 We just used up 15 minutes of your time, not going out. I just sat for children. I'm here to watch the school legislation. I apologize for that. I thought Chairman Hargis and a couple of others were coming, but it's great to see so many of you here, and welcome to the State House. Tom, you want to start really introduce ourselves, and then we'll get right with it, so we can get your folks all in and want to speak. So, Tom. I'm President Bach from Chester, and I'm the Mayor of Baltimore. I'm Representative Vicki Strong from Albany. I represent Albany, Hart, Fratsbury, Greenberg, Lecker, Chila, Chila. Chefs of Anuiba. So that's all Albany's training goes into this. I'm Representative Fugard. My towns include Highgate, Franklin, Richford, and my town of Berkshire where I am on the Farmers' School Point. Terri Ars, I represent Benson, Orwell, Shoreman, Whitey. Good morning, everyone. I'm Senator Ruth Hardy, and I represent Addison, the Addison District, 26 towns. I'm Senator Chris Pearson from Chippin County. I'm Bobby Starrer. I chair the Senate Ag Committee, and I represent Orleans, Essex counties, and I know I've hurt your feelings, but it's for you, too. I'll just say that I'm a second culture and Forestry Chair. Carolyn Farge is justifying the floor of education socially here. Soon, I think I'm John Brothelmu, and I represent Hartley, Windsor, and Westminster. I made it that he'd leave the Senator for Washington County. I'm Colin Moore, Senator, from Rockham County. I'm John Bryan, and it was my predecessor, Roosevelt, who is this advocacy that you're on. Thank you, folks, and I'm Betsy. Good morning. For the record, I'm Betsy Rosenbluth. I'm the Project Director of Vermont Feed at Children Farms and Coordinator of the Vermont Farm to School Network. I'm going to be super quick today, but happy, of course, always to answer questions because you have an amazing array of speakers from various schools across the state and farms who are eager to share their story with you. I do just want to sort of lay out all the ways this year that we can support the growth of Farm to School to all Vermont communities. The strength of our Vermont Farm to School Grants program has been this combination of technical assistance, direct funding, and coaching with schools in order to build staying power so that the programs live on past the grant period. And a lot of it's worked in our evaluation that the programs continue at the end of the grant period and the programs, of course, like any school program, will go up and down a bit, but we have been able to show that building that capacity within the school has been very positive for sustaining the programs. Our goal for Farm to School in early childhood is $500,000 a year so that we can continue to grow Farm to School to every school and early childhood site and demand for the grants from schools and early childhood providers continues to grow and the work of the network continues to deepen and have a tangible impact on schools and local producers. So this year the governor's budget has a reduction of $50,000 from last year's level of $241,000. So the last couple of years the legislature has restored that $50,000 reduction with one-time funding. We're hoping at some point that that becomes the baseline and that if it's possible to continue to work our way towards our $500,000 goal that would help us to serve more schools. Even small amounts of money allows more providers, more schools to get support. In addition, the local purchasing incentive bill, S273, will increase the amount of local food served in school meal programs and support Vermont farms and our local economy. So the grant program with that bill will support schools to be able to make that transition to more purchasing. We understand that agency of education testified last week in support of the bill but with some concerns to address about the administrative burden. So we certainly support the effort to make implementation of the program as efficient as possible and feel that it's essential to keep that funding tied to local purchasing in schools so that the additional money goes to our farmers and our local economy. That win-win approach to farm to school. And lastly, we're excited about the Universal School Meals bill, HB12 and S223. What we have seen in the 25% of Vermont schools currently providing universal school meals is that the model has led to more student participation in the meal program, which brings in more federal reimbursement dollars, more efficiencies in terms of feeding more kids with a greater participation. And that has led to more local purchasing. So in fact, a UVM study found that 64% of schools providing universal school meals were purchasing more local food as a direct result of shifting to the universal model. So all of this work together, it all works together to create this change in Vermont. So thank you for your ongoing support of farm to school. We hope to see you between four and six today up in the cafeteria. There's student displays. There's some speakers. And many of the students, Berlin Elementary, will be joining us shortly as they just walk in. They're on their way. So we'll be up hopefully in the cafeteria at lunchtime. And we're happy any of the speakers to take some questions afterwards or share a few polite questions at the end, whatever. There are any questions from back to you at this time? Thank you. Thanks. Laura? I hope everybody's doing well today. For the record, Laura Ginsberg, Agency of Agriculture, Food and Market, Section Chief for the Ag Development Division. So the Vermont Agency of Agriculture, Food and Market is proud of all of our farm to school grantees the numerous partners