María Torres feels captivated by seeing how the Esperanza Elementary School, the school his daughter Bella attends has gradually replaced cement with green areas.
“I love seeing more gardens and that they have planted trees. Before it was pure cement and it was quite hot. Now my little girl can explore nature; and know that trees and plants give us pure air and oxygen; and in hot weather, they provide us with shade,” she says.
But that’s not all, she says that her daughter who attends third grade surprises her with her comments when she arrives home. “He tells me about the bees and birds that come to the habitat created in the back of the school; and the experience of having different animals such as birds and bees come to visit them.”
Bella excitedly talks to him about nature, the earth and things that her mother didn’t know about. “So I’m educating myself too.”
The Esperanza Elementary School Located in the Westlake neighborhood of Los Angeles, it has a student population of 630 students ranging from three-year-olds attending transitional kindergarten through fifth grade. 97% of the students are Latino, many of them are minor immigrants from Central and South America.
“We are west of the skyscrapers of downtown Los Angeles and east of MacArthur Park on busy Wilshire Boulevard,” says Brad Rumble, who has been director of the Esperanza Elementary School for almost ten years and in his 34-year career he has worked for three schools in the Los Angeles Unified School District.
“Part of my journey as an educator has been to recognize the need for green spaces on our campuses, because if there are no opportunities outside for children to explore nature, we can make them possible on campus.”
When he arrived at Esperanza School, he remembers finding a lot of concrete and asphalt. Today he feels proud, because they have managed to replace 10,000 square feet of asphalt with natural spaces
“I found two small gardens in the front of the school, and I was actually very happy when I saw a tree in the parking lot. In my previous schools, Leo Politi Elementary School and Pico Unionwe were successful in taking a part of campus that no one really used and turning it into a green space for students and faculty.”
When he arrived at Esperanza Elementary School in 2014, he wanted to apply what he had learned in his previous years.
“What I found here in this yard was a lot of concrete and some holes for trees, but they were small. “We also had three palm trees that were very tall and didn’t provide much shade.”
So the new director began to think about how to reimagine that space to make it more natural and take advantage of it to make it greener.
Today, he is pleased to have created a garden in the center of the school as well as a wildlife habitat in the back.
“I worked with Oaktree Capital Management, a business in downtown Los Angeles that was celebrating its 20th anniversary, and they helped us with native trees around the perimeter of the campus.”
One of those trees is the Palo Verde and the other is the Coast Live Oak which was a gift from the parents of the Leo Politi Elementary. These trees now offer shade and contact with nature to everyone who walks through the school.
“We have planted more than 20 trees,” he says.
More shade
The interior garden of Esperanza Elementary School gives off a fragrant aroma that comes from the cleveland sage bushes, a plant native to the region. Also seen are the Toyon bushes that typically grow in Southern California.
“This is the plant that gives Hollywood its name because it has red berries that look like fruits. And when people came to develop Hollywood, they saw this tree with this bush with berries and they said, “Oh, it’s like a holly, and they called it Hollywood.”
The transformation of the interior patio into a garden was an LAUSD project, through its program Seeds which provides funding to improve and create healthy outdoor learning environments that support the curriculum.
“We had to apply for the money, and we worked very closely with the school district to make it happen. “They gave us $100,000 for this project.”
In the transformed interior garden of the Esperanza School, teachers sit to enjoy their lunch under the trees on one side; and on the other side, children play under the shade.
“In total it took us five years to develop this project,” he says.
The benefits
Principal Rumble says teachers and students have benefited from the replacement of cement with trees and gardens.
“The reality is that in downtown Los Angeles, there are not many spaces for children to run and play; and we have created these areas to help them connect with nature without taking a school bus for a field trip.”
He considers shade to be something very important, even more so when everyone is worried about climate change and the planet is warming.
“It is a fact that in Los Angeles we have many hot days. What do children do on a playground on a hot day? They look for shade. Therefore, we need to make shade available to them.”
Why don’t we have enough shade and trees in our schools in Los Angeles?
“I think in the 20th century, the thinking was to make things flat and safe, and I respect that, but now we know more about the damage the sun does, and that there are creative ways to make the schoolyard a more natural space for the students. So I think 21st century campuses are going to look different than 20th century campuses. And some of the things we do are going to provide examples of that.”
More plans
Director Rumble says they work with non-profit organizations Los Angeles Neighborhood Land Trustand The Trust of Public Land that have received subsidies from the state, one of them from California Natural Resources Agency and another of Cal firethat they will give to the Esperanza Elementary$3 million to renovate the playground and other spaces.
“A lot of this grant is going towards putting in more natural soil, so that children can play on grass instead of asphalt, and planting a lot more trees.”
He adds that greening schools is part of LAUSD’s strategic plan.
“Superintendent Carvalho has seen these spaces and recognizes the importance.”
The habitat, a green haven
Students take different classes in the wild habitat of the campus created eight years ago at Escuela Esperanza.
“We don’t call it a garden, because it really is a place for living things, and students come here to take geometry and science classes.”
He says this is because three-dimensional shapes occur in nature and it’s great to hear a child in kindergarten make the connection between the image of the cone on his paper and the beak of a bird.
And he adds that in this project they had the support of Los Angeles Audubon Society who went to school and worked with his students to imagine what California was like 600 years ago.
“They studied the soil and determined which California native plants would have grown in Westlake 600 years ago. And we planted small plants back then, small trees: and in these eight years, they have developed together with the children.”
The Esperanza School wildlife habitat includes sage, buckwheat, and trees such as coast live oak and western sycamore. The space is highlighted by a huge mural made by Mexican-American immigrant, Jonathan Martínez.
When we ask kindergarten teacher Cynthia Barrilleaux, who teaches geometry to the children in the habitat, what is the main benefit that she has observed the place has on the children, she says that they connect what they learn in the classroom with the environment and the world around them.
“Children have a lot of fun while they learn; then they share that information with their families and parents, and they come to school excited because we are applying mathematics in the environment.”
He shares that on a personal level it makes him happy to have more green spaces at school.
“It makes the students and me feel calmer. It is very good for mental health. Sometimes we spend a lot of time in the classroom and on the asphalt and when we go out into nature, that gives us peace.”
Elizabeth Williams, a retired teacher, works two days a week, teaching science to third and fourth grade students, in the school’s habitat.
“We study the nature found in this beautiful habitat; and the students have seen it grow since they were little plants; and they encounter insects, pollinators; and they are curious about everything, and I have noticed that they stay still observing the plants and birds.”
He adds that this is very useful for these children who live in the city and do not have much access to nature and learning.
“They see a turtle and immediately go to their iPads or iPhones to look for more information because they want to know more.”
He says they also talk about climate change, how it relates to them and who is creating it.
“It’s kind of an introduction to things they’ll deal with in the future as adults.”
The example of Escuela Esperanza is very important since the Initiative Green Schoolyards America revealed in a study that 2.6 million students across the state interact daily in schoolyards with less than 5% shade from trees.
Krisztina Tokes, executive director of facilities for the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD), said at a recent Ethnic Media Services press conference that the need to transform schoolyards is huge.
“Half of our schools, 485, have less than 30% green spaces; more than 200 schools have less than 10%. The good news is that we have invested almost $500 million in green projects that are in the works and include greening 30% of the playgrounds for early education.”