By Sean P. Ray | Managing Editor

OBSERVATORY HILL — On a sunny and warm March 14 morning, a group of around 45 students from Perry High School put down their textbooks, picked up gardening tools and headed down to Zenshine Community Garden, all in the name of making sure they can graduate.

And it won’t be the last time they’re doing so.

Perry High School has partnered with Zenshine Community Garden and Urban Impact to create a community service opportunity for students looking to fulfill a graduation requirement by helping out down at the garden. Pennsylvania Act 158 makes one of the requirements for graduation the completion of a service learning project.

Zenshine Community Garden is located in Riverview Park’s Kilbuck Valley, and was begun in 2022. The garden features several planting boxes in which a variety of plants, including locally grown produce, are cultivated, as well as a stone labyrinth designed to help improve mental health.

Dorrie Smith-Richie, executive director of Zenshine Community Garden, said Urban Impact and Perry High School reached out to her to pitch the collaboration. It was an idea she was only all too happy to go along with.

“It’s wonderful,” she told The Chronicle, “and that was one of the biggest things that we were hoping to accomplish with this garden — to get a lot of students involved, especially high school students.”

Check out the April edition of The Northside Chronicle for the full story.