North Star Academy Students assist with spring planting at NMU

Spring is in bloom and North Star Academy students are learning all about it. Eighth graders from the Community Environmental Education Program headed over to the Native Plants Study Area at Northern Michigan University today to help clean up the grounds and get ready for planting. North Star Academy students learned a lot from today’s event as they begin to embark on a water garden of their own.

“We’ve been doing a lot of work over the years to learn how to do this garden and to learn the proper placement of the species and part of coming to Northern is to learn about the species as well,” said Michele Talsma CEEP 8 Instructor, North Star Academy.

Students learned about plants native to the UP and the importance of restoring those plants. But, kids weren’t the only ones to benefit from working in the garden.

“Gives me a chance to provide a little education about environmental science and environmental restoration but they provide a lot back to me, both in the questions they ask, they’re excited about it, and then just helping out on the site.” said Ron Sundell, Environmental Studies Professor, NMU.

Today the students worked mainly on clean–up but they’ll come back in a few weeks to start planting. Though the site looks a bit brown now, by late June the garden will be blooming with wildflowers.