November 4, 2023 – The Berkeley Project (Gateway Garden & Pavilion)
The North Hills Community Association had the pleasure of hosting The Berkeley Project for the third time this year! The Berkeley Project is a service organization comprised of Cal Berkeley students that help to bridge the gap between students and the community. We love working with these leaders!
Each semester this group organizes a Fall Berkeley Project Day and recruits over 2,000 volunteers to work alongside community members to help in beautifying their neighborhoods. We had the opportunity to recruit 32 members to help finish up our gardening efforts at the Gateway Garden and Pavilion on a clear and sunny Saturday, November 4.
The students met at Sproul on campus, received their designated assignments and loaded up on the bus to meet up with waiting NHCA members to shuttle them over to the garden. Carolyn Burgess, Cornelia Grimes, and Dan and Vicki met up and shuttled them back and forth until we were all together to review the day’s plan of action. Dan gave a brief overview of the NHCA, along with the history of the garden. We then reviewed what needed to be done and broke up into groups. Each group focused on a different garden zone and assignment, whether it was weeding invasive grasses, removing berry bush vines, deadheading spent flowers or just pulling up dead plants. We worked with The Berkeley Project team leaders Sam and Ashley who helped to organize the four groups and helped to keep everyone on track.
This day was spent ‘beautifying’ the garden, which was the last project for this season. This volunteer workday also finishes up a two-year master plan after assuming responsibility for the garden as new Board Members in the Spring of 2022. Last year there was still a lot of weeding and cleanup needed, so we didn’t get a chance to eliminate as much of the dead plants and remove debris, which helps to invigorate the living plants, as we would have liked but we certainly got to it this year thanks to The Berkeley Project.
The day ended with us shuttling the students back to campus where they met with fellow volunteers for a sponsored lunch. Thanks again to Sam and Ashley for helping coordinate such a lovely community day.
The Berkeley Project team did an outstanding job which resulted in about 40 waste bags of green waste plus litter and other debris. The NHCA garden group enjoys working with The Berkeley Project – they are an enthusiastic and hard-working group. It is a great partnership which has truly made a difference at the Gateway Garden. Stop by the garden and see for yourself. It has been quite a dramatic transformation.
If you want to learn more about the North Hills Community Association, check out our website at: https://northhillscommunity.org
Vicki Oliveira / Garden and Events Chair / North Hills Community Association
