What is Farm to School & Early Childhood?

The students are seeing the larger picture. Farm to school is a great, tangible lens for kids to understand things like equity and social justice. They are understanding how things are connected and using that understanding to find leverage points to solve problems.

–Paul Kramer, Harwood Union High School Teacher & Farm To School Club Faculty Adviser

Farm to School: A Nationwide Movement

  • 67,000+ schools in all 50 states have farm to school programs today, reaching 42.8 million students.
  • 30.4 million students eat school lunch daily in our country, and US school food programs  spend $789 million a year on local food. There is so much room to grow!

A Glimpse into Vermont’s Farm to School & Early Childhood Programs

  • 61% of Vermont schools have at least some farm to school programming integrated into curriculum.
  • 100+ Vermont farms feed our youth across the state through school nutrition and early childhood programs.
  • Vermont schools spend over $20.2 million on food annually; 89% of Vermont schools purchase some local food.
  • 81% of Vermont schools have a school garden.
  • 65% of Vermont schools are connected to a local farm or farmer in their community.

The Farm to School & Early Childhood Movement

Farm to school connects classrooms, cafeterias, and communities in pursuit of a healthier, more just food system. These programs and/or initiatives build relationships between schools and local farms and bring locally grown foods to cafeterias and classrooms. Through hands-on learning, students can connect the dots of where their food comes from and the impacts of their choices on their bodies, the environment, and the local food system and farming community.

Farm to Early Childhood
Farm to school is growing in early childhood education, too—within center-based and family-based childcare settings, preschools, Headstart programs, and home visiting programs. If you’re an early childhood educator, visit our resources, stories, and information framed with our earliest learners in mind.
 


The 3Cs Approach to Farm to School

The 3Cs approach, which Vermont FEED developed in 2000, has taken root across the country as a successful model of change that connects efforts in the Cafeteria, Classroom, and Community to achieve robust and sustainable farm to school programs.

We’ve found that the more successful programs are not “add ons” to school policies and curricula, but integrated throughout the school priorities and culture. This requires collaboration among administrators, school nutrition professionals, students, families, and educators. 

 

In the Classroom

Farm to school education provides a real-world context for learning across all disciplines. Engaging youth in hands-on opportunities such as planting school gardens, cooking food from scratch, and visiting local farms establishes meaningful connections to the curriculum and deepens understanding. Rather than an add-on to an already crowded curriculum, food, nutrition, and agriculture can be integrated within the existing curriculum, from literacy and history to math and science.

Explore further: Download our free resource, Connecting Classrooms, Cafeterias, Communities: A Guide to Building Integrated Farm to School Programs, reflecting 20 years of practice in developing robust, long lasting, and integrated farm to school programs. Our Curricular Resources Collection offers lessons and curriculum units around food, farming, and nutrition. 

 

In the Cafeteria

The school cafeteria is a major hub of activity. It can be a powerful educational environment engaging youth in activities like taste tests and cooking lessons to introduce them to new foods and empower them to make healthy choices. Farm to school programs connect the expertise of school nutrition staff with education initiatives, resulting in increased participation in the meal program, reduced waste, and making nutritious food accessible to all students

More than half of America’s children—nearly 30 million students—get daily nutrition from school meals, and schools spend over $6.3 billion on food costs. These numbers present enormous opportunities, and farm to school programs leverage this potential by strengthening connections between school meal programs and local farms. When a cafeteria increases its local purchasing, it bolsters its local economy, resourcing it with funds that recirculate and build value long after the original sale.

Explore further: Visit our Local Procurement Toolkit for more information about incorporating local foods into your school nutrition programs. Early educators, check out the Vermont Farm to Early Childhood Local Purchasing Guide to discover ways of shifting your food purchasing routines to include more local options. For nutritious, seasonal recipes, download New School Cuisine: Nutritious and Seasonal Recipes for School Cooks by School Cooks.

 

In the Community

Making connections within the community builds partnerships outside the school for place-based learning and garners community support for school initiatives. Youth have opportunities to learn about how their food is produced and to develop their own agency for creating change. Farmers build relationships with schools, early childhood programs, and other local institutions that allow them to expand into other wholesale markets and boost the local economy. Community dinners, service learning projects, and harvest festivals involve parents, families, and the whole community in building a food culture committed to healthy and sustainable food choices.

Explore further: Read our project case study, Deepening Farm to School Connections, discover how farm partners and fourth grade teachers from rural Vermont schools built meaningful and personal connections for their students through repeated on-farm experiences, farmer-to-classroom visits, and seeing food from their local farms in the cafeteria.