November '05

Farm-to-school work is ultimately about changing the way people interact with food. Through this work, kids, teachers, parents, and cafeteria staff experience farms, gardens, and fresh food for themselves. Each experience, each exposure, builds a food memory and an expectation: that food should taste this good, that it should be grown down the road, and that they should feel this healthy and strong and smart for eating this way.

As we learn in the Curriculum story, “The Real Test: Taste Testing in School,” it often takes 20 exposures to a new food, before children learn to love it. So it is critical that fun and positive exposures to new foods take place in school, where kids spend a good part of their day. In “A Policy for Wellness”, I talk about the new federally mandated School Wellness Policies that provide parents, community members and school officials the chance to influence and formalize their school district’s food and nutrition offerings. Finally, Will Wallace-Gusakov provides an update on efforts to increase local food offerings at the Five Colleges.

As always, I invite you to share your own Farm-to-School story ideas, event announcements, or articles.

Grow well,
Kelly

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Community: A Policy for Wellness
By Kelly Coleman, CISA Program Coordinator

Does your school “feature and encourage students to eat more fruits and vegetables?” Or “promote farm to school connections and buy food that is grown locally as a first priority?” Or “integrate food and nutrition issues and activities into the academic curriculum?” According to the Center for Food and Justice’s “Healthy School Food Policies: A Checklist,” many school districts do.

And soon, if it hasn’t already, your school district will join the ranks and adopt a policy of its own. All school districts with federally-funded school meal programs are required (by Congress in the 2004 Child Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act ) to develop and implement a School Wellness Policy by the start of the 2006 school year. This policy requirement provides us with a great opportunity: to influence standards for diet and health in our public schools. It also gives us a chance to say how important fresh, local food is to our children’s diet and education.

Every school district is at a different place in the development of their School Wellness Policy – some have created committees and dug into the work, others are just learning about the requirement. But since almost all districts will have to create one and since community involvement is required (see the side bar), this mandate creates a chance for you to become more involved. To find out where your school district is in the process you can try contacting your school board or superintendent’s office.

To get a list of resources for drafting School Wellness Policies compiled by the Local Hero Schools Network contact Kelly@buylocalfood.com.

Finally check out the Events listing below for workshops on school wellness policies -- including the Local Hero Schools Network's "School Wellness Policies: Bringing Local Food to the Table" taking place Thursday, December 1 from 5:30-7:30 pm at the Hitchcock Center for the Environment. To RSVP contact Kelly at 413-665-7100 or email her at Kelly@buylocalfood.com.

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Curriculum: The Real Test, Taste Testing in School
By Kelly Coleman, CISA Program Coordinator

Do you remember the moment when you finally decided you liked brussel sprouts? For me, it wasn’t until my mid-20’s. So, if what they say is true, that it takes 10-20 exposures before children are willing to try new foods, I may have confronted sprouts once a year – for 20 years – before that happy day arrived.

Thankfully many kids are being introduced to new foods early and regularly in life – through school. At VT FEED and Action For Healthy Kid’s “Weaving Schools into Wellness” conference, a number of presenters spoke about classroom taste testing activities which involve students in cooking, eating, AND analyzing.

At the Sharon Elementary School in Vermont, each class takes responsibility for a taste test a month – they decide on a recipe, cook the food, and hand out samples to the entire school during lunch. They also do the research to find out what other students really think about the food. Kids with clipboards weave through the cafeteria to see if students liked the sampled food, if they would eat it again, and if they would eat it from the lunch line. These results are then compiled and shared with the school and the cafeteria staff. Sharon Elementary Principal, Sheila Moran says that there is often “a lag between ‘cool’ taste tests and what [kids] will actually eat in the cafeteria,” but she adds, the taste tests are “an opportunity [for kids] to take fresh and seasonal food and do something.”

One of VT FEED coordinators, Joseph Kiefer, summed up, “Kids need to have multiple exposures, hands' on experience cooking, growing, and eating, to learn to love food.” With any luck, today’s kids will learn to love brussel sprouts well before college.

Learn more about VT FEED’s Taste Test at:
http://www.vtfeed.org/tools-resources/pdfs-tool/Coordinating%20a%20School%20Taste.pdf. To see the “Weaving Wellness into Schools” conference flyer see: http://www.vtfeed.org/news/FEEDVTActionConf05%202.pdf.