who have helped move this critical work forward and the national recognition our state receives as a result of its commitment to farm to school programming. Since 2007, after the passage of the Rosenberg Offland Farm to School Act, we have awarded 128 grants totaling $1.4 million funding projects at 176 schools and 45 early childhood centers. This has had a combined impact on nearly 52,000 students. And if you look at this year's report, which was passed out earlier on page 38, you'll find a lovely map of all the program grantees showing the wide range of these dollars across the state. Every year, we receive more requests for funds than what we have available. Grantees are able to use funds for a variety of projects, the most common being garden supplies, local food, kitchen, cafeteria supplies, professional development, and sometimes a farm to school coordinator position. As cultural awareness of food systems and impacts on food choices grows, farm to school programming is well positioned to be the connector for moral economies to the cafeteria. School leadership students and parents all know the positive impacts of serving local foods, from increasing student engagement through hands-on learning to increasing school meal participation rates. Early childhood education centers are the most recent addition to our farm to school program and they have joined in with enthusiasm and engagement. Early childhood centers funded by the grant program have taken a whole family, whole community approach. The more direct interaction with families has allowed for innovative expansion of services offered, such as onsite food pantries stocked with local produce, cooking classes, and parent education. Young children are also introduced to a wide variety of foods, developing their palate and planting the seed of good eating habits. Vermont has a mature and successful program because of well organized, coordinated, and over robust network of public and private organizations. The technical assistance provided by these organizations is a critical aspect of the grant program, ensuring that all schools have access to the resources and information they need to meet their goals. Technical assistance helps grantees develop holistic programs that through coordinated efforts address multiple goals throughout the community, the classroom, and the cafeteria. Schools often report that coaching helps keep them motivated, on task, allows staff to develop meaningful connections in their region, and is vital to the success of their program. Schools receive technical assistance on a wide variety of topics, but generally focusing on procurement, increasing meal participation rates, curriculum, and school gardens. Farm to School continues to be relevant, particularly as rural communities are in a period of change. Supporting Farm to School means supporting the state's ag economy, developing interest in ag as a career, and giving kids opportunities to eat nutritious foods grown in Vermont. This program is a win for all who are involved. Thank you for your time today, and all of your Farm to School commitments, and I know that you're going to enjoy hearing from the students who have joined us today. And I'm happy to take questions now, or I'm going to stay through the whole session. Questions? Yes? Just looking at the map, it seems like Essex County is kind of bullied. Is there a reason for that? There are a few applications from Essex County. We are working with service providing organizations to develop schools to get ready for applications in that area. And so we, I think we have a commitment over the past year or two years to looking at areas that are underserved by Farm to School grants and increasing our outreach and work through the service providers to increase application rates from those areas. So I would say that that is not actually uncommon for our grant programs. If you look at the Working Lands grant map as well, it seems like Essex County is a little bit of off the norm for applications. And so that is something that we are aware of at the agency of Ag and working really hard to change. It's up to them. It's not something you are... Right, we can only... Just cutting them out, right? Right, we can only give them a grant if they apply. And so if they don't apply, then unfortunately we can't consider them. So we're working on developing their ability to even write a proposal. They're just independent thinkers. If you look at that, there's six different communities up there, and a can of which is a larger, most populous site, one of the most populous towns, way up in the Kremlin, there in there, Island Ponds in there, Concord is in there from down south, Women Mercs in there. I don't let those communities slip. I keep tabs on some of them. So, any other questions? Great, thank you. I'll keep my testimony brief. My name is David Baker. I'm the superintendent of schools in Windsor, Southeast Supervisor Reunion, representing the towns of Hartland, Weathersfield, West Windsor, I've been there eight years, and I've been a Vermont administrator for 39 years, and I love this state, and I love the way that we have this kind of interaction, which you don't have everywhere. I hail from Rhode Island originally, and certainly these kinds of things as wonderful as that little state is, they don't happen the way they happen here, so we just need to be very proud of what we do. I don't get out very often, and so I don't get to speak much, but I will try to keep this brief. I do come out though, and I think that there's something that impacts locally where there have been good partnerships formed, and that's why I'm here on behalf of the Vermont Department of