The societal changes of our food system and worldwide changes in household roles contribute to environmental challenges, and a decline in the level of skills linked to food production, preservation, preparation and serving in society. There is evidence that the resulting obesogenic society creates a setting where children are more susceptible to overweight, obesity and related non-communicable diseases. These are worldwide tendencies existing in Denmark as well

There is growing evidence that school gardens can have a positive influence on children’s health behaviour and their awareness of the effects of human behaviour on the environment. Furthermore, educating children to become more food literate and environmentally aware can help to create consumers who can make qualified decisions regarding the food system. School gardens are seen as having an important role in this education.

Whereas several studies have researched the positive outcomes of working with school gardens, less has been about how to actually get teachers and school managers to initiate implementation of school gardens in the first place. None of the studies found focus on the role of communication in relation to implementation.

This Extended Master Thesis researches challenges and opportunities in relation to working with school gardens in a Local Council school district in Denmark. These issues are explored through a combination of Design Thinking, Situational Analysis & Mapping and Working Group. Furthermore, the knowledge gathered is used to suggest recommendations in relation to encouraging more schools to implement and work with school gardens in the Local Council school district.

Although this thesis has a focus on communication, a holistic approach was found to be important in order to deal with other issues that affect and disturb communication and take them into account in the communication planning. Some of the opportunities that can support teachers to a successful implementation are creating a strong network in the school district around the school gardens, involving school management, making a clear link to the curriculum and related policies that the Local Council have. More creative and alternative ways of communicating to reach the teachers and managers are required rather than using standard communication channels and mediums. The upcoming school reform was also seen as a central element in which school garden work can closely be linked to.

The Theoretical Framework of Design Thinking, Situational Analysis & Mapping and Communication Planning has contributed to creating an analysis based on user-needs and the findings and recommendations came from the research participants themselves. Furthermore, creating a Persona, Storyboard and Customer Journey Map were central to the visualisation of the relations between the findings whilst taking into account the context in which the empirical data was collected.