Source: United States Senator for Ohio Sherrod Brown
WASHINGTON, D.C. – Today, U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-OH) announced that the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) Farm to School Program, which helps eligible schools improve access to local foods, has awarded more than $600,000 to eight communities across Ohio. Brown recently introduced legislation to renew the important nutrition program that supports both school-aged children and local and regional producers. The bipartisan Farm to School Act would build on the successes of the Farm to School Program, which was authorized in 2010. The bipartisan Kids Eat Local Act, would support local and regional food systems and encourage healthy meal choices among school-aged children.
“Children deserve access to nutritious foods in their schools so they can focus on their studies and grow into healthy adults,” said Brown. “The Farm to School program increases the amount of Ohio grown food in school cafeterias and teaches children about how and where our food is grown.”
USDA Farm to School grant recipients include:
- $36,400 grant to Spice Field Kitchen, Inc. in Cleveland, Ohio to assist with multi-media components highlighting local producers, agricultural growing practices, and easy culinary applications.
- $98,606 grant to The PAST Foundation in Columbus, Ohio to help develop, implement and share a system for local food procurement, entrepreneurship in agribusiness and a focused agricultural education program.
- $45,910 grant to Clermont Northeastern Local Schools in Batavia, Ohio to enhance agricultural education and improve farm to school connections through the installation of a greenhouse edible garden.
- $100,000 grant to Graham Local School District in Saint Paris, Ohio to partner with the local agricultural community, the Champaign County Local Foods Council, area culinary arts programs, Champaign County Family YMCA, Champaign County Chamber of Commerce and the current resources at each school in the district to provide education about local products, nutrition, production opportunities in the shared-use commercial kitchen and gardening skills.
- $96,524 grant to Green Umbrella in Cincinnati, Ohio to lead development of the region’s existing farm to school programs into a collaborative network for mutually accelerating everyone’s successes.
- $96,536 grant to MyWhy in Cincinnati, Ohio to establish a year-round farm to school initiative that will increase locally grown produce to Title One schools located in Cincinnati food deserts.
- $91,180 grant to Reynoldsburg City School District in Reynoldsburg, Ohio to expand its Biotechnology/Agriculture pathway and capacity to grow and distribute produce at a school-based urban farm.
- $96,460 grant to Saint Stephan Community Services, Inc. in Columbus, Ohio to develop a shared use model that leverages community-based agriculture assets to support a continuum of STEM-based farm to school experiences and learning activities for children ECE/pre-K through grade 12 in the Linden community of Columbus, Ohio.
“The PAST Foundation and our partners on the Farm to School and Beyond project are thrilled to be funded by the USDA’s Farm to School Grant with the support of Senator Brown,” said Annalies Corbin, PhD, President and CEO, PAST Foundation. “With this funding, we will build and implement an agribusiness entrepreneurial endeavor for students to learn essential work skills, business management, and STEM skills for agribusiness while earning industry recognized credentials in East Central Ohio in an Appalachian community.”
“As a part of our work to support our students in developing 21st century competencies, including being a socially aware global citizen, we continue to search for funding and opportunities to grow our pathway experiences that lead to careers with the future in mind,” said Dr. Jocelyn Cosgrave, Chief Academic Officer at Reynoldsburg City Schools. “The funding from the USDA farm to school grant program will provide our students with exposure to and experience with technology and equipment that allows them to grow food, sustain resources, and impact their school and local community. Who knew that growing food could be such an exciting endeavor for our students? Seeing their hard work come to literal fruition has been a delight and we couldn’t be more excited to support our Agriculture pathway, which is unique to a more urban school setting.”
“Clermont Northeastern is excited to have the opportunity to receive this grant and when a school meal program incorporates Farm to School practices, the meals quality improves and children are more likely to participate and eat the food,” said Clermont Northeastern High School Principal TJ Glassmeyer. “It also helps the kids know what it’s like to harvest their own food and learn the process and will help bring in more revenue for the school meal program and allows schools to go out and purchase even more local food from producers and farmers from the state.”
Brown has led efforts to support local agriculture in Ohio and address child hunger through farm to school programs and locally sourced food.
In June, Brown visited school officials and other local partners at Federal Hocking Middle School’s Farm-to-School program to celebrate the program. In the summer of 2020, Federal Hocking School District was awarded $98,000 funding from the USDA to support the development of a Farm-to-School Program. Using healthy local produce not only improves the quality of the meals that students eat, it also teaches students to respect the work of local farmers and the importance of supporting the local economy. By increasing the amount of local food provided in cafeterias, the district can feed students well, and create opportunities in agriculture for both students and new markets for farmers and producers. Brown has long supported these programs, and many of them have utilized the Farm Bill programs Brown has consistently fought for. He is the first Ohio senator to serve on the Senate Agriculture Committee in more than 50 years.
The USDA Food and Nutrition Service awarded over $12 million in Farm to School Grants to over 170 national, State, and local organizations engaged in farm to school activities. This is the largest ever cohort of farm to school grantees in the history of the Program, which for the first time will include Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) and Child and Adult Care Food Program operators (CACFP). These grants will serve more than 1.4 million students in over 6,800 schools across the United States.
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