Agriculture, Vermont Feeds, Farm to School, and Hungry Free Vermont, because those agencies in tandem have just done such an excellent job, I think, of integrating the work and working at the local level with all of us to provide not only those financial resources to the grants, but also that coaching and technical assistance, which is so critical. I can't take credit for the initial piece of Farm to School that happened in my district. It was alive and well in one of our schools when I got there in Hartland, a matter of fact, because Hartland, as John can tell you, has the distinct privilege of having several folks who are very familiar with the Vermont Department of Ag and sat on some of these agencies, and so Hartland got off to an early start and was one of the first recipients of some of the school to work money. But what happened was, much like with any good coaching and technical assistance and staff development, it just began to mushroom out our supervisory union, albeit through some of the Act 46 process, a matter of fact, we're one of the success stories I think of Act 46, our supervisory union stayed intact, and I don't know how much any of you had to do with staying strong with that, but I appreciate that, and I think Windsor Southeast has benefited from that, because we do work together and we try to spread the wealth. So a lot of what happened in Hartland initially then got spread out to Windsor and Weathersfield and West Windsor, to the point we were able to through some of the work and coaching work that went on hire a supervisory union-wide farm to school coordinator and so some of those teams that were happening in that little building then began to expand into a larger building. So that's exactly what we want to see, right? We want that seed money to then grow. And so consequently, now those community gardens, those community dinners, the emphasis on nutrition, the curriculum work, it's really happening in all of our buildings and there's an investment, I think in all of our buildings, so much so that our communities decided, two of our communities with Weathersfield and Hartland, decided to embark on a pretty, I think a pretty ambitious move from a corporate control of our food services program to a self-operational food, and that's why Craig's here, because last spring we hired Craig to pilot that in Weathersfield and Hartland and the participation rates have gone up tremendously our breakfast program and breakfast after the bell programs have grown tremendously but more importantly, that cafeteria or dining hall, as Craig likes to say it, as the largest classroom in the building has actually spread the word throughout the building so much so that our newly merged district, Mount of Scutney Windsor and West Windsor are going to go self-operational next year. So we're going to integrate that whole notion of local product, local purchasing high levels of nutrition, education and trying to provide good healthy meals for all of our kids throughout the entire supervisory union none of that would have happened without the technical assistance and coaching and financial incentives from the Vermont Department of Ag and all of these agencies that we here today to basically support. So I will turn it over to Craig he will probably speak more from the heart than the head because he believes so strongly in delivering the right message to our kids and to our communities but I want to tell you that what's going on is working and I would suggest that we at least level fund these programs, we take a strong look at the local purchasing incentive I don't know if that's in this committee right now but I tell you that is critical to the work that we're doing and Craig will talk more about that local purchasing piece as he speaks to you. Thank you. Thank you. So I'm Craig McCartney food service director for Windsor Selfie Supervisor Union I am a Vermont so there is hope for Windsor and I'm passionate about school food service, I'm passionate about farm to school I've been in it for a good amount of time and as a chef coming out of the restaurant industry into school food service Farm to School has given me the ability to promote our programs to hire a different level of people because we're emphasizing something grander than just school food service, slop and go we're looking at a program that's educational that we can reach out to community farmers producers have them be a huge part of our school and our food program that is the best that is this whole local purchasing bill is essential for successful food programs and educating our future on how to eat properly support local farmers understand the importance of eating locally the difference between local carrots and commodity carrots able to allow them to go to the farmers markets in the summers and understand what asparagus looks like and tastes like when the school bus drives by deep metal farm in Weathersfield they understand where their beets and their lettuce and their cabbage is coming from so that's really the core of our school food service program and it is 100,000 is the goal, it should be a million because as we know as being a Vermonter and listening to the stuff that's going on in the legislature the money, a million dollars to fund education for our education for our children it's a lifestyle change it's eating healthy it's supporting local it's only going to help the benefits it's a life lesson that they can learn from a good percentage of kids don't love going to math and English and science they like going to recess and lunch so why not fund that more so we can educate them more to continue to build our economy in the state of Vermont how do we make sense