Integrated Campus Programs

Integrated Living Skills

Independent Living Skills (ILS) activities are integrated into all aspects of the youth’s life on campus.  These activities help prepare Academy youth with a solid foundation of the everyday skills needed, as they transition out of the program and into independent living situations.  ILS activities include:

• Meal planning/preparation
• Household chores
• Money management
• Job search and retention
• Accessing community resources

Agriculture Program

The Agriculture Program on campus, a collaborative effort between New Alternatives, Inc., the school, and the YES Program, provides learning opportunities through agricultural literacy to cultivate the youth’s life skills.  The program offers agriculture elective courses, incorporates health and wellness into the youth’s residential life, and is an after-school internship program with participating students paid for their work.  The youth work alongside the San Pasqual Academy Neighbors grandparents in the garden, preparing, planting and sustaining their crops. 

Through the program, independent living skills are incorporated into the daily life of the youth.  For example:  agriculture in the classroom supports math, science and critical thinking skills; agriculture as an internship develops the students’ work readiness skills; agriculture from a health standpoint reinforces the students’ sound nutrition choices; and agriculture from a business perspective strengthens their entrepreneurial skills. 

In time, the program plans to use the harvested fruits, vegetables and herbs in the daily menus in the Academy homes and Cyber Café.  After the crops become plentiful, there are plans to sell the goods at local farmers markets and perhaps to restaurants around the county. 

The program features a one-acre Student and Community Garden and the beginnings of a twenty-acre student farm.