Sarah Cathcart

Sarah is Vice President, Education at Longwood Gardens, Pennsylvania, USA. Sarah has spent her career in education having joined Longwood from the RHS where she was Head of Education. Sarah moved to the US in 2017 and implemented an entirely new education strategy and approach at Longwood. Recognised worldwide for its formal education programmes, Longwood, under Sarah’s direction, instigated a new and innovative range of informal and inclusive educational opportunities. Sarah’s achievements at the RHS included gaining recognition for gardening in the English National Curriculum and an imaginative and ground breaking collaboration with the UK Space Agency on the Rocket Science Project linking citizen science, plants and space which increased the RHS schools’ membership to 27,000 schools. Sarah is passionate about horticultural education and believes in the need to coordinate and collaborate globally to prevent biodiversity loss. In 2014 Sarah became Vice Chair of the Education and Employment Group at the Ornamental Horticulture Roundtable, working with industry and DEFRA to address the UK horticulture skills crisis. Sarah actively supports public gardens and schools through programmes like Seed Your Future, Niagara Parks Education Advisory, and the Unionville Schools District Grounds group. Sarah is a regular speaker at conferences on education in horticulture around the world.