Roswell North Elementary Foundation
Liz Rains is the Science Lab Teacher and School Garden and Kitchen Lab coordinator for Roswell North Elementary School. She grew up in a small rural area of Virginia, twenty five miles outside of Washington DC. Her dad was an avid gardener and the person that inspired her to grow food. In 1989, she graduated from Salisbury University on the shores of the Chesapeake Bay. After college Mrs. Rains worked at The Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, FL in Ophthalmology and for America Online (AOL). It was during this time that her interest in “how things work” really started.
The Rains family relocated to Roswell in 2007. All three of their children attended RNE, Crabapple Middle School and Roswell High School. Anna is a teacher at Spaulding Elementary School, Andrew is finishing his student teaching as a high school history teacher at Cherokee High and Mary, the youngest of the Rains children is a Sophomore in college, studying Environmental Law and Environmental Science. As soon as she arrived in Roswell, her volunteer work with RNE and school gardens began. She was part of the original RNE Environmental Club and it was her interest in growing with the students that brought her to RNE.
When she arrived at RNE, twenty five garden beds were here waiting to be tended to. Together with the students she planted, weeded, maintained, harvested and donated thousands of pounds of produce for our neighbors, friends and families through the Food Bank at the NFCC. Recently, the gardens have provided food for our own students as we work with our Cafeteria Manager to bring Farm to School fruits and vegetables to the lunch tray. During Covid, our gardens produced lettuce, basil, celery, potatoes, broccoli and kohlrabi that was used daily by the chefs at Table and Main to create a community meal program for those who needed a hot meal.
Mrs. Rains believes everyone should make the world a better place and it is her life long work with Girl Scouts that keeps her busy outside of school. As a retired Troop Leader and mentor to girls as a Girl Scout Gold Award advisor, she continues to watch young women taken on the world. The Science Lab at RNE gives her an opportunity to blend all of her passion and past experiences into a curriculum that she shares every day with the students here at RNE.
Roswell North Elementary Foundation 