so I mean I can go on all day long but I think it's really important that funding farm to school and an initiative like local purchasing and supporting you know I was just sitting by Angus and he's a local farmer and talking to him about what is local and I believe in his idea of supporting a local farmer that food is not always the most local purchasing that we should be focused on we should be supporting the smaller player also so I really hope that we can and the other piece of it too is that we're about to put in law a recycling and composting program in July and that's a real big piece of the food service and education also that we just kind of take for granted that we just it's going to happen but it is also a big piece of the circle of food service because where that compost is coming from is the waste in the dining hall and we need to educate them also so we got to look at the we got to start at the bottom and look at the core necessity and then we can worry about all the other stuff that goes with it so I really hope that we focus on the importance of this and move it forward so thank you for your time well thank you very much we can answer questions later if you want or whatever and I will tell you that Craig does walk the walk we've gone from 5% to about 25% of local purchasing right now including buying two local cows and it's worked out Craig asked me to put them in my office I said no but they graze out in the back and we use them but it's been great we have two cows so some of them are right here I'll just give you an idea of local purchasing and a lot of people say well it's more expensive it is not more expensive and the situation is with our local farmers I bought a cow 850 pounds $2.40 a pound you can't buy red slime commodity beef for that so it works it's working Craig said I'm one of the sponsors of the local food initiative sent so many barriers or challenges that comes up the concern of the agency of ed is documenting your local budget that is dedicated to local foods and whether or not they'll be able to audit that or sort of monitor that so can you just talk about you just said that you're approaching 25% we've heard that distributors can challenge in that dynamic they may be in fact we're bringing you local apples but they don't label it that way can you just help us understand some of the experience that you guys have been through that gives you the confidence to say that you're going to be a quarter or a quarter and Craig can answer this I'll just give you the quick answer from where I sit and what I've learned from Craig for us local means really local so what Craig did is he went to local Weathersfield farmer for the cow produce production apples for example so we would be able to through those invoices and through those documents be able to clearly document what's local and what we would have to do is make sure that those vendors if we were going to use a vendor split it out so we knew exactly what it is and quite frankly they would need to do that because that's how we're going to get incentivized but I'll tell you it's worked for us and I think it's worth a good strong look at how that works and I will tell you right now whether it's the carrots or the apples or the local maple, we have all local maple syrup that's supporting our industries in that local area and I think there's no better match than that piece of legislation to kind of get the economy going and to get the local schools going and to get the kids educated so I think that brings up a good point and a point that we spoke about also with Angus was local is local regional is regional so the beauty of small town school food service in Vermont is that we're able to build those relationships and I can go sit at the kitchen table at Clay Hill Farm and have coffee with a guy and talk about what we're going to pay for and I can go to Wellwood Orchards and what Springfield and talk to the lady and say I'm going to buy this amount of apples for this amount of time and you're going to give me the price of 20% off because I'm going to come get them so we have to procure everything as you know in school food service so it's just another procurement piece so with a local purchasing incentive I would set it up as this is you put in procurement it's just another line on a spreadsheet and say I bought my Wellwood Farm I bought 10 cases of apples for $28 a bushel and I bought and it just go down the line I think it's important because I have this conversation and I'm not always the biggest fan when I say this but food is a percentage of it is local but more local is Kingdom Cranberry or or Richard McNamara Farm in Plainfield, New Hampshire those people are local West Farm is local Deep Metal Farm is local so it's building those relationships going out and saying I'm going to buy 2000 pounds of carrots from you from September to November until February and that's easily documented the tricky part is going through Reinhardt and saying I'm buying a local apple and you're never and Reinhardt just sold out to the second biggest company in the country in the world so I don't know if and I probably shouldn't say it but I'm going to say it anyways because I'm kind of honest kind of I think maybe you put some language in there that it is local purchasing and it's a hundred mile radius and you're dealing with the farmer and building relationships with farmers that are going to benefit them, the economy, the community and the school and that's how we do it for getting it on the table. John, do you have a question? Yeah, I was looking at your brochure that says 81% of Vermont schools have school gardens. How many diverse food scraps into those gardens or