Participants at Clash of the Colleges in Canterbury, hosted at Ashburton, featuring Girls who Grow and Future Farmers NZ.
Participants at Clash of the Colleges in Canterbury, hosted at Ashburton, featuring Girls who Grow and Future Farmers NZ.
It is now two years since Girls who Grow began its programme to support the next generation of female leaders, change-makers and environmental guardians.
The programme aims to connect them back to the land and build meaningful and values-aligned career pathways into climate-positive agriculture, farming, horticulture and conservation that support ecosystems to thrive.
Girls who Grow connects 15- to 17-year-old girls through workshops, imagination challenges, on-farm experiences and mentorships.
This provides pathways for young women to enter New Zealand’s food and fibre sector, which accounts for 81% of the country’s exports but involves only 6% of school leavers.
“Now is the time to grow the next generation of female change-makers, leaders and environmental guardians in agriculture,” Girls who Grow co-founder Catherine van der Meulen said.
And what a learning year it has been, not only for the students but for Van der Meulen as well.
The first year saw Wakatipu High School and Mt Aspiring College join the pilot programme, taking part in experiences run by Girls who Grow, and come December 6, these students will join together at Lake Hāwea Station to present their evolving projects on climate-positive solutions to drought to industry leaders and farmers.
This year Wellington, Wairarapa and Horowhenua schools have accepted the Girls who Grow challenge.
On a cold, wet day with sideways-blown rain that only Wellington can produce, Aotea College in Porirua had 25 intelligent, curious young learners who involved themselves in a two-hour workshop, where they shared stories, explored their interests and passions and immersed themselves in “Jessica’s story”, a cleverly adapted imaginative tale about the future where ecosystems thrive.
A taste test and vegetable-guessing experience at Future Pathways Expo in Levin, supported by Woodhaven Gardens.
Van der Meulen said this had also been a big learning curve for her, with Wairarapa and Horowhenua showing her how their communities can come together with suppliers, organisations, volunteers, speakers, schools and students getting behind Girls who Grow.
The feedback from the students has been very positive.
They enjoyed being able to voice their concerns for regional environmental challenges in New Zealand or the planet, produce ideas to enable a possible solution and apply this through a design thinking process.
Where to for Girls who Grow?
Manawatū College students with Talisman Nursery natives after making a pledge of their commitment to the environment.
With Year 10 students now included in the programme, van der Meulen hopes to continue to scale these workshops into more regions across the country over the next year, with long-term visions including open-access educational farms with decentralised ownership and management led by female collectives.
Canterbury working on their Resilient Food System module at Clash of the Colleges.
Plans are under way for their next stages of engagement with the students for 2025, which include an on-farm lunch and learn experience, an imagination challenge that supports students through a one-day design thinking programme to create meaningful solutions to regional issues, and a year of mentoring with regionally based mentors to further develop their project ideas.
“Our Wairarapa students are about to take their projects through the next phase of the programme being supported to go through the Young Enterprise Scheme and Girls who Grow mentoring stages of the programme in 2025 with solutions such as a desalination plant, community water programme, apps to support farmers with native plantings ensuring high survival rates and many more,” van der Meulen said.
The programme has received early-stage funding from WellingtonNZ, OneNZ and Federated Farmers, Palliser, Pukaha, New Chapter, Grounded Governance, Tararua Growers Association, eknows, True Chartered Accountants and Lewis Farms through student scholarships.
Van der Meulen is always happy to connect and chat about what this could look like for organisations interested in enabling a scholarship ortwo to support the students for the 2025 and 2026 Girls who Grow programmes.
Student scholarships across two years (2025 and 2026) are $300 perstudent.
Van der Meulen said now was the time to encourage young women and support them to pursue careers that connect to nature and the industries that wrap themselves around it.
These are our daughters, granddaughters and our future.
