About Gardens

Since 2012, Restore has been using community gardens as another resource to engage and support the youth and families we work with. Over the years we have seen incredible results physically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually in the populations we are involved with. We currently run the school garden at El Dorado Elementary School and the community garden at First Presbyterian Church, as well as supporting and providing resources for several other gardens in the community. 

      Community gardens have provided a unique context for Restore to communicate our heart for relationships, mentoring, and leadership development as we engage with students through practical lessons in the garden. After a few years of experimenting with different garden curriculums for our program, we discovered that one of the greatest opportunities we had in any garden was to use it as an outdoor classroom to instill basic leadership and life lessons in those participating. Health, nutrition, environmentalism, and other topics come up frequently as well, but they are secondary to our overall goal of raising up skilled and powerful leaders. 

    Restore has also pioneered its own Garden Leadership Curriculum, which came out of our experience developing community gardens. We have     successfully implemented this curriculum and seen considerable results, especially among students on school campuses who have difficulty learning in the traditional classroom setting. For more information about the Garden Leadership Curriculum, contact EmmaSchyberg at

emma@restorestockton.com.