Indoor Garden Towers Installed At GBHS
This Tower Garden® growing system in the GBHS Library is one of three purchased to grow plants without soil at Great Bend High School.
Students Will Grow Food Without Dirt
October 13, 2018
Soon Great Bend High School students will be growing vegetables indoors in a soil-free system called a Garden Tower®, Assistant Principal Randy Wetzel said.
The school used funds from the federal Carl D. Perkins Career and Technical Education bill to purchase three of the aeroponic, vertical growing systems to grow plants and vegetables in the classroom without dirt.
“The Tower Gardens were bought for our Family and Consumer Science Cluster (Culinary Pathway),” said Wetzel, who is also director of the Career Technical Education program at GBHS. They were assembled by students who are now learning how to use them.
The towers were suggested by Amber Wolking, the new Family and Consumer Science (FACS) teacher. They are set up in the library, a biology classroom and Wolking’s own classroom, the “foods lab.” Plants should start growing in the next couple of weeks.
“What’s great about the Tower Garden is that it takes up less than 3 square feet of space, indoors or outdoors, and you can grow 20+ fruits, vegetables or flowers using a vertical aeroponic growing system,” she said.
Like hydroponics, aeroponics is an alternative form of gardening. The main difference is that hydroponics uses water instead of soil as a growing medium, but aeroponics uses 90 percent less water than a traditional garden, Wolking said.
“We have two mineral blends that we will add to the (tower’s) green base, which is the water reservoir,” Wolking said. The plants are grown in rock wool.
“We also test the pH of the water and add an acid or base, depending on what is needed. The water and lights will come on in timed intervals to help simulate the outdoors. The water goes up the center and then gently falls on the root system inside the center tube,” Wolking said.
“Research has found aeroponic systems grow plants three times faster and produce 30 percent greater yields on average,” she added.
The students will have the opportunity to grow their own plants from seedlings purchased from a company that specializes in growing starter plants for Tower Gardens.
“I’m excited to have the students take ownership of the gardens and watch them grow. We will be utilizing what we harvest in the classroom to create different recipes, canning, taste testing and comparing to grocery store produce, experimenting with different herbs and offering extra produce to the community. The students will take pride in what they create from ‘Tower to Table’ and will learn that healthy can taste good!” Wolking said.