The "Laboratorios para la Vida" (LabVida) program used school gardens to teach agroecological principles and practices to teachers in Chiapas, Mexico. The program aimed to contribute to scaling up agroecology through formal education. The program ran for two cohorts from July 2012 to March 2013 and July 2013 to July 2014, involving a total of 55 teachers. The majority were middle school (28) and primary teachers (14), but a few taught in preschools (2), high schools (3), and universities (2). Four were officials of the Public Education Secretariat (SEP) and two were university students. Most of the teachers were from public schools, but 5 worked in private schools and 10 in alternative programs or NGOs.
Rather than providing prescriptive agricultural techniques, LabVida aimed to teach key agroecological principles like promoting biodiversity, building soil health, and closing nutrient cycles. The program also sought to develop scientific thinking and inquiry skills among participants by having them conduct experiments in the school gardens. Additionally, LabVida emphasized traditional ‘milpa’ agriculture systems and foodways as important biocultural heritage to be valued and integrated. A core aspect was fostering dialog between Indigenous/local knowledge systems and academic knowledge. The program worked to build a community of practice around these topics among the participating teachers.
Some of the key outcomes and lessons were that place-based and food-related learning activities resonated most strongly with teachers and led some to change their own dietary habits. Teachers were more receptive to inquiry activities that engaged local knowledge than formal experimental methods. Grasping general agroecological principles and the scientific process remained challenging for many teachers. Building alliances within schools and between schools and communities to ensure continuity of the garden programs was a challenge. However, the community of practice that formed among LabVida participants emerged as an important mechanism for collective learning.
The authors suggest that starting with meaningful topics like food may provide an inductive pathway towards developing broader agroecological literacy. Overall, they conclude school garden programs show potential for scaling out agroecology through formal education channels through influencing food choices, building allies, and mobilizing public institutions, despite the constraints posed by rigid education systems.
The Bottom Line
This article examines the opportunities and limitations of scaling up agroecology through formal education, using the LabVida school gardens program in Chiapas, Mexico as a case study. Through analyzing data from 55 educators who participated in their 120-hour training program between 2012-2014, the authors found that while teachers gained appreciation for agroecology and learned to implement basic agroecological practices, their understanding of core principles and scientific processes remained limited. The study's most significant impacts were on educators' personal eating habits and their increased appreciation for local knowledge and its relevance to schoolwork. The research demonstrates how garden and food-system education can effectively leverage institutional resources to improve educational outcomes, including agroecological literacy, while noting that increased awareness of agroecology and the value of local knowledge may intersect with other drivers of scaling like markets, organizational networks, and policy. While the program faced challenges in teaching scientific concepts and processes, starting with food and place-based learning proved to be an effective entry point for engaging educators with agroecological principles and practices.