Welcome to the R'Garden!
We at the R'Garden are committed to increasing local food access in Riverside and emphasizing the importance of a sustainable food system! It is our mission to gives students, faculty, and community members the resources they need to foster environmentally and socially conscious connections within UCR and the greater Riverside area.
At the R'Garden, we support UCR in several ways! One of the main ways we help is growing food on about 6 acres of row crops, one of which is accessible to UCR students, staff, and faculty as well as community members to harvest from completely free! We also host events in collaboration with other student organizations and campus departments in addition to our annual Pumpkin Patch in the Fall and Earth Day Celebration in the Spring.
Want to get involved?
One of the easiest and most impactful ways you can get involved with the R'Garden is to come out during our open hours to volunteer! The R'Garden wouldn't exist if it weren't for the dedication of UCR students both past and present!
Open Hours:
Monday - Friday
8am - 4pm
About the R'Garden
Who Are We?
The R'Garden is a student and community resource space that began in 2009, when a group of students, faculty, staff, and community members set out to increase environmentally centered spaces on UCR's campus. In 2012, the student organization's Sustainable UCR and Cultivate R'Space began organizing a petition and rally to under the campaign "Where's R'Garden?" From that dedication came what we know today as the R'Garden!
Made up of several different areas, the R'Garden has expanded from the original 3 acres of community plots, row crops, and Valencia orange grove to now be on the scale of an Urban Farm! Since 2018, our farm land has increased to a total of 8 acres! With our mission being to feed UCR's community, we grow crops that range from season to season and prioritize donating our produce to the R'Pantry on campus as well as local food banks and food recovery programs.
Mission
The R'Garden is a space that grows fresh produce while providing an opportunity to learn about social, environmental, and economic sustainability through a food systems. We are a student resource center as well as a community centered garden which aims to educate folks on the local food systems in Riverside, while actively engaging folks on the importance of having access to local & fresh produce. It serves as a sustainability hub to promote service learning, and community-based research around food systems through student-led projects and collaborations with the campus and community.
R’Garden has recently expanded to 8 acres that includes a community garden, row crops, a Valencia orchard, and a greenhouse area. In addition to our sections in the R'Garden, we host several events through the school year ranging from a Fall Harvest Festival & Pumpkin Patch to our Spring Dig N' Dance earth day celebration. It is our goal to collaborate with other campus organizations to provide a space that acknowledges the agricultural legacy of UCR's campus as a Land-Grant University that was intended to teach local communities how to cultivate the land.