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Are you overwhelmed by the idea of fertilizing your school garden during summer break—or worse, feeling disappointed when your garden underperforms come fall?

In this episode, Leila Mireskandari shares a powerful shift in perspective: you don’t need to fertilize your school garden during summer at all—if you set it up right from the beginning.

💡 Learn why proactive garden design is more powerful than constant summer maintenance, and how proper soil prep, smart plant choices, and working with nature can eliminate fertilizing from your summer to-do list entirely.

🌱 What You’ll Learn:

• Why fertilizing can (and should) be skipped in a well-designed school garden
• The #1 mistake teachers make that creates a need for summer fertilizing
• How to choose the right crops to avoid summer headaches
• The importance of working with nature instead of against it
• How some teachers grow 20+ varieties of food with no fertilizing and minimal summer work

📚 Resources Mentioned:

• 📝 Free List of Recommended Seeds for School Gardens
• 🌼 Free Guide: How to Minimize Summer Maintenance in School Gardens
• 💻 Low-Cost Webinar + Full Class: Grow a School Garden with Almost No Summer Maintenance

Whether you’re just starting out or looking to make your school garden more manageable, this episode will help you feel empowered to design a garden that thrives—without burnout.

👉 Listen now and take the first step toward a stress-free, abundant school garden!

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Welcome back to School Gardens with Ease! I’m your host, Leila Mireskandari, and in this episode, we’re tackling a question that comes up a lot around this time of year:

👉 How much cleanup does a school garden really need in the summer?

If you’re a bit of a clean freak when it comes to your school garden—or you’re feeling overwhelmed by summer maintenance—this episode is for you.

We’ll explore:

• The difference between necessary and unnecessary cleaning
• Why a productive vegetable garden isn’t always a neat one
• How to balance structure with nature’s wild beauty
• What cleanup tasks actually matter
• Why you shouldn't lock your school garden up for the summer
• How to design a low-maintenance garden that thrives even when school’s out

🌿 Spoiler: The best gardens work with nature, not against it. And yes—you can have a thriving garden with almost no summer maintenance.

🎓 Want to go deeper? In my class "School Gardens with Almost No Summer Maintenance," I teach everything you need to know to build and grow your garden with your students during the school year—so summer takes care of itself.

🔗 Click here to learn more about the class

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Weeding might be the most dreaded chore for school garden volunteers, especially during the summer—but what if it didn’t have to be? In this episode, Leila challenges the common belief that weeds are inevitable in gardens. She breaks down why weeds show up, how our cultural biases shape our attitudes toward them, and how you can design your school garden to prevent them in the first place.

She also shares her favorite Permaculture trick for eliminating weeds before they even appear—plus the real reason why a volunteer rose plant didn’t stand a chance in her own backyard garden!

🌿 What You’ll Learn

• Why weeds are not a given in well-planned gardens
• How to design your school garden to minimize weeding
• What a “weed” really is (hint: it’s all about perspective!)
• Why bare soil is an open invitation for weeds—and how to prevent that
• The surprising benefits of weeds in some garden ecosystems
• How sheet mulching can be a total game-changer for weed control

🛠️ Mentioned in This Episode

• 🌼 Sheet Mulching – A powerful Permaculture technique you’ll want to try.
• 📚 School Gardens with Almost No Summer Maintenance – Includes a full "Weeds Module" with step-by-step strategies and downloadable guides. (Link in the show notes.)

📌 Key Takeaway

If your garden is full of weeds, it’s not a sign of failure—it’s nature doing her job. But with intentional planting and smart soil coverage, you can avoid weeding altogether… and finally enjoy a low-maintenance, student-led school garden.

👩‍🏫 Ready to Make Weeding a Thing of the Past?

Check out Leila’s class:
👉 School Gardens with Almost No Summer Maintenance
Includes a full weeds module, spacing plans, PDF guides, and everything you need to ditch the weeding chore—forever.

🌻 Stay Connected

Thanks for tuning in! Subscribe, rate, and review if you’re loving the podcast—and come back next week for more tips to grow a thriving school garden with ease.

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Is your school garden going to thrive this summer—or completely overwhelm your volunteers and fizzle out in a tangle of weeds?

In this episode of School Gardens with Ease, I’m diving back into summer maintenance (yep, again!)—because this is the time of year to be planting with intention, and if you don’t… your garden could be doomed before the heat even hits.

If you want your garden to be buzzing with bees, bursting with herbs, and producing food all summer long—without exhausting your community—this episode is packed with the proactive strategies that actually make that possible.

✨ Inside this episode:

• Why spacing is overrated and how dense planting stops weeds before they start
• How to eliminate summer chores like weeding, harvesting, cleanup, and even fertilizing
• Tips to train your summer volunteers (so they don’t accidentally pull out your seed-saving plants!)
• How to design gardens that don’t need pesticides or disease treatments
• The gear, planning, and watering systems that make it all a breeze

🎓 Want to go deeper?
My class “School Gardens with Almost No Summer Maintenance” is now available—60% off until Sunday!
👉 Click here to join the class. (Insert your actual link)

🎥 Missed the webinar on summer maintenance? Let me know in the comments if you want me to bring it back!

