MISSION The Giving Garden empowers individuals and communities to grow through gardening.

VISION Our sustainable campus-community garden provides a place in which people can access fresh food, education, community support, and inspiration to make positive changes in their local communities and food systems.

Our MOTTO: A garden is more than just dirt and plants!

GUIDING PRINCIPLES The Giving Garden is organized around the following guiding principles:

• Sustainability encompasses a wide range of practices and cultural beliefs. We recognize that for humans to live sustainably, the regenerative ability of the Earth’s ecosystems must be protected. Therefore, we ensure our interactions renew, rather than deplete our local and global environment.
• Organic agriculture allows humans to interact in a constructive and life-enhancing way with natural systems and cycles. We strive to use organic means of pest control, soil enrichment, and general garden care. This includes decisions regarding the source of all plants, seeds, soil and compost. This also means we strictly prohibit the use of genetically modified organisms (GMOs), synthetic pesticides, synthetic fertilizers, or any other method deemed unsustainable.
• Community & Place: This organization supports the development of a sustainable local community. We pursue authentic partnerships among our members and with the greater surround community.
• Education is an essential way to address the context in which The Giving Garden is situated. Through education, we build the skills of our members, develop leadership in students and in the community. We offer educational opportunities as a central way to strengthen our local community.
• Interrelatedness: We believe that working with plants and soil in a garden is about developing a respect for Life. Participants in the Giving Garden will be guided through the process of cultural-ecological analysis* to identify connections and interrelationships within the complex landscape of human-nature interactions.

*The term "cultural-ecological analysis" comes from: Martusewicz, R., and Jeff Edmundson. 2004. Social Foundations as Pedagogies of Responsibility and Eco-Ethical Commitment. In Teaching Context: A Primer for the Social Foundations of Education Classroom, ed. Dan Butin. Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Elrbaum Publishers.