Master Composter Program Offers Composting Education for Georgia Adults

Summary

Citizens throughout the state of Georgia are increasingly concerned about their environment. To increase composting awareness, Cooperative Extension staff and Athens-Clarke County Recycling staff created the first Georgia Master Composter program to educate the public about ways in which they can compost kitchen and yard scraps. Volunteers from the program are required to volunteer in the community and help Extension staff reach additional clientele.

Situation

Both Cooperative Extension staff and the recycling department coordinator teach numerous composting classes to the local community and are not able to fulfill all the requests for information or projects. Master Composter program participants are required to volunteer in their local community in projects concerning composting. These volunteers will help Extension staff extend efforts by fulfilling more requests as well as building additional partnerships with community groups.

Response

Cooperative Extension staff collaborated with the Athens-Clarke County Recycling division to create a Master Composter program for Georgia residents who wanted to learn more about the composting process. In 2011, program materials and handbooks from Master Composter programs in other states were collected and reviewed. With permission from these other state programs, the Georgia Master Composting handbook and program were created with a focus on Georgia specific composting information. The Athens-Clarke County Master Composter program is the first of its kind in Georgia. Since this was created as a master course, participants gained a greater depth of knowledge and committed to pass this knowledge on to others in their community. The first program was held in January 2012 and had 13 participants. These participants attended nine weeks of classes as well as two weekend field trips to backyard, farm and commercial composting facilities. During the last class, program participants gave a presentation to their classmates on a composting topic which was of particular interest to that student; their classmates provided feedback on the presentation. These presentations were a wonderful opportunity for the sharing of ideas. Upon completion of the class, participants were required to volunteer 40 hours during the first year to graduate from the Georgia Master Composter program and 20 hours each year thereafter to maintain their active status.

Impact

Participants of the 2012 program fulfilled their volunteer requirements in their community through approved volunteer projects and have currently reached over 500 people. The projects included community demonstrations to local community gardeners and school children, as well as building demonstration compost bins at 11 local schools during International Compost Awareness week during May of 2012. Class participants had a monthly booth at the Athens Farmers Market discussing composting with market patrons. This booth has been extremely successful with both kids and parents; kids were able to learn more about the composting process and even get to touch a worm. Two class participants set up a booth at a 5-K race banana snack station, educating runners on composting fruit and vegetable scraps, and composted over 70 pounds of banana peels after the race. Another class member successfully applied for a grant with the University of Georgia Office of Sustainability to create an on-campus composting program for students, staff and faculty of the Warnell School of Forestry and Natural Resources and the Odum School of Ecology. This grant provided composting containers throughout the colleges, two educational classes for interested individuals and paid a student worker to collect and deliver compost to the student-run community garden on campus (UGArden). In addition to these volunteer projects, several class members have created composting businesses based on the knowledge gained from the program. One of these businesses collects compostable food scraps from homeowners, small businesses and the local farmers market, composts this material, and then sells the compost back to the community. Another class member has created a business which sells bokashi fermentation systems to homeowners and plans to collect food scraps from grocery stores, restaurants and cafeterias which will then be fermented through the bokashi process. Of the 13 participants in the 2012 program, 9 completed their 40 hours of volunteer service and graduated in February 2013. These nine graduates contributed 384 volunteer hours and had almost 800 in-person contacts during their volunteer service. There are 20 participants in the 2013 Master Composter program who have already begun volunteering in the Athens community. They have worked with local schools, community gardens and with numerous projects during International Compost Awareness Week in May of 2013. As of August 2013 the 2013 Master Composter program participants have volunteered over 300 hours to the local community. Athens-Clarke County Cooperative Extension staff also coordinated an advanced training for the Master Composters that involved a tour of the vermicomposting bins at Len Foote Hike Inn located in Dawsonville, Georgia. Eleven Master Composters participated in this trip which was their first time seeing a large scale worm composting process. These are comments from the 2013 Master Composter Class Participants on their program evaluation: • The coordinators have a keen interest in composting and are eager to share their knowledge. All questions asked, however lowly, were answered with the same intensity. • Best class I've taken under UGA/CAES! • They were very organized and came across as passionate about the subject matter. UGA and Athens Clarke County is very lucky to have these two dedicated and highly knowledgeable employees. • I learned so much more than I expected! I really, really enjoyed it! • It was excellent! I have thoroughly enjoyed the class-wish it was not ending tonight! • Y'all told me I would get a lot for my money and I totally agree a great investment! • I learned a lot and had fun doing it! • Course was very good. I learned a lot of good information. Really enjoyed the field trips. Learning experience on the field trips seeing the many different ways to compost and the useful ideas of each one.

State Issue

Conservation & Management of Natural Resources

Details

• Year: 2013
• Geographic Scope: District/Department
• County: Clarke
• Program Areas:
  • Agriculture & Natural Resources