Blueberry Harvest School 2022
This month marks Mano en Manos busiest and most exciting time of the year- blueberry season! Each summer the population of Downeast Maine rapidly grows with the arrival of workers and their families who come to the area to harvest and process blueberries.
Mano en Manos works hard to help to fill the gaps in support that many migrant workers face when they arrive in Maine, provide access to essential services and resources, and welcome new and returning faces to our community.
This summer, our work will be focused in three main areas:
Blueberry Harvest School
Camp Services
Welcome and Resource Fairs
We will share stories across all of these focus areas throughout the summer, and want to share more information about our annual Blueberry Harvest School (BHS)!
Blueberry Harvest School 2022
The Blueberry Harvest School (BHS) is an educational program for migratory farmworker children/youth (birth-20) in Washington County for Maine’s wild blueberry harvest. BHS has two major elements: an in-person school for children ages 3-12, and a camp services program which provides academic enrichment and support for children ages 0-2 and children over 13.
All aspects of BHS programming are built around the interests, abilities, and needs of migrant students, with the goal to provide instructional services and educational activities that:
Promote students’ social-emotional growth.
Center students’ languages and cultures.
Offer opportunities for engagement and collaboration with peers in a culturally responsive learning environment.
In addition, the program will provide support and counseling services during the blueberry harvest, to ensure that basic needs are met and students are set up for success inside and outside of the classroom.
Each year BHS adopts a theme to guide curriculum and instruction based on parent feedback. This year the theme is, “Our Origins,” and focuses on celebrating all identities and honoring where we come from. This theme aims to connect students from different contexts to each other by exploring each student's unique senses of where they come from.
In addition to classroom instruction, students will get out and about and learn through exploring on field trips. Each class will have weekly field trips to explore the area and have fun!
This past week our incredible team of educators and community advocates have come together for four days of professional development where they have discussed and expanded their knowledge of: language justice, trauma-informed practices, teaching strategies for multilingual learners, and program routines and expectations.
Our talented, multi-lingual team are part of the communities we serve, and collectively represent more than 155 years of experience with the Migrant Education program, speak more than 5 languages, and bring unique professional expertise and lived experiences to their work.
The Blueberry Harvest School will begin on August 1, 2022 and run for three weeks.
If you want to learn more about the Blueberry Harvest School or the Migrant Education program, visit our website or contact Leslie Monroy (lmonroy@manomaine.org).
*All plans for 2022 BHS programming have been and will continue to be adapted as needed to follow health and safety guidance from the CDC and the state of Maine. We will continue to follow the CDC and Maine DOE to structure our program and policies.
