Our People: Rebecca

All across Te Tai Tokerau - from charming Kaiwaka to tranquil Te Hapua, hundreds of students from 22 schools have the opportunity to grow, harvest, prepare and share fresh kai, as part of Garden to Table.

Enabling each of these schools to embed and deliver their Garden to Table programme is the responsibility of Whangārei-local, Rebecca Myhre - and it’s a job she handles with ease, grace, and passion.

Recently, Rebecca told us her Garden to Table story, and it was too good to not share.

Rebecca (left), pictured with Aaron and Jennifer from Ruakaka School (middle), and Louise - Garden to Table’s Programme Manager North (right)

There are many synergies between Rebecca’s passion for children’s education and protecting te taiao (our environment), and the values we hold close at Garden to Table - which explains why she’s right at home as a Regional Coordinator.

Rebecca has a background in education, having worked as a primary school teacher for 8 years in both Auckland and Kuala Lumpur - and this vast experience is one of the best things she brings to our team.

During her time working as a teacher at Maungawhau School in 2016, she even had the opportunity to support the establishment of a Garden to Table programme.

“As a teacher, I had seen how my year 3 and 4 students had thrived in learning Garden to Table. I loved the resources and the opportunities it gave me to connect with my students in a different way. Some of my students who didn’t enjoy a maths lesson loved exploring the gardens, hunting for bugs, and calculating how many bugs of different varieties there were and what that meant for the soil and our plants. It was real-life learning and student lead (my favourite kind of learning!)”

Rebecca in the kitchen at Tangiteroria School

When the opportunity to work for Garden to Table arose in 2020, Rebecca jumped at the chance. She’d recently returned to Aotearoa from South East Asia - and although she’d been intending to stay on maternity leave for a little longer, she applied for the role … and has never looked back.

“My husband noticed the Northland Garden to Table job on Do Good Jobs. He had heard me talk about how much I loved the programme while we were living in Malaysia. I couldn’t miss the opportunity to work for Garden to Table in supporting new and established schools to grow, harvest, prepare and share kai from the garden”

As Northland’s Regional Coordinator, Rebecca’s workdays are varied. “I might be delivering seeds and seedlings to a school, supporting a garden or kitchen session, supporting kaiako and volunteers through training and connecting schools to each other”.

When we asked Rebecca to share a few of her highlights, she had plenty to say.

Ruakaka School’s Masterchef competition, held last year, is a definite stand-out.

“The calibre of the recipes and the artful plating up and the pride that the students had in their seasonal meals was amazing. The collaboration and skill in making some complicated dishes was admirable!”

Some of Ruakaka School’s MasterChef dishes - jaw-dropping chocolate beetroot pudding with a cucumber and kale smoothie, knock on the door gnocchi, and Bulbasaur’s burger

Having grown up in Mahurangi, Rebecca is passionate about rural school education, and enjoys finding innovative ways for rural schools to support each other. Helping schools integrate the Garden to Table kaupapa with their curriculum, so that it is embedded into the school culture and learning, has also meant a lot.

Other memorable moments have included seeing students come together to share kai, joking with tamariki as they harvest ‘treasure’ from the garden, and hearing stories about the enduring impacts of Garden to Table, as they radiate far beyond the school gate.

“I always love sitting down with students and hearing them say ‘I have never tried ... before but it is yum!’ The joy and satisfaction that comes with cooking from your garden is unbeatable! Recently, a parent thanked the school for teaching their child to cook. Whilst the parents had been sick with covid their child was able to use some garden greens and what was in the fridge to make a quiche! What an incredible link taking that learning from school to the home in a time of need!”

It’s these life-long learning opportunities that mean the most to Rebecca.

“Teaching a child to garden and to use seasonal kai from the garden is setting them up with skills for life tackling food security and food resilience issues that we are seeing in communities at the moment”.

Ngā mihi nui, Rebecca - your incredible contributions inspire us greatly. It’s an honour to have you as part of our whānau!

You too can get involved and support our team to do more of this mahi around the motu. Please consider a donation today.