- Nutter Town Halls Back on Tonight
- Brian Hickey Seriously Injured
- Filmmaker sought to Document and Follow the Timeline of Political, Zoning and Environmental Crimes in Philly
- FDR, Obama, and the Path to Health Care Reform in 2009
- How We Vote
- It's Our City Interview with Mike Nutter
- Witnesses to Hunger
- Reardon's Actual Library Closing Criteria
- Books for everyone: Buy, buy, buy, buy, buy
- Giving Thanks
Yo, School District: Buy Local, Serve Local
Submitted by Dan U-A on Tue, 09/25/2007 - 10:11pm.
Today, the school district announced that it was booting Aramark from its contract to serve Philadelphia kids their lunches. Now, I haven't been in a public school cafeteria for 8 years, but, I can imagine the selection: Lots of french fries, lots of chicken fingers, really crappy fruits and vegetables, and the like. (And the kids who got free breakfast at Central generally got tastycakes.)
When kids eat crappy, high-sugar, high-fat food, they not only are less healthy, they are less likely to behave in school, and less likely to learn.
That is why I really hope the school district takes this opportunity to completely re-think how it serves food to its kids. Instead of a focus on mass produced, deep fried food, the district could be serving fresh, healthy, nutritional meals, many of which can be made with local foods. The district could lean on existing Philly farms- Greensgrow, Weaver's Way, etc., and start its own farms around the City.
I don't know a ton about the healthy food initiatives, so I cannot go too in-depth here. Does anyone want to do some basic research about how healthy foods have been implemented elsewhere (start with Appleton, Wisconsin). Anyone want to see if someone from one of Philly's urban farms wants to talk about their experiences, and whether this kind of thing could be scaled out to fill part of the School District's shopping list?
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By the way, for dinner
By the way, for dinner tonight I had dinner in Germantown, eating eggplant from the Weaver's Way farm in... Germantown.
Alice Waters and the Edible Schoolyard
Check out Alice Water's Edible Schoolyard. Their website has everything someone would need to begin working on getting a school to partner with this type of program.
There was also an extensive profile of her in the NYTimes that ran in last Wednesday's Dining section that touches on this subject matter and the difficulty she has had in getting this kind of stuff off the ground.
In Pennsylvania, PASA does a lot of work trying to get schools to adopt programs like the Edible Schoolyard.
There was also that whole essay I wrote a while back that I cross posted as part of YPP's Apprentice Challenge thingee. But as I'm on double-secret probation around these parts, I can see how you may not want YPP's impressionable readers exposed to such writing.
______________________________
Phillyville
Lunch revolution takes more than vision and desire
An excellent detailing of the difficulties of the lunch revolution is laid out in a Sept. 4, 2006, New Yorker article called "The Lunchroom Rebellion." Its subject is Ann Cooper, back then the new "executive chef" for the Berkeley public schools, who had formerly cooked for Hillary Clinton and for a chi-chi E. Hampton NY private school.
Among the difficulties she faced:
- only a quarter of the Berkeley schools had a functioning kitchen (in Philly there are 123 "full-service kitchens" for 322 feeding sites);
- in her NY private school, Cooper had 27 employees for 500 diners; in Berkeley she had 53 for 4,000 diners (while I don't have comparable numbers for Philly, the district serves 200,000 meals per day);
- in her NY private school, she spent $12/child/day; in Berkeley, she could only afford$3.50/child/day
- high poverty districts rely on the fed govt.'s subsidized food program, which buys up a billion dollars of raw and processed food, almost 3/4 focused on meat and dairy and a quarter on vegetables
A couple of other random personal notes:
- in a cash-strapped district like Philadelphia, full service kitchens are typified as "money losers" and the pre-plate meals (these are the nuke and serve) as delivering a "healthy profit";
- At my daughter's West Philadelphia elementary school, I helped start a children's garden with help from the Urban Nutrition Initiative and White Dog Cafe. It should have been an ideal partnership, but we needed strong reinforcement and collaboration within the school, teachers, lunch personnel, the principal, parents as well as our partners. But somehow, there was just a lack of priority, lack of tech support and experience, and in the end, after we lost a lunchroom aide due to a budget deficit, lack of desire to move(on my part as well as others).
I don't say any of this to be discouraging about the possibilities of the lunch revolution, just to highlight the challenges that we need to think about when we want the District or our schools to buy local, serve local. Parents United went after the ARA issue last August so vociferously largely because a number of parents had strong feelings about improving cafeteria food (esp. after a humble victory eliminating sodas several years ago). We're hoping that the elimination of the ARA contract can reinvite a larger conversation about food and healthy eating, rather than profit margins.
One other favorite source for me is Morgan Spurlock's visit to a school for troubled youth ("Supersize Me"). In it they talk about their methods, one of which is the delivery of healthy fresh foods for the youth at breakfast, lunch and snacktime. The school invests in its food program because the return on deliverables have been that the students are more energetic, engaged and frankly happier and connected it with the food program. What could be a better endorsement?
Thats very helpful
Thats very helpful info.
The school that Spurlock visited was, I think, the same one I was obliquely referring to above.
More info on that school here.
Aramark has declined to
Aramark has declined to change its non-dicrimination policy so that it comports with the City's Fair Practices Ordinance. Why do business with anyone who won't?
more local food and school resources
For educators and those interested in the local food movement as it relates to schools, the Summer 2006 issue of Rethinking Schools (http://www.rethinkingschools.org/archive/20_04/20_04.shtml) is primarily devoted to healthy food initiatives.
Two very interesting resources, www.seedsofsolidarity.org a Massachusetts farm-to-school organization, and the most ambitious and relevant to Philly Wisconsin Homegrown Lunch which provides food to the Madison School District, http://www.reapfoodgroup.org/farmtoschool/.
Some-Things Happening at Weavers Way
Hello Y'all,
A friend of Weaver's Way referred me to your discussion. Great topic! I'd love to take a moment to share with you a little of what is happening at Weavers Way Coop. The store has a one acre organic farm in Germantown as was mentioned. Educational efforts are a paramount part of the farm's mission as well as supplying "really local" food to the Weaver's Way Coop, other local grocery stores and farmers markets.
Philadelphia is ripe for a well organized farm-to-school initiative and Weaver's Way Farm is serving as a excellent venue to bring this kind of partnership together. That is why the farm is working with other organizations and local schools to forge an interactive program for students and adults to experience the many layers of food understanding. We believe that by exposing people to the farm, in ways as simple (or complex) as growing food we can begin to help foster positive development in our community.
If your interested in learning more about our programs, or would like to find a way to contribute financially or as a volunteer, please check out www.weaversway.coop or http://weaversway.coop/index.php?page=the_co_op_farm