To see ideas for
pond,
pavilion,
skatepark,
waterwheel,
press skateboards.

For a narrative tour
of the classroom,
click TOUR.

Student Garden: The student garden is east (or right) of the playground, what used to be the vacant lot. Green patches are student plots. The gray circles are compost bins and tool storage. The brown rectangle is the class meeting spot.

Outdoor Classroom: The outdoor classroom takes place of the abandoned public housing. The classroom contains a pavilion (reddish square), cement water channel (blue wavy line), red waterwheel, pond, and three small ecosystem plots: wetland, grassland, and forest. Water flows from the pavilion from right to left, downstream towards the pond. The cement channel has wide slow deep parts (south of the forest) and narroy fast shallow parts (the windy section right before the pond.)

The three orange rectangles are meeting places (big enough for a class of 30.) One meeting place is on the left (or west) side of the pond and is a good place for classes to gather just as they enter the classroom. The meeting spot on the other side of the pond borders pond, wetland, grassland, and forest. This meeting spot is good for discussion of the different ecosystems. The third meeting place on the far side of the classroom is next to the pavilion. This is the place to discuss the pavilion.

To the left (or east) of the classroom is the skatepark/stormwater detention pond. It takes the place of the empty, unused spot at the end of Aspen Street (between playground and middle school.) Aspen Street itself now has a stormwater channel cut in its middle. The stormwater channel carries stormwater diverted from local street drains to the stormwater detention pond. The detention pond has the old track of Mill Creek painted on its floor.

Site Management: The site is low maintenance and high use. Use of native, flood and drought tolerant plants would minimize the need for watering. Cement channels dry periodically do not need much maintenance. The turtle pond would be low maintenance as well ­ the water does not need much replacement beyond what storms provide. The site is very close to Sulzberger Middle School and used frequently by its science classes. The site is fenced and the gate locked at night to discourage unintended use of the site.