Former student still putting in work at UCOL Whanganui campus

Blake Tolley and Peter Healey planting on opening day. Photo / Bevan Conley

Blake Tolley has planted the seeds to produce more productive students at UCOL.

A student vegetable garden opened on the Whanganui campus on May 7 and was an idea that sprouted in Tolley's mind when he was a student last year.

As well as completing a certificate in science and health, Tolley was an executive officer at UCOL tasked with handling hardship funds for struggling families.

"I wanted to give out produce, so that we would know families are getting fresh nutrients, instead of giving out money that they could go and spend on chippies," Tolley said.

"Food always seems to be a problem in hardship situations, you can always trace things back to food - if you start with a full stomach, you can achieve anything."

Tolley took the idea to the head of UCOL Whanganui Bronwyn Paul who gave him the green light.

He drew up some plans, used a website to make them 3D and then looked into funding.

"I was a part of a group last year called Tuia, it's an organisation that supports young rangatahi Māori to do great things in their community," Tolley said.

"I applied for some funding through them and they were the ones that made this happen."

Tolley has two jobs that are heavy on the veges, one in fresh produce at New World and another at Origins Cafe.

He also volunteers for St John Youth who needed to work a certain amount of community hours to receive some badges, and building a garden was the perfect opportunity for that.

"I've always had plans for gardens, I was hoping to build one with St John's Youth, just to teach them about a hands-on approach. A lot of kids my age don't do gardening," he said.

"You can make a garden out of a wooden pallet, that way you know your produce isn't covered in sprays and you're teaching people something important."

Seedlings were purchased with leftover funds from Tuia and Peter Healey of Wanganui Garden Services came to the party too.

There are cauliflower, broccoli, cabbage and leek seedlings currently growing in the gardens and herbs too.

"We're planning to leave a sort of honesty box here, there's no charge, you can take what you need, but not any more than that," Tolley said.

It's a lovely thing to grow your own food and know where it's coming from, it means a lot to see my plans built and I'm hoping that it's going to go as well as I imagined."