Girl expands garden project to feed the hungry

A simple seed that sprouted an idea has blossomed into a dream now reaching fruition.

Katie Stagliano, a fourth-grader at Pinewood Prep School, is farming with a purpose: to help ease hunger by donating the harvest to local shelters. She's far from alone.

Through a chain of events that started with a cabbage seed she planted a year ago in her home garden, Katie has become the inspiration and catalyst for her school to establish a garden for the student body to cultivate with the aim of benefiting those in need.

Katie started last year with a cabbage seed and the hope of winning a contest through Bonnie Plants for growing the largest cabbage. She watered and fertilized her vegetable until it grew to 40 pounds, well beyond her expectations.

But once the cabbage got to a certain size, she and her family decided to donate the vegetable to the Tricounty Family Ministries, where it ended up on the dinner plates of more than 250 needy people. "We got the idea that it deserved a special honor," she said. "It made me feel really good. I was excited. We'd always done a garden at our house."

Katie said she'd always had an interest in gardening, "but after I grew my big cabbage," she said, her interest "grew bigger and bigger."

Katie helped serve her cabbage to the needy. Through the volunteer effort, she decided she could do more. She entered a T-shirt contest called Launch My Dream through amazing-kids.org, a charitable organization in California.

Katie's idea was that there would be no hungry children. The organization selected her dream to sell as a T-shirt design with part of the proceeds going to help her start gardens.

"My dream is no hungry children," she said. "I thought we could make it come true and donate most of the food to a soup kitchen and help needy people."

Through it all, her mother, Stacy, has been amazed to see how the power of an idea can take root and spread.

"It's truly growing by leaps and bounds and everyone's getting on board. It's just amazing," she said.

The school found some land on its 43-acre campus that could be turned into a large garden plot. After the sod was broken and the ground tilled and cultivated, classmates gathered April 16 to plant.

In March, the Web site inevergrewup.net heard about Katie's story, and asked her to write a blog post about her experience. Bonnie Plants found out what she was trying to accomplish and donated a truckload of plants and some tomato cages for the school's plants.

The Staglianos contacted Fields to Families, an organization that helps bring harvests to those in need, and officials put them in touch with the Clemson Extension Office.

Now, Katie has Master Gardener Lisa Turocy giving advice to her and her classmates.

Turocy, who volunteers her time, got her certification in February and Katie became one of her first contacts needing guidance. The 37-year-old said she had no idea what was in store for her or how much she would enjoy helping Katie and her school.

"She's totally vivacious and excited about it," Turocy said. "For something of this magnitude, I never thought I'd be able to be a part of it.

"Whenever we get together, she always has questions. It's great to have dialogue with Katie because she totally understands. The kids have great questions and they're so enthusiastic. They want to understand what to do with the seeds. I would love to see this expand to other schools."

And as if this attention wasn't enough, a news crew from NBC Nightly News was on the scene at Pinewood when Katie and her classmates planted their garden. The story ran as part of the broadcast's "Making a Difference" segment April 22.

Katie sees the publicity as an opportunity to get the word out about how to help people.

"It doesn't really matter if you're little or big, you can still make a difference," she said.

Contact Bill Henley at 937-5433 or bhenley@postand courier.com.