Milledgeville Community Garden Association

July 2 marked the groundbreaking for a new community garden located in the playground of the former Southside Elementary School. The school now houses the New Beginnings Worship Center. Rev. Earnest Franklin worked with members of First Presbyterian Church and area citizen gardeners to secure the site. The ambitious project seeks to cultivate five acres of arable land. Currently, the community gardeners are braving the summer heat while preparing the site as they plough and remove rocks and debris. The group has met some difficulty in acquiring compost material. Hay, manure, wood chips, and other materials need to be composted and tilled into the soil. Irrigation pipes will be installed in the garden.
The Milledgeville Community Garden Association developed a web site and blog http://chemistry.gcsu.edu/garden/ For more information, go to the web site.

Milledgeville Cares

Milledgeville Cares, formally organized in January of 2009, spearheads an effort to serve people who have been adversely affected by the current economic climate. Louise Sallstrom, Milledgeville Cares founder, initiated the endeavor to bring public and private charitable and social service providers together to share information and create collaborative strategies to meet the needs of people requiring assistance. In July, Milledgeville Cares affiliated with Charity Tracker, an Internet-based organization that provides a way to document client receipts in order to equitably serve all in need. In addition, announcements, event invitations, and critical alerts can be posted.  Working cooperatively, it is possible for agencies to buy in bulk, share projects and volunteers, and raise the money that is vital for meeting needs.  Through the use of this web site, the organization will generate data necessary for comprehensive reports detailing specific needs and the number of requests for aid, a requirement for securing grants. Since April two agencies, alone, report having served 350 cases totaling in excess of $27,000.
For more information about Milledgeville Cares and Charity Tracker, please contact Louise Sallstrom. lsallstrom@charter.net

Service Learning at Georgia College & State University

Learning beyond the classroom is one of Georgia College's strategic goals. Georgia College President Dorothy Leland commented on the relationship of the community and university in her 2004 President's Investiture Address, "We must explore exemplary models for fostering an ethic of civic responsibility and community engagement." One of the university programs dedicated to this effort is Service Learning. Located in the Office for Academic Engagement and directed by Sara Faircloth, the program works with faculty who encourage their students to connect classroom learning to the wider community by serving in a variety of local nonprofit organizations, businesses, and public agencies. For more information contact Sara Faircloth through http://www.gcsu.edu/engagement/service.htm