Weekly Objectives:

• Get together and talk more about the final report in order to get a head start.

• Start gathering data with the final project in mind.

• Have our Google Form survey’s questions finalized with our community partner and submitted to the UA volunteers

• Discuss and finalize blog post # 3

 Achievements:

• On Oct. 24th we have been able to have a long personal interview with one of the long-term volunteer, Augusto, which shared with us how UA and volunteering at GNH impacted his life, and his view on the impact of UA on the West End community.

• On Oct. 25th we enjoyed another beautiful afternoon of gardening at the Freesia rooftop garden site. This time we planted peas and garlic, and sure enough, once again we got our hands full of probiotics. Harvesting wasn’t the goal of that week gardening, nevertheless, we ended up with 3 of the cutest zucchini ever harvest in BC, or at least that is what we think!

• During this week tutorial, we’ve been able to share our vision within our group about this evolution of our knowledge and our emotional rollercoaster up until this point. Those trends are represented in the following graphs.

• We have been able to finalize with Joey our list of questions for volunteers to answers, as well as added several other questions suggested by Joey and her leadership.

• As of this week Tuesday, the Google Form has been submitted to every volunteer (granted they have an email) for them to answer, and for us to start collecting qualitative data.

Moment of Significant Change Workshop

The first thing that stood out as a group during the tutorial session and the Workshop was how much we enjoyed getting our hands dirty and reconnecting with Mother Nature. Those moments are easily spotted by the peaks on the emotional graph. We also found participating in the community lunches and interacting with volunteers highly meaningful as those interactions allowed us to connect the lecture notes and readings with our community, the city we live in, and what is currently happening and being done in the West End. Having experienced direct contact with community partners, volunteers and stakeholders in general gave us a whole new meaning and level of interest to our academic journey. Not to mention the extra layer of complexity that comes with real life situation! We also noticed that just like going out to the community affected our emotional state, the topic discussed during the lecture also affected our emotional state depending on how related to our personal experience the topic was.

The Graceful Dismount

As our project comes to an end, we are taking time as a group to reflect upon the progress we’ve made this far. At the beginning of the semester we decided, alongside Joey, that the goal of our project was to assess the value and importance of the UA program at GNH. Throughout the term our group has been able to attend many volunteer farming sessions and multiple community lunches so we could talk to people involved in these programs. We have been successful in gathering input from volunteers through personal interviews and online surveys. Once we have collected all responses, it will lead us towards formulating our final report. Up to this point our group has stuck to the project goal and communicated with each other to ensure we are all on the same track. As the last few weeks of the term approach us, we will continue as a group to stick to our goals so we can successfully complete our project.