Cafeteria: Getting 5 at the 5 Colleges
By Will Wallace-Gusakov

Institutions, whether they be schools, colleges, hospitals, prisons, or other entities, represent an important potential market for local farms thanks to their large and reliable demand and their commitment to community. This is evident in the case of the Five Colleges (Amherst, Smith, Mt. Holyoke, and Hampshire colleges and UMass Amherst): their combined cafeterias serve upwards of 40,000 meals a day during the school year. And although this number drops during the summer, even then they serve many thousands of meals daily. Additionally, their consumers (the students) come from all over the world and import money into the area; this money can (and should) be effectively captured for the local economy by farmers. Finally, the colleges all have a commitment to supporting and relating well to the communities in which they are located.

If colleges want to serve healthier, tastier food to their students and support their neighbors, and if farmers want to tap into these potential markets, it should be a simple matter to have local farmers selling to colleges, right? Well, yes and no. As one colleague put it, ‘If it was easy, we would have done it already.’ There are a number of different obstacles to making farm-to-college sales work, from basic ones like the lack of students in the summer and produce in the winter, to more specific logistical problems involving the steps that food takes from the field to the cafeteria.

However, there are many creative ways to overcome these problems, and many creative people working to get more locally grown foods into the Five Colleges. All of the colleges have occasionally bought local food in the past; now Five College students, professors, food service staff and administrators have been collaborating along with the Mass. Department of Agricultural Resources and CISA to make more connections between farmers and cafeterias. Change comes slowly, but it is coming: each school’s dining service is now looking closely at what foods they can buy locally, and the dining service directors from each school are meeting to discuss possible cooperation in buying food from local growers. In the past month, both UMass and Amherst College have announced their interest in joining CISA’s Local Hero Campaign and buying more local food.

This project is moving forward thanks to the efforts of many different people. But there is more work to do as we all work towards a goal that will benefit so many: the colleges, the students, the community, and most importantly, the farmers.

Will interned at CISA last year and this year he is a research assistant for the Mass. Dept. of Agriculture's Farm to School Project, working with Kelly Erwin to assist the Five College food service directors as well as assist schools k-12 and farmers in western Massachusetts. He is a senior at Hampshire this year and a student board member on CISA’s board.

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Events

December 1st, 5:30-7:30, Amherst, MA
School Wellness Policies: Bringing Local Food to the Table
The Local Hero Schools Network, founded by Seeds of Solidarity, CISA, and Fertile Ground, offers an opportunity to learn how you can be involved in your school’s wellness policy; share ideas on how wellness policies can foster connection among schools, farms, and community organizations and promote learning experiences through school gardens and classrooms; leave with priorities and progressive templates for your community. To RSVP contact Kelly@BuyLocalFood.com or 665-7100. For more info see http://www.buylocalfood.com/farmtoschool.htm.

December 14th, Harrisburg, PA
Farms and Schools: Growing our Future
The 7th Annual Future of Our Food & Farms Summit and Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture Commodity Processing Show will focus on farm-to-school efforts. For more information see http://www.foodfarm.org/.

December 15th, 9:00 am – 3:30 pm, Northampton, MA
Communities and Schools Working Together for Wellness
The Massachusetts Department of Education is offering an all-day regional trainng for members of local school wellness policy committees at the Hotel Northampton in Northampton, MA. This forum will provide an opportunity and practical guidance for schools and communities to collaborate towards the development and implementation of School Wellness Policies. The day will include case studies, keynote addresses, break-out sessions and workshops. For further information please contact, Holly Alperin, Comprehensive School Health Education Coordinator at 781.338.6308 or halperin@doe.mass.edu.

Announcements

Student Writing Contest
USDA Risk Management Agency Announces 2006 Future Farmers of America (FFA) Writing Contest
The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Risk Management Agency (RMA) will be again sponsoring a Risk Management Strategies for Supervised Agricultural Experience (SAE) Program writing contest for FFA members. The writing contest provides students with an opportunity to learn about agricultural risks, and to apply risk management tools to their program. Due January 31, 2006. For more info see: http://www.ct.gov/doag/lib/doag/pdf/ffa_national_essay_2006.pdf.

