Farm to School programs teach children to appreciate local food and healthful eating.

America has become an increasingly urban landscape, meaning that most people are further removed from the sources of their food than in the 1930s, when local farms and backyard gardens were a bigger part of everyday life.

Those of us who are not directly involved in agriculture can still put food on the table—thanks to local supermarkets and international distributors—but increasing obesity and food-related diseases like diabetes signal that something has gone awry, and the most startling statistics pertain to kids.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), states that 25 percent of kids between ages six and 11 were overweight in 2007. In the late ’70s, it was only 6.5 percent. The CDC also estimates that one in three kids born in 2000 will become diabetic. Perhaps the most disturbing news is that kids born in 2000 will also be the first generation with a shorter life expectancy than their parents.

Numbers like these are exactly why Ann Cooper left her job as an executive chef at an upscale Vermont inn to become a school-cafeteria lunch lady. Considering that over 30 million kids eat a school lunch five days a week, 180 days a year, Cooper knew that the front line in the battle against childhood obesity was somewhere between the tubs of French-toast sticks and the processed macaroni and cheese.

“I don’t know what can be more compelling than the fact that we are feeding our children to death,” Cooper says. “We have to absolutely make nutrition a priority, because all the math and science in the world won’t do kids any good if they are plagued with health problems.”

Cooper notes that 78 percent of American schools do not meet U.S. Department of Agriculture nutritional guidelines, and advocates a return to “real” food that is devoid of human-engineered products such as trans-fatty acids and high-fructose corn syrup.

Where does one find “real food” these days? On the farm.

A program called Farm to School has spread rapidly across the country over the past 12 years, changing the way schools stock their lunchrooms and, perhaps more importantly, the way kids think about food.

Away From the Farm and Back
Deborah Kane, vice president of food and farms for Ecotrust, explains the school lunch program’s evolution in a document titled, “What’s for Lunch?” Kane says school food first came under permanent federal regulation in 1946 in an effort to reverse the malnutrition trend that resulted from the Great Depression. The government also supplied funds for the employment of school cafeteria workers and the purchase of excess commodities (pork, dairy, wheat) for schools—all of which boosted the economy.

The original goal was providing healthy meals with plenty of calories so that kids didn’t go home hungry. But as nutritional thinking and educational priorities changed, schools were told to cut fat out of their meals while keeping the same calorie levels and reducing costs. Kane says sugar was added to some items to replace the lost fat calories, and food production was outsourced to cut costs, making many school kitchens little more than microwave centers. Meanwhile, it became harder for farmers and other local food producers to sell to schools because the belt was tightening on cafeteria budgets.

Eventually, people noticed that school cafeterias were not making a passing grade. Seeds for the Farm to School program were sown in 1996 through pilot programs that reconnected school cafeterias with local food producers and kids to the taste of fresh produce. Today, the National Farm to School Network supports programs in 40 states, and over 8,700 schools by offering free training and technical assistance, information services, policy networking and support, and media and marketing activities. The program has also grown far beyond produce.

“Farm to School programs buy and feature farm-fresh foods—such as fruits and vegetables, eggs, grains, honey, meat and beans—on their menus or use these products in the classrooms for education,” says Debra Eschmeyer of the National Farm to School Network.

Michigan, Too
“In Michigan, we have a number of farm to school programs [over 40] in all areas of the state,” says Colleen Matts, a Farm to School specialist at Michigan State University.

Last December, Michigan lawmakers passed a new law that helps support the schools’ expanding efforts to buy locally-grown food and boosts the economy. The law greatly reduces bureaucratic hurdles to large food purchases by public schools, and requires the Education and Agriculture departments to help schools and farms connect.

“Farm to school” applies to a variety of initiatives in Michigan,” Matts explains. Besides offering fresh, local foods in school cafeterias, it includes school garden programs, fundraisers that use local products, farmer visits to schools, and field trips to nearby farms. The program also offers farmers a way to diversify their markets and help manage risk, she says.

