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Farm to School Pilot Funded
Students in the Chelsea School District and the Ann Arbor Public School District will be seeing more local foods as part of their schools food service program during the school year 2007-08. The Community Foundation for Southeast Michigan recently awarded a grant to the Food System Economic Partnership (FSEP) Farm-to-School Committee to hire a coordinator to work with these two school districts, plus the Henry Ford Academy in Dearborn to create the system to bring local foods into these schools as part of an overall childhood obesity prevention strategy.
In the fall of 2006 as a preliminary part of this project, Chelsea Schools hosted a Farm Day in November, where several local farmers brought in produce including fruits and vegetables which were beautifully displayed and also included as part of a Potato Bar during lunch. Students enthusiastically tried vegetables prepared in new ways such as baked kale chips and all reports are they enjoyed them a lot!
Watch future editions of HIP Happenings for more updates on this exciting project! For more information on this project, contact Sharon P. Sheldon, Washtenaw County Public Health at sheldonsp@ewashtenaw.org or Jennifer Fike, Program Coordinator, with FSEP at fikej@ewashtenaw.org.
