Community News
GREEN THUMB
BY ANGELA MATUA
AMATUA@QNS.COM
tudents at Astoria‘s P.S.
122 will grow their own
vegetables with the help
of two hydroponic science
labs that will also serve to teach students
about agriculture, biology, technology
and sustainability.
Councilman Costa Constantinides
allocated $160,000 through discre-tionary
funding to help build the labs
in an elementary and middle school
class at P.S. 122. In a ribbon-cutting
ceremony on Dec. 8, the classroom labs,
constructed by New York Sun Works,
were unveiled.
“We are proud to kick off our Science
2050 Budget Initiative with this open-ing,”
Constantinides said in a statement.
“With these innovative learning spaces,
children have the opportunity to interact
with plants, study the biology of how
they grow, and receive meaningful les-sons
in ecology and agriculture. These
types of multifaceted science learning
experiences will give students academic
benefits in a variety of subject matters.”
New York Sun Works began in 2004
as an initiative called Project Science
Barge, according to Director of Develop-ment
and Events Sidsel Robards. The
organization wanted to build a green-house
on a barge on the Hudson River
as a model of a sustainable urban farm.
22 JANUARY 2018 I LIC COURIER I www.qns.com
The initiative inspired them to create
The Greenhouse Project, an initiative to
re-create what they made on the barge
but on school rooftops. The first school
chosen for the initiative was P.S. 333
in Manhattan and now, the organization
has constructed 70 labs and developed
721 curriculum lessons throughout New
York City and New Jersey.
Staff at New York Sun Works met
with science teachers and the principal
of P.S. 122 during summer 2017 when
they constructed the hydroponic lab
and hosted professional development
sessions with the teachers, who learned
how to operate the lab.
A hydroponic lab allows people
to grow plants without using soil. In-stead,
students will use water mixed
with mineral nutrient solutions to grow
vegetables and herbs, and each lab
is retrofitted to serve specific spaces.
The lab at P.S. 122 includes hydro-ponic
growing systems, a composting
station, a germination rack and an inte-grated
pest management station. Plants
grown in hydroponic systems use 80 to
90 percent less water than plants using
conventional techniques.
This specific greenhouse can grow
about 902 pounds of produce a year,
including lettuces, herbs, microgreens,
cucumbers, tomatoes, peppers, egg-plants
and squash. Pesticides are not
used in this lab, so ladybugs are in-troduced
to protect plants from pests.
