These days, if you ask most school children where their food comes from, you’re either likely to get a blank stare or a quick answer of, “The grocery store”. If you ask parents what their most common complaint about the school their child attends, somewhere in the conversation you’re likely to hear about their perceived poor quality of school lunches.

Local Matters’ Local Food to School Program was created to address both of these issues by putting children more in touch with the source of their food and over the long term, influencing the quality of school lunches by encouraging a connection between the school and local farms.

The Local Food to School Program enlists the School faculty, parents and other interested members of the community to literally “dream” how the components of the program are to be constructed. Typically, an edible garden brings nature into the educational environment and enables a richer curriculum that integrates indoor and outdoor learning. The playground can be deconstructed to include features like dry creek beds with natural spring-like water features, low grass ’serpent’ mounds, a ‘council-ring’ sand pit, a spiral edible garden, meandering permeable gravel pathways, and lush native plant communities including woodland, meadow and prairie plants indigenous to the location of the OLE. With these additional features, children have a more natural environment to explore and gain an understanding of other plant species that are necessary for a successful garden to grow.

A nutrition, health and wellness curriculum supports the outdoor environment in the classroom and creates the framework for interdisciplinary, collaborative, student-centered, experiential, and engaged learning. Students who participate in school garden projects discover fresh food, make healthier food choices, and are more physically active.

Eventually connecting the school with the farm community (Farm to School) further enhances the quality of the food in the school while creating a stronger connection for the students with the source of their food. This relationship also benefits the farm community by growing the local economy and preserving farmland through the growth of edible food crops.