Website/Online Content

Smith, H.*¹,
¹ Horticulture Agent, N.C. Cooperative Extension, Greensboro, NC, 27405

 

The Guilford Gardener Course was a 6-week course that focused on several topics and was geared towards people who wanted more in-depth information than our regular 1-hour gardening classes. The course was offered in the spring and there was a morning and an evening class option. It could be done as a stand-alone course but was also a prerequisite for the fall core Extension Master Gardener classes if anyone was interested in continuing on to be a volunteer. The class was offered at the Extension office in Guilford County, but since the county is so large and there are two major cities, Hanna decided that to reach a wider audience that she would also offer the course remotely at the High Point Library where residents in that part of the county could go there to watch a live feed of the class rather than driving a long way to get to the Extension office in Greensboro.

Since this was a course where each week builds on the last, participants were able to receive a Certificate of Completion at the end if they attended 4 of the 6 classes. An additional benefit of attending the course was that participants received a flash drive with relevant resource material and they also gained access to the course website. The website contained basic information about the course such as the schedule as well as an option to submit a question to Hanna. A tab called “Resources” loads a page where participants can get research-based resources relevant to each class topic as well as any handouts that were created for the class. Since the classes were offered remotely through Zoom, Hanna was also able to record the classes and post those on the website for participants who may have missed a class or wanted to go back and revisit a presentation. 61 participants registered for the course with 59 receiving a Certificate of Completion and 98% of participants reporting knowledge gain in areas of growing fruits/vegetables, conducting soil tests, selecting appropriate plants, and many other areas.

Website: https://sites.google.com/ncsu.edu/2019guilfordgardener/home