HAPI team mem­bers Tyler Reed and Bri­an Kleinke will be offer­ing an Intro­duc­tion to Hydro­pon­ics class on Octo­ber 2nd from 6:30pm — 9:30pm EST. The class is a next step in the HAPI pro­jec­t’s new edu­ca­tion and out­reach pro­gram, fol­low­ing on the heels of our engage­ment with East Hick­man High School. Atten­dees will learn the basics of hydro­pon­ic food pro­duc­tion and devel­op their skills in con­struct­ing dif­fer­ent types of sys­tems.  The class is host­ed at the Colum­bus Idea Foundry and is open to the pub­lic. Cur­ricu­lum being devel­oped for the class will form part of the foun­da­tion­al con­tent for the HAPI Learn­ing Envi­ron­ment, and online edu­ca­tion­al ini­tia­tive slat­ed for roll­out lat­er this year. Kleinke said “Edu­ca­tion in the area of self-direct­ed food pro­duc­tion is increas­ing­ly impor­tant in our com­mu­ni­ty, espe­cial­ly now.”

The first of a larg­er sequence of edu­ca­tion­al offer­ings around hydro­pon­ics and aquapon­ics, the class will famil­iar­ize stu­dents with the basic con­cepts of hydro­pon­ic food pro­duc­tion and intro­duce them to com­mon tech­niques and tools of the trade. Top­ics for dis­cus­sion will include plan­ning, light­ing, growth and struc­tures, envi­ron­ment, hygiene and foun­da­tion­al oper­at­ing prin­ci­ples. For much of the class, stu­dents will par­tic­i­pate in build­ing sys­tems that embody dif­fer­ent core tech­niques in mod­ern hydro­pon­ic pro­duc­tion. All tools and mate­ri­als will be pro­vid­ed. “This will be an immer­sive class, ” stat­ed Reed, “very hands-on. One of our goals is to estab­lish an ongo­ing work­shop, a ‘work­shop­ping’ if you will. A place where prin­ci­ples like com­mu­ni­ty involve­ment and prod­uct inno­va­tion are used to fos­ter greater food secu­ri­ty and local inde­pen­dence.”

Class reg­is­tra­tion can be com­plet­ed on the Colum­bus Idea Foundry’s Class­es page.