As partners on the project, Bee Mission, a Bournemouth-based CIC, has installed professional beehives on the Academies’ site and will be supporting students and staff to manage these safely and successfully. Bees play a vital role as pollinators in our ecosystem and staff at the Glenmoor and Winton Academies hope to use the new beehives as a way to bring the curriculum to life as students learn about biodiversity.  

The Let it Grow project has also seen the development of two distinct outdoor spaces on the academies’ grounds: a dedicated Wellbeing Garden and a productive Community Garden. The first has been designed by Cheryl Needham of Grounded Community in Boscombe and will feature therapeutic and healing plants, aromatic herbs and a wildflower woodland walk to create a full sensory, calming environment for students. Similarly, with many local community gardens having closed in recent years, the Academies’ newly developed Community Garden – featuring a relocated poly tunnel and active growing beds – will offer an additional space for local families and neighbours to enjoy. 

Key project partner Bee Mission supports local bees by installing and managing beehives on rooftops, corporate land, farms and gardens across Dorset and Hampshire. Amy Foster, Head of Bee Mission, said of the new arrivals at the Glenmoor and Winton Academies:  

“The bees are settling in really well, there’s just one hive but about 25,000 bees at the moment and that number’s growing every day. That might sound like a lot of bees but unless you’re up here next to the hive, you wouldn't notice them.  

“We’re super excited about doing hive demonstrations with the pupils, we’ve got plans to bring in the honey spinner, and we’ll be serving the honey produced by the hive in the school cafeteria too. It’s a great way to educate the kids on the importance of bees and why we should be looking after them.” 

Describing the full project, Angelina Parker, Vice Principal at Glenmoor and Winton Academies, said:  

“We are very excited to have launched ‘Let it Grow’ officially and to partner with a local organisation in Bee Mission to install our new beehives. Across the curriculum and in our work with students, we always look for opportunities to bring learning to life for students and to offer a rich education with character. This initiative is a fantastic example of this and one which we know students are very excited about. 

“By linking the hives with our new gardens and wildflower walks, we are creating a complete ecosystem which will allow us to offer so much more not only to our students but to our local community. Both the Community and Wellbeing Gardens will help to enhance and enrich everything we already offer and we are looking forward to our students and neighbours beginning to benefit from them.   

“Above all, we are very grateful and fortunate to have had some amazing support from the local community to help us deliver on this wonderful project, as well as grant funding from BCP’s Virtual School and The Grace Trust without which this would not have been possible. Together, with this support, we have been able to create something through ‘Let it Grow’ which will be far more than the sum of its parts by transforming our outdoor spaces.” 

Gavin Darwin, Deputy Safeguarding Lead at the Academies, and Project lead for the Community Garden, said:  

“We want the Community Garden to be a real hub for local families and residents. Our goal is to open it up so that it becomes a place where people can come in, even during the holidays, to help us maintain the land and grow it. 

“For our students, it offers a practical side to their learning and helps to foster vital skills and attributes we know all our young people benefit from. By getting involved in the ‘active’ side of the garden – moving the poly tunnel, planting the wildflower walk, and tending to the beds – we hope they will gain a real sense of achievement and purpose. 

“It’s about more than just gardening; it is about giving them a space where they can build confidence, learn new skills, and see the tangible results of their hard work growing right in front of them.” 

With the warmer weather and more people in their gardens at the moment, the team behind the Community Garden team has also put out a call to local residents to donate any unused or unwanted plant pots this Spring, rather than throw them away.  

These would be used to support the work planting out seedlings which will benefit visitors to the Garden, with Gavin Darwin adding: 

“Instead of letting them go to waste, we can put them to work here. Whether it's for the sensory garden or the wildflower woodland walk, every donated pot helps our students and local volunteers get more plants in the ground and makes the space feel like a true community-built project.”