0920_September Comstock's Magazine September 2020 | Page 59

California Farm to School Program.
“People just think of (farm to school) as
… purchasing local, but it’s also about
access and education,” says Anicich.
“You have to buy it local, you have to
educate the kids and let them experience
it in order to get them to eat it regularly.”
That’s the vision the program
is working to broaden, he says, and
SCUSD models that vision well.
Through a long-term partnership with
local nonprofits Food Literacy Center
and Soil Born Farms, students in select
elementary schools are immersed in
healthy-eating programs that link
classroom education to the cafeteria
and experiential learning.
“We partner on a vegetable of the
month, and we cook with it in foodliteracy
class (with the students), Soil
Born is either planting (or) harvesting it
(in school gardens), the Health Education
Council is talking to parents about
it and at those particular schools, they’re
putting it on the salad bar,” says Amber
Stott, founder and CEO of the
Sacramento-based Food Literacy Center.
“Most of the kids we (work with) in
schools have a very narrow experience of
fruits and vegetables. It might be apples,
oranges and lettuce. We get kids who’ve
never seen broccoli or pears before.”
But after years of working with students,
the culture of healthy, fresh food
is baked into these schools, and children
become huge food adventurers,
she says. “The kids really understand
more about their health and how their
food affects their health,” Stott says.
SCUSD sources fresh ingredients
from more than 35 farms throughout
California and plans to work with the
National Farm to School Network to
identify additional farmers to meet
their growing needs. “(At least) half of
our product comes from local farmers
(those within 250 miles) in season,”
says Flores. That figure is expected to
increase to as much as 80-90 percent
when the Central Kitchen opens.
While many small farms can’t
meet the volume of produce needed by
school districts like SCUSD, Nederveld
says the district hopes to work with local
growers to scale production to meet
the majority of its need for in-season
local produce like tomatoes.
California’s rebalanced budget, necessitated
by the recession caused by the
coronavirus pandemic, includes $10 million
to expand California’s Farm to School
Program. “Some of our kids are eating four
meals a day with us,” says Nederveld. “If
that’s the case, then we need to make sure
they’re well-nourished. … (But) if they’re
not going to eat it, what have we done?”
Jennifer Berry Junghans is an environmental
journalist who primarily
writes about food systems, wildlife and
conservation. Her work has appeared in
numerous publications and on the air,
including Highlights for Children and
Public Radio Exchange.
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