Further, Matts says there is a statewide expansion in techniques that help extend the growing season. More farmers are producing food in “hoophouses,” or high tunnels that are passive solar greenhouses used for year-round production. “As more farmers use them, there will be more access to local foods like salad greens for much more of the school year,” she explains.

Economic, Environmental Benefits
Students aren’t the only ones benefiting from Farm to School. “It is usually more environmentally-friendly to eat local food because less fuel is used in shipping,” Eschmeyer adds. Farmers, and the local economic community, also have a lot to gain.

Data on the average farmer’s income from the program is limited, but participants typically say the program provides about 5 to 10 percent of their income. Sometimes that’s just the boost a small producer needs to supplement or stay in business.

Jim Bardenhagen, a fruit and vegetable farmer and retired ag director for Leelanau County Extension, agrees. “Farm to School helps me have a diverse marketing program besides the restaurants, local grocery stores, and farm markets.” He wants to increase business with schools, but says, “We’re going to have to look at what the schools want to use, too.” The challenge is that when the crops come in they have to be used soon.

Eschmeyer says schools participate in Farm to School on varying levels, with some buying only 1 percent of their food from local sources and others as much as 50 percent. Cost is sometimes an issue.

“There is no clear, across-the-board indication that food costs for Farm to School program meals are greater,” Eschmeyer says, “however, labor costs for preparing Farm to School meals are higher since it usually incorporates cooking from scratch—more than taking plastic off.”

Bardenhagen says Michigan schools have received the program well, but it’s a big investment to change kitchens back to being able to cook again. Michigan public schools annually spend $200 million on food, Matts adds.

Even with increasing costs, Cooper says that healthy food shouldn’t be just a side dish. “I think that what is really important to understand is that Farm to School has to go beyond the sides of the plate—it has to effect the center of the plate,” Cooper adds. “As a lunch lady in America, the government will pay me to feed children chicken nuggets and fruit cocktail,” but she also reminds parents it’s their tax dollars that pay for the school lunch program.

With cooperation from parents, teachers and producers, some schools are finding that fundraisers featuring local food and agricultural products are a viable and healthier alternative to school fundraisers that focus on candy or cookie dough sales. These “farmraisers” teach kids about local agriculture and support local producers and the economy.

Pepper Bromelmeier, a district conservationist with the Natural Resources Conservation Service, has helped her kids’ school by connecting with local producers for items such as honey, soap, apples, cider and even bison and trout. Her farmraiser is now a yearly event that both kids and community enjoy. Forms and flyers to help other interested schools can be found at mifarmtoschool.msu.edu.

But, all is lost if kids with a taste for fast food aren’t interested in trying new things. That’s where the second component of Farm to School comes into play: education.

Cafeteria Classroom
“Farm to school programs also help farmers cultivate the next generation of consumers; if school kids are exposed to tasty Michigan apples while they’re in school, they could develop a life-long habit of reaching for a Michigan apple,” Matts explains.

“Kids get particularly excited when farmers visit the school to tell their stories about how food is grown and what it looks like before it gets to their plates—that there are different colors of potatoes and they grow underground,” she adds. Kids also tell their parents about the farmer they met and local food they tried at school and then insist their parents take them to visit the farm or farmer at their local farmers’ market.

Participating in agriculture has educational benefits that go beyond the lunchroom.

“When you plant a simple row of peas, a whole world is opened up,” Eschmeyer says. By combining math, English, history and science, a child learns to measure space between the rows, how deep and far apart to plant the seeds—and that’s just the beginning.

Even if your child’s school doesn’t have this program, there are lots of ways you can reinforce good eating, like limiting TV, which exposes kids to thousands of processed food ads.

“Grow food with kids,” Cooper suggests, and take them shopping at farmers markets. “This doesn’t mean that there will never be fast food, but we have to turn our backs on this processed-food culture,” she says.

Chelsey Simpson is managing editor of Oklahoma Living magazine, the statewide publication of Oklahoma’s electric co-ops. She is also a board member of the Oklahoma Food Co-op, which is dedicated to sustainable, local food.