Announcing the 2024 Friends in Gardening Award Winner: Joelle Don De’Ville

School gardens provide campuses and students with so much more than fresh food or beautiful landscaping. Gardens serve as an extension of the classroom, a living laboratory, and a place for quiet respite. At the Office of Sustainability, we know school gardens — and the benefits they provide — would not be possible without the dedicated work of campus volunteers who go above and beyond to build, maintain, and support these spaces.

The Friends in Gardening (FiG) Award was created in 2023 by the Central Texas School Garden Network to recognize the efforts of an outstanding school garden volunteer. This week, Mary K. Priddy, Education and Outreach Coordinator with the Office of Sustainability and Coordinator for the Central Texas School Garden Network, presented the second annual FiG Award to Joelle Don De’Ville, the Agriculture, Food & Natural Resources teacher at Gorzycki Middle School.

Left to right: Joelle’s Golden Gnome trophy; A queen butterfly lands in the Gorzycki gardens.

“Joelle is a garden warrior!” shared Carolyn Finkler, Joelle’s nominator and colleague, who teaches business, marketing, and finance at the school. “Joelle has inspired so many students on campus to volunteer their time to work on developing and maintaining our monarch butterfly garden.”

Carolyn Finkler, Joelle Don De’Ville, and Mary K. Priddy stand together in the Gorzycki gardens.

Through Joelle’s leadership, the Gorzycki gardens are continuing to flourish. Student groups from across the campus and community, including the National Junior Honor Society, Girl Scouts, and Peer Assistance Leadership and Service (PALS), have shown up on their own time to support the gardens. They’ve built stone borders, assisted with planting, cared for the goats and chickens, and helped keep things looking beautiful. But Joelle’s commitment goes beyond just maintenance — she envisions a space where all students can reap the benefits of nature and is taking steps to bring that vision to life.

“Joelle has also overseen the building of a garden specifically for our Life Skills students that is raised and accessible to all of the students,” Carolyn added. “It’s called AAA: Agriculture for All Abilities.”

When asked where Joelle would like to take photos, she was quick to answer that she wanted to be in front of the AAA garden. “This is my favorite part of the garden,” Joelle shared. “Be sure to get the amaranth in the photo!”

Standing in front of the AAA garden, Mary K. Priddy presents the coveted Golden Gnome trophy to Joelle Don De’Ville.

Joelle’s enthusiasm for her work is contagious — as evidenced by the number of collaborations she’s fostered in support of the garden. Creative writing students use the garden for a class on transcendentalism, students in the art program painted plain metal tubs to be used for plantings next year, and the Texas A&M Forest Service comes each fall to plant a tree on campus for Texas Arbor Day. Joelle also makes sure that every student in her class gets to take home a sapling to plant themselves.

One of the standout experiences from the last year was a partnership with Gorzycki's culinary class. First, culinary students came to the gardens to learn about chickens and how to keep them from students in the Principles of Agriculture class. The next day, the culinary students invited the agriculture students to their kitchen so they could work together to make egg bites. One student exclaimed that they were “way better than Starbucks!”

The culinary collaboration in action! Left to right: Learning about chickens in the garden to making egg bites in the kitchen.

The work of teachers like Joelle can far too often go unnoticed. With the FiG Award, the Central Texas School Garden Network and Office of Sustainability hope to shine a light on the incredible work being done across our region to foster lifelong learners and conversationalists.

“My students are my true inspiration,” said Joelle. “They are the living embodiment of what you sow today, you reap tomorrow.”

As the winner of the FiG Award, Joelle received a $50 Central Market gift card, a certificate of recognition, and the coveted Golden Gnome trophy.

Students prep garden beds for planting at Gorzycki Middle School.

Research consistently shows us that time spent outside supports happy, healthier, and smarter kids. We are proud to present this year’s award to Joelle and invite you to share us in congratulating her.

If you would like to explore ways to green your school’s campus, learn more about the Bright Green Future Grants program.