Northwest-based chain, Taco Time Northwest is celebrating it’s 50th anniversary this year by launching a schoolyard garden program at Newport Heights Elementary in Bellevue – which seeks to offer students hands-on experience in a variety of disciplines including natural sciences and nutrition.

The sponsored program, which has enabled the school to start a Garden Club consisting of 19 students, provides garden beds, seeds and a gardening expert.

“It was so great to see how excited the Garden Club students were to be able to put their hands in the soil for the first time,” said Gretchen Everett, marketing and advertising director of Taco Time NW. According to Everett, the Newport Heights Elementary schoolyard garden is a pilot program that the company hopes to expand throughout Puget Sound area in the future.

In the case of Newport Heights, the school hopes to develop the curriculum each year in order to teach students lessons including the life cycle of fruits and vegetables, the benefit of insects, the importance of climate on plant growth and cooking with fresh and local produce.

Students from Newport Heights Elementary participate in the Taco Time NW-sponsored Garden Club. CONTRIBUTED