holds a master’s degree in school psychology.

Projects 2020-21

Living Questions, Round 2: Outdoors & Distanced

As public schools across St. Louis went virtual, Project Lab St. Louis designed an outdoors version of the humanities seminar that had resulted in Living Questions, a book of student essays published in 2019. Thanks to a a generous grant from the Missouri Humanities Council and with the support of the Naitonal Council for the Humanities, Project Lab was all set to go with lawn chairs, blankets, snacks, and a hot spot for connecting our Chromebooks to the Internet. Unfortunately, the different challenges of that school year made a second round of Living Questions impossible. We’re hoping we can make it possible in 2021-22!

Projects 2019-20

CurrentS: Summer 2020

A publishing opportunity for Missouri writers, artists, essayists, poets, and journalists between 13 and 18 years old! Project Lab St. Louis collaborated with Gateway Writing Project and OneCity Stories to launch our first issue of Currents, a magazine featuring the work of Missourians between 13 and 18. The inaugural issue was published in July 2020 and can be read here: Currents 2020

From Deer to Venison: November 2019

In a two-day, hands-on seminar, interested Normandy High School students were introduced to the art and craft of meat fabrication. How is the body of an animal transformed into consumer cuts and boned meat? In collaboration with Normandy’s Culinary Arts teacher and Science coordinator, students had a profound experience that ended with a shared buffet of delicious dishes featuring venison.

The Crosscurrents CrossTown Walk: April 2020

[This project was canceled due to COVID-19.] Only 12.6 miles separate Normandy High School and Kirkwood High School in St. Louis County. This day-long experience was designed to bring students from both schools together to walk and talk half the way, meeting up in the middle to celebrate all grassroots movements that are environmentally sustainable and socially diverse. Apart from having fun, our purpose will be to illuminate new understandings about ourselves, our neighborhoods, and the relationships we nurture close and (not all that) far from home.

Student-centered Approach to Academic Literacy

This project emerged out of a close collaboration with Normandy’s High School Principal and the district’s English Language Arts Coordinator. Our purpose was been twofold: to engage students in the editing and writing of academic, cross-curricular informational texts, and to scaffold secondary students toward becoming confident readers of academic texts at the secondary and post-secondary level. We have drafted 200 passages in Biology, Earth Science, United States History, and World History. Each passages is between 500 and 700 words, factually accurate and sourced, accessible when read independently, composed from a stance that embraces social justice and cultural relevance, and critically reviewed by students. This free resource is available upon request by writing us at contact@projectlabstlouis.org