Winner of Best School Garden in Gentoo’s Sunderland-wide competition announced

Rickleton won in the competition’s Best School Garden category, for students’ dedication to creating a community garden for students and local residents within the community.

The garden, created in the school grounds, features planters growing vegetables, a woodland path, poly-tunnels and a variety of trees and flowers planted by the children from seed.

Community volunteers have worked with the school to create an organic garden, teaching the children the importance of recycling and using fertiliser from garden waste and compostable materials.

The pupils, alongside community volunteers and the school’s headteacher, were awarded a customised trophy, certificate and £200 worth of vouchers to be used towards improving the garden. The Best School Garden category was sponsored by Panacea Software.

The judging panel, made up of keen gardeners from Gentoo, enjoyed a tour of the garden by the children and were impressed with the quality of the fresh vegetables including carrots and potatoes, grown by the children.

Alan Gordon, Gentoo's Neighbourhood Estates manager, said: “We were delighted to award the students of Rickleton Primary School with the prize for Best School Garden this year.

The partnership between the community and local school children really makes Rickleton’s school garden stand out.

"It was great to see the children enjoying the garden, working with community volunteers and learning vital skills about taking pride in the environment and outdoor spaces in their local area. A very well-deserved win for everyone involved.”

Alan Baker, deputy headteacher at Rickleton Primary School said: “The children were very excited to hear that they had won Best School Garden in the gardening competition. It’s great to see the hard work of the children and the community volunteers has been recognised.

"The children love getting involved and working in the garden, it builds up their social skills with other children and members of the community, and they are very passionate about improving and maintaining the garden.”

Now in its eighth year, Gentoo's city-wide Ready, Set, Grow competition encourages customers, local schools and community groups to showcase their gardening talent.

The competition launches in spring each year and is announced via Gentoo's social media channels.