New Grant Available
Lowe's Charitable and Educational Foundation (LCEF) -- Lowe's Toolbox for Education
As part of its continued support for public education, Lowe's Companies, Inc. has announced that its new Toolbox for Education program will award grants to parent-teacher organizations and associations for improvement projects at up to one thousand schools across the United States. One of the sample projects is for building a school garden! Any school (charter, parochial, private, etc.) or parent group that has a group tax ID# or official 501(c)(3) status from the IRS is eligible for the Lowe's Toolbox for Education grant program. Projects are eligible for up to $5,000 per school. The application deadline is March 15, 2006, for more information, go to: http://www.toolboxforeducation.com.

New Program in CT
CT added to the Fruit and Vegetable Snack Program. In the Agriculture Appropriations bill, $6 million was included for six new states (Utah, Wisconsin, New Mexico, Texas, Connecticut, and Idaho) to be added to the Fruit and Vegetable Snack Program, which already operates in Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Mississippi, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Washington and in three tribal nations. Fresh fruits and vegetables are made available to school children through this program. 14 states are now funded -- 36 states to go!

Help Massachusetts Agriculture in the Classroom (MAC)
MAC seeks donations for silent auction fundraiser. Massachusetts Agriculture in the Classroom is looking for donations for their silent auction fundraiser held Dec 1 & 2nd at the Peabody Marriot. If you are interested in donating or want additional information please contact Debi Hogan (508) 336-4426.

Organic Diets Significantly Lower Children’s Dietary Exposure to Oganophosphorus Pesticides. The Centers for Disease Control have released a new study revealing that switching to organic foods provides children with "dramatic and immediate" protection from toxic pesticides. The scientists tested the urine of elementary school children for 15 days. Children ate conventional foods for ten of the days and ate organic foods for five days. Pesticide levels increased five-fold in the children's urine as soon as conventional foods were reintroduced to their diet. The study concludes that many children are primarily exposed to pesticides through their diet, and not necessarily through other methods. Fore more info see:
http://www.organicconsumers.org/school/organicstudy090405.cfm
http://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/members/2005/8418/8418.pdf

Study Finds Price of Produce a Stronger Indicator of Childhood Obesity Than Access to Fast Food. A RAND Corp. study funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture finds that elementary school children living in communities that offer high-priced produce are more likely to gain excess weight than children living in areas where fruits and vegetables are less expensive, the Associated Press reports. To see the report:
http://www.rwjf.org/portfolios/features/digest.jsp?iaid=138&id=84323

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) Finds There is Too Much Junk Food in Our Schools. The GAO recently released a report on foods sold out of school vending machines, school stores, and cafeteria a la carte (snack) lines. Although there have been improvements to the school food environment in some schools and states, there is still way too much junk food sold in our nation’s schools. The new GAO study shows that the availability of junk food in schools has not decreased over the last five years; availability has increased in middle schools and high schools are saturated.

Universal breakfast programs increase MCAS scores. According to new research findings announced in Project Bread’s Status Report on Hunger in Massachusetts, schools with universal breakfast programs (which offer free breakfast to all students), have a higher level of student participation then other schools. Higher levels of student participation in school breakfasts correlate with higher MCAS scores. The report says, “when the school breakfast participation rate is over 80%, MCAS scores are significantly higher then when participation is at lower levels.” To read Project Bread’s report see: http://www.projectbread.org/media/StatusReportOnHungerInMA_2005.pdf.

News

See T. Susan Chang’s fun piece on using action heroes to tell positive food stories: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=4951354.

Anand Vaishnav’s Globe article discusses the diminishing length of school lunches. http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2005/08/06/school_lunc
hes_are_no_picnic/.

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Special thanks to Foster's Market for supporting the Farm-to-School E-News!

You can find Foster's at 70 Allen St. Greenfield

413-773-1100

Funding for CISA’s 2005 Farm-to-School program is provided by CISA’s community and farm members and by grants from agencies including the Community Foundation of Western Massachusetts, Frank Stanley Beveridge Foundation, and the Lawson Valentine Foundation.

Pictures in header are used with permission from The Food Project, CISA's Local Hero Campaign, and parents.