Summer Green Team

The Summer Green Team is a free program hosted at CitySprouts garden sites across Boston and Cambridge each year. It is designed for middle grade students and provides opportunities to learn gardening, cooking, and leadership skills while working and spending time outdoors. Youth learn to be leaders and stewards in their community through a combination of garden work, STEAM-focused projects, and field trips to green spaces within their community. By working on local urban gardens and meeting with community leaders, the program aims to provide youth the opportunity to identify issues they are passionate about and envision an endless array of possibilities for their future.

BOSTON

This year, CitySprouts is excited to partner with Boston Public Schools and Boston After School and Beyond as a 5th Quarter Site!

Our Boston-based program for rising 5th and 6th graders, will run Monday-Friday, 9AM-3PM for 5 weeks, July 8 - August 8. Location is at the Orchard Gardens K-8 School.

Activities will include gardening, cooking, local field trips, and weekly adventures to visit Boston greenspaces, and academic instruction designed to close summer learning gaps.

Apply now through a 5th Quarter SCHOOL MINT Application below.

CAMBRIDGE

CitySprouts continues to host two sessions of the Green Team Summer Program for rising 5th-8th graders in Cambridge. This year, our program will run at Cambridge Street Upper School and Putnam Avenue Upper School. Both sessions (see below) will run Monday-Friday, 9AM-2PM, are entirely free, include free daily breakfast and lunch, and incorporate weekly field trips.

  • The Science of Gardening will run from July 7 - July 25

  • Growing Green Communities will run from: July 28 - Aug 8

Admission to the program is chosen by an application process. The link to apply for one or both sessions is below. We hope to see you this summer!

 
 
 

CAMBRIDGE MAYOR’S SUMMER YOUTH EMPLOYMENT PROGRAM

This year CitySprouts is partnering with the City of Cambridge as a host site for the Mayor's Summer Youth Employment Program! Both of our Cambridge summer sites will be hosting 2 high-school CITs to support the program. If you or someone you know is going to be a high-school student in Cambridge next year and is looking for an opportunity to learn more about working with youth and gardening in the city while getting paid, professional experience, this is a great fit for you! Click the button below to learn more about the program and apply! Applications close on May 9th.

Questions? Email Alex Frank at afrank@citysprouts.org

Meet the 2025 Summer Green Team and Their Sites

BOSTON

Orchard Gardens K-8 School

Phil and Wes

CAMBRIDGE

Putnam Avenue Upper School

Nicki and Simone

CAMBRIDGE

Cambridge Street Upper School

Catie and Kalyani


Read about last year’s programming here.

Frequently Asked Questions

  • We review applications on a rolling basis beginning on April 1. If your youth is accepted into the program you will receive an email asking you to confirm the details of your application. A youth will not be registered for the program until you confirm their intent to attend. This helps us ensure that we are able to fill all the slots we have available.

  • As a tuition-free program the Green Team relies heavily on grants and donations for funding. By providing demographic information like household income and ethnicity we can paint a better picture of the communities we are serving when applying for funding. Responding to these questions is completely voluntary, and your response does not impact your youth’s eligibility.

  • While gardening is a big focus of the program, Green Team groups do a wide variety of activities every day. We take extra care to work in the garden in the mornings when temperatures are lowest, and all staff are trained to identify and treat any symptoms of heat exhaustion. We have classrooms reserved inside to escape the heat and will have crafts, experiments, and cooking activities that all relate back to the garden.

  • As a tuition-free program the Green Team holds a strict 75% attendance policy to ensure the youth involved participate fully. If you have concerns about your ability to meet that attendance policy please reach out directly to Alex Frank at afrank@citysprouts.org. Failure to meet the attendance policy may result in removal from the program and forfeiture of the stipend.

  • The Green Team partners with Food Services at Cambridge and Boston Public Schools, so the meals are determined by them. If you have dietary restrictions or concerns please be sure to inform us ahead of time so we can make arrangements to ensure your youth’s needs are met.

  • Field trips vary year-to-year. We take extra care to ensure that our trips focus on learning about and connecting with green spaces and communities throughout Boston and Cambridge. To get an idea about what kinds of trips we go on, check out last year’s summer recap.