Classroom Snack Program

A creative strategy to get more fresh fruits and vegetables in front of school children is providing fresh snacks during their classroom snack time.

Starting in the spring of 2006, Wisconsin Homegrown Lunch has partnered with the Willy St. Co-op kitchen and the Madison Metropolitan School District Food Service to provide ready to eat snacks to four Madison schools. Once a week students at Lincoln, Midvale, Lakeview and Falk Elementary Schools receive a fresh fruit or vegetable snack. Classroom teachers are provided 'Snack Bites' with each snack which provide information about the farm where the snack came from and nutritional information that can be shared with students as they enjoy their snack.

Asparagus Snack Bite

It takes a team effot to pull this seemingly simple task off:
1) 200+ lbs of produce is purchased from local farms by the Willy St. Co-op,
2) Staff at the Willy St. Co-op kitchen wash, chop, bag, and deliver snacks to the MMSD central kitchen,
3) MMSD Food Service deliver snacks to the four participating schools,
4) WI Homegrown Lunch collects money from each school and pays Willy St. Co-op.

In each of the past two school years:

• over $5,000 worth of carrots, apples, sweet potatoes, kohlrabi, and asparagus have been purchased from local farms
• over 3,000 lbs of fruits and vegetables have been made available to students
  
  

Wisconsin Homegrown Lunch
A joint project of the REAP Food Group and
the University of Wisconsin's Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems

Contact Doug Wubben, project coordinator, at dwubben@wisc.edu

http://www.reapfoodgroup.org/farmtoschool
Web site designed and maintained by Lori Compas
at the UW Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems
Updated February 3, 2008