even legally can they do that to be a universal settlement? Yeah, that's a good question. I don't think that's our brochure but we do that's a state brochure and we do do some of that without looking closely at the composting requirements that are coming up. I don't know whether it's legal or not. I know that up until the last couple of years a lot of our local farmers have been grabbing our compost and taking it out so we're hoping that some of that can continue as we move forward but the gardens have been strong. Compost is always a challenge it requires a lot of time to make it spoke. It creates craters that nobody wants to deal with on school grounds. I was in Linden for nine years. I built a pretty quality farm to school program in Linden and we had an amazing farm to school program with four raised beds and a full working greenhouse and we had a compost but that's a full time commitment. I know that partly in Wintersfield currently we do not have compost on premise. So it's legal and unless there was an enormous amount of food scrap generated which I don't know of any K-12 schools in the state would generate enough for them to be considered a regulated small none of the schools that are K-12 that I'm aware of would produce so much that it would need to be regulated like that is totally legal. A quick question for you David have you ever figured out how much it would actually cost the taxpayers within your district if the food program went right through the school budget? How much would you get out of the state aid formula and how much would it actually cost your local taxpayers to cover that? So you mean it would be part of the general fund rather than a separate entity through we haven't done that analysis but it will be an interesting analysis and I think that what we have found which is interesting is that when we moved from corporate to local and self-op because everybody always says how much more expensive it is to do self-op we haven't necessarily found that I think that's just kind of you know it's out there and maybe it depends on how you do it but I will tell you that our budget actually our total budget food budget since we've moved has gone down Can you tell to my superintendent I'll tell you I'm dead serious absolutely yeah David Baker reach out to me and I will certainly reach out and I had to be convinced but over the last seven or eight years I've been and I'm over mantra I'm not born raised like Craig is all my kids were born here we certainly have done our share but I had to be convinced but I think once they see the numbers and they look at it and you see that price for hanging beef okay good thanks thank you 30 minutes 30 minutes and that's that seems to be okay you know and we had to make that policy because we had some schools that were giving only 20 minutes some schools were so we've you know we made no less than 30 minutes and that's K-12 if you get on the chance a good food and you're not going to enjoy it they probably eat more of it they wouldn't have any weight so I'll just tell you one success one of my biggest successes yet this year I've only been there since May and I get beat up most every day but we brought in these local beef patties we made the staff patty in my hand to you know and we sear them on the grill and we had burger day once every other week and one time we had to use up the commodity burgers and the kids saw them on the line and our numbers went down by almost 35 percent because they couldn't smell the burgers cooking so they knew they weren't the good burgers so that's beautiful that's what it's all about that's the story thank you thank you thank you my name is Peter Stratman I've worked for 16 years I'm also a role and foundation teaching fellow from 2014 I'm Cameron Hoffman and I'm an 8th grader at Kavis School I'm Silas Robbins and my name is I'm Leanne Riley and I am a teacher at Kavis School and before we jump in at the risk of breaking some official rule we brought bread and cheese that we made bread that we wanted to share with you can we pass that around and cheese you can't come from Kavis without cheese you can't you can't you can't and the story behind this bread is that I think for us part of our motivation around farm to school is about building community and that's making food together breaking the bread together and this is Artisan Bread it's a no-knee recipe I developed by a guy named Jim Lehi and popularized by Mark Bitman who is a very famous author and chef now and if you haven't made no-knee bread because it's super easy and it's just used to give the time it rises for 18 to 24 hours and you cook it in a Dutch oven and it's delicious and we built this into our curriculum and it's actually more about it in a bit but just about the science of fermentation how that works but you can make something delicious with four basic ingredients and humans have been making and breaking bread for 30,000 years so we probably share some with you today so thank you for having us we're excited to be here and share a little bit of our story with you at Cabot School our goal is to design and implement learning experiences in which students investigate, research, build and present work that intersects with the real world we are striving to make farm to school an integral part of that experience Cabot's Farm to School program helps bring students and community members together some whose families have been farming for generations and others who have never stepped foot in a barn regarding these experiences are providing mirrors for students to see themselves and their potential Cabot's Campus is dotted with garden beds that serve as miniature outdoor classrooms students