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Alumni Awards List

MOHAMMED NURU was born in Bristol, England, and raised in Nigeria. His ties with agriculture go back to his youth, when he helped raise livestock on the family farm and grow fruits and vegetables which he and his brothers and sisters sold from their bicycles. Nuru moved to the United States in 1983 to study landscape architecture, pursuing and receiving his bachelor's degree from the KSU program. After some years in the for-profit design world, Nuru chose a less traditional path, joining the San Francisco League of Urban Gardeners (SLUG) as Landscape Architect. From this position, Nuru cultivated several youth garden programs that addressed income-generating, job training, and recreational needs in low-income communities. Nuru quickly rose to become the Executive Director of SLUG, and he is credited with the growth of the organization from primarily a garden group to one of the most active grassroots, social justice organizations in the country. Nuru oversees an office staff of 25 (and several hundred volunteers, serving more than 2000 members city-wide) and is actively involved in all aspects of SLUG's administration, including program planning, funding, community outreach strategies, contract negotiations, accounting practices, and non-profit compliance issues. In addition, with a rotating field staff of 40, Nuru manages an average of 25 projects a year, including community gardens construction, public properties landscaping, and certificate programs in construction and landscaping to the chronically unemployed. Active in other venues of community and professional service as well, Nuru is the founder and Board Chair of the East Bay Urban Gardeners (EBUG) and founding member of Access African International. He was instrumental in bringing the Urban Resource Partnership (URP) program to San Francisco and now sits on the URP Planning Committee. This year, Nuru was elected Vice President of the Bay View Hunters Point Project Area Committee Board and chosen to sit on the Recreation and Park Department's Public Advisory Committee to prepare a program, landscaping, and strategic plan for the Department through 2025. From 1991 to 1994, Nuru served on the Landscape Advisory Committee for the San Francisco Water Department's Public Utilities Commission, and from 1994 to 1996 on the board of the American Community Gardening Association. Nuru is a member of the American Society of Landscape Architects (ASLA).