Upper Valley and Southeast Vermont 

Sharon Elementary School 

CLASSROOM

Sharon Elementary School has been working with VT FEED for five years creating and using food, farm, and nutrition curriculum for grades K through 8.  Kindergarten and third grade classrooms have integrated a standards-based three-season food and nutrition curriculum into the school year.  Taste tests occur in classrooms.  Students and teacher conduct field studies on farms and in small school gardens.  The school is working to create more classroom based garden education experiences, and gardens for every classroom.

CAFETERIA

Food service director, Lynn Ann Perry, has been developing local purchasing contracts, and conducting taste tests of seasonal and local foods.  The school celebrates the Fall with an annual local food harvest festival.  A kitchen-sized garden was created on school property and has successfully provided the school with squash and tomoatoes.  

COMMUNITY

Sharon has had supportive and groundbreaking leadership from the principal throughout the rest of the staff to successfully weave farm to school into their school culture.  The school is now gearing up to work with more community members and parents as it develops school-aged gardens for every classroom.

Hartland Elementary Farm to School Program (HES FTS)

Hartland Elementary School (HES) was one of 14 schools in Vermont to receive a Farm to School (FTS) grant from the VT Agency of Agriculture in March 2007. Hartland Elementary’s Farm to School Program (HES FTS) and Vermont FEED were the two Vermont farm to school  programs awarded Victory Against Hunger Awards by the Congressional Hunger Center (CHC), Victory Wholesale Group, and National Farm to School Network in 2008.

The HES FTS program is organized around monthly agricultural themes, including maple syrup, extending the growing season, seed starting, fall harvests, tomatoes and salsa, apples, dairy, and grains and cereals.  Each month, there are a series of activities conducted that relate to the monthly theme, including lunch in cafeteria, snacks or tastings offered made with local foods, displays in central foyer in school, field trips to area farms, classroom activities and visits by farmers.

Classroom:

K through 2nd grade students visited sugarhouses and dairy farms.  Classes read books about dairy farms and made yogurt with local milk in the classrooms.  Teams of 4^th grade students researched a VT food resource (dairy, chickens, maple syrup, honey, pumpkins, apples, and farmers markets and farm stands), visited a local farm producing the resource, and displayed topics at the school and town library. Students prepared resource-based food samples.  Eighth grade Design Construction students constructed a hoop house on school grounds to use for seed starting, and many classes started seeds in the spring, and vegetable seeds were sown in the hoop house this fall.

Cafeteria

New local foods were purchased and used in school foods, including eggs, apples (drops), whole wheat, and maple syrup. All students were given the opportunity to taste local food during lunch.  All 2500 apples were used to make apples sauce, pies and distributed to students for snacks.

Community

During its past four Annual Farm Day, K-4 students meet nine area farmers or specialists and meet animals raised on the farms (piglets, lambs, chickens, dairy calf, water buffalo).  The school grew 100’s of tomato plants at a nearby (Le Max) farm and produced salsa from tomato starts donated by the Women’s Correctional Facility in Windsor.  Many community volunteers came to the school to make salsa after school one day.  A 6th grade student through an art class contest designed the label for the container.  Salsa sales have raised $600.  The Spanish teacher worked with FTS to make salsa in her K-5 classes and discuss the role of salsa in Spanish cultures.

The Upper Valley Coop in White River Junction and Wellwood Orchard in Springfield provided a discount on purchases for the Farm to School program; Britton’s Lumber provided a discount on lumber for the hoop house.  Donations for the program were received from Stella’s Restaurant, Cobb Hill Cheese and Honey, Richardson Farm Syrup, and Cabot Cheese.  Strawberries from Hanover Coop for use in Smoothies during colors week

Following a presentation to the School Board, the board allocated $5,000 for the program continuation through June 2008.