Farm to School Lunch Across America Initiative

Summary

In 2024, The Henry Ford (THF) committed to implementing the Farm to School Lunch Across America Initiative which will activate partnerships between small, local farmers and school districts in five communities nationwide to pilot experiences that promote the benefits of adopting a farm-to-school lunch program. This will begin in October 2024 and impact approximately 3600 students across eight schools. This commitment seeks to create an initiative to improve school lunches by advocating for free, locally sourced, in-season, regeneratively farmed meals. It will also support student health, promote environmental sustainability, and bolster local economies. By working with local food systems, four major issues will be addressed: nutrition, climate change, social equity, and the economy. THF is activating the Farm to School Lunch Across America Initiative by collaborating with a variety of thought leaders and influencers to increase regenerative agriculture, nutrition, and food accessibility for communities in the United States.

Approach

The Henry Ford (THF) commits to implementing the Farm to School Lunch Across America Initiative which will activate partnerships between small, local farmers and local school districts in five communities nationwide to pilot impact experiences that promote the benefits of adopting a Farm to School Lunch program. The initial pilot launching in October 2024 will impact ~3,600 students across 8 schools.
This commitment seeks to improve the school lunch program by advocating for free, locally sourced, in season, regeneratively farmed meals. It will also support student health, promote environmental sustainability and bolster local economies. By working with local food systems, four major issues will be addressed: Nutrition, Climate Change, Social Equity and the Economy.
This initiative has several components necessary to create long-term systemic change in the nation’s school lunch program. First, THF will build coalitions around the need for locally sourced, in-season, regeneratively farmed and free lunches for students across America – leading to long-term positive change in school lunch meals. Next, THF will amplify and bring focus to the national conversation advocating for accessible, locally and regeneratively grown, scratch cooked and free school lunches for students across the country. Finally, as THF implements its action plan the organization will encourage the procurement of food directly from farmers and producers who take care of the land and their workers.
THF is activating the Farm to School Lunch Across America Initiative by collaborating with a wide variety of thought leaders and influencers to address the issues of climate change, regenerative agriculture, nutrition and accessibility. They are using their collections and historical expertise to help advocate for free, accessible, locally sourced, regeneratively grown and cooked from scratch school lunches for every student in America, starting with the students on their campus at Henry Ford Academy (HFA)

Action Plan

The Henry Ford is creating impact experiences to highlight schools in under-resourced communities who are doing extraordinary work in the farm to school space. These schools will receive a locally sourced, cooked from scratch, regeneratively farmed, free lunch through a coordinated series of events during Farm to School Month in October 2024. Through this program THF’s goal is to educate students and their communities on the importance of eating local, seasonal and nutritious meals and how this can positively impact the environment. Experiences will take place on a weekly basis. The five program areas include: Southeastern Michigan (week 1) ; Chicago, Illinois (week 2) ; Washington, D.C (week 3) ; Minneapolis, Minnesota (week 4) ; Northern California (week 5) .
Each experience has several components. During the pre-experience, educational materials will be shared, leveraging the resources of THF’s online learning platform, InHub, and from partner, Pilot Light. A special school assembly will take place in which the school community will meet the farmer and the chef. These presentations will connect students and parents with where their food comes from, showcase how food goes from “dirt to plate” and highlight how eating this way is not only healthy for people but also healthy for the planet. A Farm to School Meal at Lunch, prepared by local chefs using locally sourced, in-season ingredients, will highlight the experience. Meals will be tailored to be inclusive of location, student culture, and community needs.
A School Farmers Market will take place after lunch that will engage with local residents to extend the education from the school to the surrounding community. Resources will be provided to connect these communities with ways to continue eating this way. Tools will be provided for students’ family members and community members to connect with local government officials to advocate for school supported agriculture.

Background

Currently, too many students do not have access to high-quality, nutritious meals at their schools. Also, there is limited awareness and education about the positive impact regenerative farming has on the environment such as enhancing soil health and biodiversity.
School-supported agriculture supports local farmers and food producers, which over the long term is good for local economies. This puts the power of school lunch budgets right back into local farming communities. If more schools were able to source ingredients from local farms, they could reduce the carbon footprint associated with long-distance food transportation by providing fresher, healthier meals to students.
By choosing and learning how to work first with farmers supporting regenerative practices and helping to bring that conversation into the classroom, schools could amplify awareness of the need to increase regenerative farming, which will improve environmental sustainability and effectively reduce climate change.
The time is now to address and influence the way school lunch is prepared, procured and delivered in an equitable fashion to grow the next generation of innovators, inventors and entrepreneurs. Substantive and meaningful change can occur when policymakers, funders, communities, farmers, educators and students come together. Schools need a program that aims to both amplify and knit together coalitions to address the social inequities, lack of access to good nutrition with the added benefit of fighting climate change, by working with regenerative farmers.

Progress Update

Partnership Opportunities

To accomplish the goals of the Farm to School Lunch Across America initiative, THF will act as a convener and a connector to drive coalition building and momentum around farm fresh and scratched cooked school lunches. In addition to its current partner network, THF is working to identify and complete partnerships in each of the communities identified in the action plan to implement the program. To drive change around access for all schoolchildren in K-12 to a locally-grown, nutritious and free school lunch, we will need to activate government advocates, policy maker advocates and build more connections in the media and film communities to promote the work. Funding is needed to scale this program on a national level including individual philanthropists, corporate and foundation support and government agencies., THF’s mission is to provide unique educational experiences based on authentic objects, stories and lives from America’s traditions of ingenuity, resourcefulness and innovation. THF’s purpose is to inspire people to learn from these traditions to help shape a better future. Based on this mission, the Farm to School Lunch Across America initiative will leverage THF’s historical expertise including one of the nation’s best collections related to agriculture and the environment and four working farms in Greenfield Village. THF will use its national platform as the nation’s museum of American innovation to promote the Farm to School Lunch Across America initiative. Through its existing partnerships and extensive media support, including a large presence on social media, THF will continue to be a connector and convener to bring these partners together and provide the resources necessary to create the impact experiences planned for students during this commitment to action.