Karma for Cara Foundation awards microgrants to youths 18 years of age and younger who spearhead exceptional service projects in their communities. Microgrant recipient Elizabeth (15) from Florida created an edible community garden at her high school, Jose Marti MAST 6-12 Academy. At the time of application, Elizabeth and team had already selected a location for the garden and collected cinder blocks for raised beds. With the school located in a food desert, many kids in the area did not possess a good understanding of how to access healthy food. The plan was for the project to start with 16 raised beds cared for by teachers & students with an eventual expansion to 25 beds with community participants involved in the care of the garden.

1. What inspired you to start this project? There are no edible food gardens available for the surrounding community as a whole or to students who belong to our school community.
2. Other than you, how many student volunteers participated in your service project? 35
3. Other than you, how many adult (18+) volunteers participated in your service project? 3
4. How many hours did you spend on your project? 3 per week during the school year
5. How many hours did other volunteers spend on your project? 1.5 per week during the school year
6. How many individuals were affected by your project? 70
7. During the time period between when you applied for a K4C microgrant & when you completed the project, what surprised you? Because I deposited the grant money to a school club account, I was surprised by the difficulty I went through in order to gain access to those funds. 
8. Overall what did you learn from this experience? I learned how to properly manage a large group of people to meet a collective goal. The garden project involves many hours of physical labor (digging, building raised planting beds, etc) that cannot be done with a single person.  
9. How will your project continue having an impact in the future? The project is a permanent installation next to our schools arboretum. Current and future students will continually be able to access to garden resources. 
10. How was the K4C microgrant helpful in the completion of your project? The K4C microgrant has given us the ability to purchase PVC pipes for irrigation, in addition to sprinkler heads and timers.