Thanks for your interest in volunteering with GrowNYC!
For an example of a completed volunteer project, take a look at this photo gallery of volunteers at United We Stand Community Garden in the Bronx and this New York Times article profiling the garden after construction was complete.
Bronx
Stevenson High School (Castle Hill)
1980 Lafayette Ave [map]
65,000 square feet - can fit up to 250 people
A large 1.5 acre orchard connected to a High School in the Bronx. Site was very successful but fell into overgrowth and disrepair starting in 2020, and they need a hand rejuvenating the site. A super exciting project that will require lots of weeding, pruning, and cleanup, and is great for a big group.
Brooklyn
CAUSA Festival Garden (East New York)
790 Blake Ave [map]
9,000 square feet - can fit up to 20 people (May - June)
A renovation of an existing garden, including replacing all garden beds, moving soil and mulch, and building seating.
McCarren Park Demonstration Garden (Williamsburg/Greenpoint)
457 Leonard Street [map]
6,000 square feet - can fit up to 100 people
A large, conveniently located site where we can use help with building and art projects, which includes building garden beds and benches, and decorating produce bags. A 2020 update on what we're up to at this garden and here are current photos of the garden space.
Urban Strategies Headstart (East New York)
1091 Sutter Ave [map]
2,000 square feet - can fit up to 15 people (April - May)
An installation of a new courtyard garden space for a daycare center. Includes building metal raised beds and filling them with soil.
Manhattan
Elizabeth Langley Memorial Garden (Harlem)
123 West 137th Street [map]
5,000 square feet - can fit up to 20 people (April - June)
A renovation of a long-standing garden to redo existing garden beds, fill them with new soil, prune trees, and spread mulch.
Governors Island Teaching Garden
The Governors Island Ferry leaves from 10 South Street in downtown Manhattan [map]
45,000 sq ft - can fit up to 200 people
A one acre foot urban farm dedicated to education that has pivoted to growing food to donate to food pantries over the past year - that work was recently highlighted by the NY Times. The farm features a beautiful view of the downtown Manhattan skyline and is our most popular volunteer location.
Our farm is very large and leaves plenty of room for large groups to safely distance. Volunteers generally help us with farm maintenance like planting, harvesting, watering, weeding, and preparing food for donations, as well as building and art projects.
Governors scheduling: We hold volunteer days at Governors, primarily, on:
- Tuesdays from 1:30pm to 4pm
- Wednesdays from 1:30 to 4pm
- Thursdays anytime
- Fridays anytime
The site is very popular for volunteers - we have a minimum group size of 25 but most volunteer groups are around 50-60 people.
VIRTUAL VOLUNTEERING OPPORTUNITY
Grant Reading => New Community Gardens
GrowNYC's has built more than 160 community gardens, urban farms, and school gardens throughout the five boroughs, adding more than 1 million square of green space to New York City. We've also completed hundreds of renovation projects, built green infrastructure elements like rainwater harvesting systems and bioswales, and much more.
Want to help us choose our next batch of projects? Every spring, we get dozens of worthy submissions from NYC groups interested in having GrowNYC build them a publicly accessible garden. Help us read those applications and hear about the interesting and unique garden projects New Yorkers are proposing. You'll read 2-4 applications, submit your feedback in a rubric, and will get kept in the loop as we progress through selecting and building out some new gardens within 4-6 months!
An example before/after:
