The graduating eighth grade class at Charter School of Morgan Hill recently bestowed their younger classmates with the responsibility of caring for the apple trees planted in the campus orchard when the eighth-graders were just kindergartners.
During an emotional, passing of the trees ceremony in early February, each eighth-grade student handed over their treasured tree to an incoming kindergartner, who must commit to caring for that tree over the next nine years until their graduation.
“This is my tree now,” said Jada, 5, a new kindergartner at CSMH. “I have to take good care of it, because Emma and my school are counting on me.”
The students planted the apple trees in the winter of 2004 under the watchful eye of agriculture teacher Kathy Funke, who is also the founder of the agriculture science program at the charter school.
Over the years, the students became the stewards of the apple trees, which were planted in the school’s orchard and are considered as “the crown jewel of the CSMH campus,” according teacher Debbie Lera.
“I think the orchard is symbolic of our growth as a school and as a community,” said Funke, who taught students about watering and fertilizing as well as pruning, pest control and disease prevention. “We have persevered, just like the trees, through many struggles.”
The Charter School of Morgan Hill, located at 9530 Monterey Road in the far northwest part of town, opened in 2001 and has since boosted its enrollment to 520 students with yearly lotteries. In 2012, the charter recorded a 902 Academic Performing Index – the state’s yardstick for measuring academic success – second to only Nordstrom Elementary (915). The benchmark API score is 800.
Students at CSMH, which considers itself a project-based learning school where students are immersed in real-world projects, took pride in keeping the apple orchard alive and flourishing. When the trees began to produce apples at harvest time, students compared the different types of apples and made apple sauce and juice.
“Our students learned so many important lessons,” Funke said. “They learned that if they really believe in something, they shouldn’t be afraid to go out on a limb for it.”
The lessons learned — comparing the apple trees’ lifespan to a student growing roots, branching out and meeting challenges head on — will soon be tackled by the younger generation at CSMH, which had 120 students, parents and staff present in the orchard for the passing of the apple trees ceremony.
“The passing of the torch was bittersweet for the outgoing eighth graders, though the enthusiasm of the future caretakers was contagious,” said Lera, a CSMH teacher who is also a parent of an kindergartner.
