The Chair of the High Atlas Foundation Board of Directors, Chemsedine Sidi Baba, and I had a wonderful visit to the Ecole de Jardinage in Rabat this week. We learned about its mission and the wonderful dedication they have to their 90 students who learn critical skills in agriculture and ecosystem management. All of the students who participate in their three-year degree program do not pay tuition and have breakfast and lunch everyday provided by the excellent restaurant facility on their eight-hectare campus.

One feels the heartfelt dedication of the school’s staff and leadership team as we know the world over that pedagogically, people learn best by doing and directly experiencing. The students participate everyday in the practice of gardening and growing trees and plants that are, at this school, of endemic, organic varieties.

The building structures embody the utilization of local materials and heritage knowledge which, as we also know, are excellently resilient. The school’s leadership has a great sustainable development vision, which they are advancing everyday with students. They seek to include in the future the planting of a fruit tree nursery to benefit rural communities in their region and potentially beyond.

There are so many things we learned that sincerely impressed us, but one important takeaway is the school’s real focus on the employability of the students that graduate from their program. The participants arrive early everyday, study and practice sustainability to the late afternoons, five days a week for three years in an encouraging, beautiful environment with professors who themselves are educator-practitioners.

I would be so very happy if one day soon, graduates of the Ecole de Jardinage were colleagues at the High Atlas Foundation. We very sincerely look forward to learning more as to how HAF can be supportive of this needed educational model.

If you may be visiting Rabat, perhaps you can enjoy lunch at the so very good restaurant on the school’s campus, tour its land, meet its amazing staff and students, and be truly inspired as we were on this visit.