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Short answer: No. But the longer answer might surprise you!

Summers can be tough on school gardens—drought, weeds, and neglect often leave them struggling. But what if your school garden could be designed to require almost zero summer maintenance?

In this episode, I break down how Permaculture techniques can help you create a thriving school garden with:
✅ No weeding
✅ No cleanups
✅ No fertilizing
✅ No pruning
✅ No pest or disease control
✅ Much less watering

Yes, it’s possible! I’ve done it many times over the past 11 years. And now, I’m sharing how you can do it too.

🎉 Join My Low-Cost Webinar! 🎉
I’m hosting a special webinar to teach you exactly how to build a school garden with almost no summer maintenance. Plus, you’ll get two implementation guides worth $38!

💰 Limited-Time Offer: Get 50% off until March 31st—only $14 CAD!
📅 Webinar Date: April 2nd (4 time slots available)
🎥 Recording available for registrants only

🔗 Grab Your Spot Here!

If you're listening after April 2nd, let me know if you're interested—I might bring it back!

Let’s make school gardens effortless this summer. 🌱

Resources & Links:
🔗 Webinar Registration: https://kids-growing-city-edec.mykajabi.com/almost-no-summer-maintenance-webinar-registration

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🌱 Welcome to another episode of School Gardens with Ease! I’m your host, Leila Mireskandari, and today’s episode is a special one—part of the Podcasthon movement, where over a thousand podcasts highlight a charity of their choice.

💧 In this episode, we’re talking about water—clean, accessible water—and why it’s critical for school gardens, communities, and the world.

🌍 What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

• Why Charity:Water is my favorite nonprofit and how their 100% donation model builds trust.
• The biggest summer maintenance concern for school gardens—and why watering can’t be eliminated.
• How good design can reduce watering needs by up to 80%, but never fully remove the need for water.
• The impact of clean water on food-growing and why it matters for your garden.
• Why water education belongs in your classroom—from the water cycle to human impact.
• Shocking water facts—Did you know 703 million people lack access to clean water?
• How regenerative gardens positively affect global water cycles.

💡 Take Action Today!

• Support Charity:Water and help solve the global water crisis: charitywater.org
• Explore more amazing causes through Podcasthon: podcasthon.org
• Get ready for my new course on school gardens with almost no summer maintenance—stay tuned!

🎧 Listen Now & Share
If you found this episode helpful, share it with a fellow educator! Let’s grow gardens—and awareness—together.

🔗 https://www.kidsgrowingcity.ca/school-gardens-with-almost-no-summer-maintenance

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🌱 Happy Spring Equinox! As gardeners, we’re excited to welcome spring, but before you grab your rake and start clearing up your school garden, pause and listen to this episode first!

In today’s episode, I’m talking about one of the biggest mistakes school gardeners (and home gardeners) make—cleaning up too early in spring! Many beneficial insects like ladybugs, bees, and butterflies are still taking shelter under leaves and dead vegetation. Clearing your garden too soon can harm biodiversity and reduce the natural helpers your garden needs to thrive.

What You’ll Learn in This Episode:

✔️ Why early spring clean-up is a big no-no for your garden
✔️ The best time to start clearing and prepping your school garden
✔️ How delaying clean-up supports beneficial insects and biodiversity
✔️ A fun science lesson idea to teach students about working with nature
✔️ A sneak peek into my new class on school gardens with almost no summer maintenance (stay tuned for the link!)

Let’s work with nature, not against it, and teach our students to do the same. Don’t be a clean freak—be a garden protector!

💚 Happy Spring! I’ll see you in the next episode.

🔗 Links & Resources:
👉 School Gardens with Almost No Summer Maintenance Class: https://www.kidsgrowingcity.ca/school-gardens-with-almost-no-summer-maintenance

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Welcome to School Gardens with Ease! I’m your host, Leila Mireskandari, and in this episode, we’re diving into an important and sometimes controversial question: Should we use plastic to grow food?

In This Episode:

• Why I still use plastic party cups to start seeds in my Oasis programs.
• The dilemma of balancing environmental responsibility with practical classroom gardening.
• The importance of sub-irrigation and why paper, clay, or biodegradable pots don’t work in a classroom setting.
• My ongoing search for a viable alternative to plastic that is moisture-resistant and flexible.
• How my philosophy of making a green handprint outweighs an unavoidable footprint.
• A call to action for manufacturers or innovators to help find a better solution.

Key Takeaways:

• Environmental responsibility is a priority, but practical limitations in schools mean we sometimes have to make trade-offs.
• Over or under-watering is one of the biggest causes of failure in classroom gardening, and sub-irrigation is the best way to prevent it.
• Plastic is currently the best available option for sub-irrigation, but I’m always on the lookout for alternatives.
• We should strive for solutions but never let the lack of a perfect option stop us from growing food and making a positive impact.

If you or someone you know has a solution to replace plastic in classroom seed-starting, I’d love to hear from you!

Let’s continue the conversation. You can reach out to me through my website or social media.

Thanks for listening! See you next week for another episode of School Gardens with Ease.