Social Studies Teacher Mr. Ron Cheser advises the Garden Club for any students who are interested in agriculture.  The purpose of the Garden Club is to beautify the MacArthur campus, learn about agriculture, teamwork, and build character.  There are 18 students in the Garden Club, and it meets every Tuesday and Thursday.

According to Cheser, students are planting winter crops: onions, lettuce, cabbage, etc.  Garden Club teaches students not only basic farming skills, but it also helps members share.  When all the crops are done planting, members pick it out and share with the whole club.  Members learn math skills, science skills, and biology.

In the Garden Club, there are specific roles: President, Vice President, Secretary, Treasurer, and an ASB representative.  These students are Emmanuel James who is president, Angel Rios who is vice president, Kimberly Cabrera is secretary, Marcus Solano as treasurer, and Jason Luna as an ASB representative.  Their jobs are to put the shovels back when there done using them, water the garden daily, and rake leaves.

“I like being in the garden club because it’s fun to garden and it’s like a hobby of mine,” said sixth-grader Kimberly Cabrera

Some days the club meets up to discuss what they need to buy.  Cheser said that this will influence students to be a good planter in the future, and it will influence them to be better at all subjects at school.  “I like helping other clubs,” said seventh-grader Jason Luna.  In other words, if there’s a club that’s in need of help, he’s on it’s way to help them.  Jason likes helping Cheser, too.  

For many students, it’s exciting because they find different kinds of insects, in past years they’ve found rats, worms, etc.   Some challenges include big projects, such as landscaping which includes raking leaves, digging dirt, etc.

Cheser decided to advise the Garden Club because when he was younger, he remembers watching lima beans grow in small cups, as a school project.   Cheser also took classes at University of Irvine and Cal State Fullerton.   In the year 2000, the Garden Club started, it ran for 10 years and stopped for 3 years and started again last year.

“It’s not the mountain that defeats the hiker, it’s a pebble in a shoe” said Cheser.  Put differently, all the little things add up to something really big.