across grade levels plant flowers, herbs and veggies last year's bounty included herbal tea, cucumbers, tomatoes, carrots beets, kale, beans, pumpkins watermelons, basil, spinach and more many items are integrated into Cabot's food service program where special projects and students get to directly benefit from their efforts pizza from the bread oven with garden veggies may be one of the favorites Cabot's Farm to School is helping us develop a positive school culture students participate in community events and garden work days where they take an active role in building community this fosters a sense of belonging for students while offering unique opportunities for personalizing the financial award and technical support provided by the Vermont Farm to School has made a marked impact on our ability to enhance academic programs in school culture it's enabled us to expand staff and students knowledge about sustainable agriculture including how to make nutritious and delicious food choices with the help of our coaches Cabot's food service program is working to make fresh local produce meat and dairy more available and developing a procurement model that has open discussions for local regional procurement across our new supervisor union participating farm to school is also helping us cultivate partnerships with local farmers we've received technical assistance from organizations including the Vermont Community Gardens Network Shelburne Farms and the Center for an Ag Economy and we're developing a school-wide curriculum that integrates culinary arts, gardens sustainability and sciences and community engagement building community is a core goal of Cabot's Farm to School experiences with that in mind last fall we held our first annual garden party in which students and members of the community came together for a garden work day called Day in the Dirt teams put the gardens to bed for the winter and began preparing new projects for the spring in the first and second graders cleaned up the raspberry patch and tended to a few garden projects elementary and middle school students created an elderberry garden and cleaned out the veggie beds other teams laid the groundwork for a new perennial meditation garden it was fantastic to see students of all ages working on campus together and enjoying delicious bird cider and donuts this community event also provided a leadership opportunity for seventh and eighth graders as they were leaders of many small group projects throughout the day the elementary students gained a deeper understanding of where our food comes from and the importance of a well-balanced diet it was a nice break from the classroom setting while still being an educational experience we're using Farm to School to provide new and unique opportunities for personalized learning in the middle, preschool students and kindergarteners grew herbs to make tea elementary classrooms visited local orchards and farms middle school students explored sustainable food and built compost bins and furniture for garden spaces and high school students produced a science focused cookbook this fall to help us enhance our curriculum and deepen farm school connections teachers collaborated with educators from Shelburne farms to facilitate learning experiences that focused on healthy eating soil science, local agriculture sustainability and more lessons provided a variety of engaging hands-on activities for students at all levels students made apple sauce, cheese, pancakes and butter and they investigated topics including local food production pollinators, soil health and more teachers are developing a scope and sequence of lessons and investigations based on these elements later this spring faculty students will participate in farm based workshops at Shelburne farms that investigate ecology sustainability, nutritious food and local agriculture and several classes are integrating farm school themes into extensive project based learning expeditions on that project based learning note the middle school's first trimester project based learning unit this year was entitled Farmed Plate redesigning America's food system we learned about the ins and outs of America's food system from sugar cane production to the beef industry we investigated the chemical reactions that occur when making artisan bread learned about photosynthesis and analyzed excerpts from Michael Pollins the omnivores dilemma after we learned all this we each designed an expert project a specific topic to focus on for the remainder of the trimester exhibits included a podcast about factory farming a cookbook made with Vermont harvest of the month recipes a climate zone map showing where food comes from and its impact on the environment along with much more for my expert project I chose to create a TED style talk exploring the issues with the current fast food system and how we can solve them this project as a whole helped our students learn about the benefits of nutritious local foods impacting our health and our community we brought a few artifacts to share with you from our first trimester project we'd love for you to pass around as you listen to the testimony the farm to school is about much more than nutrition curriculum and gardens it's about building a community and learning and growing together on November 2nd, Cabot School Cabot Farm School hosted a community harvest supper Cabot Chef Brock Miller and students K3 worked together to prepare a delicious meal that included smoked local pork from Snub Valley Farm Chickens from Sox Family Farm Veggies from Bullshed Farm Cabot Smith Farm, Dance and Carrot Farm Carpenter Pitkin Farm, Sunny Meadow Farm Taffae from Rhapsody and Ciders from Birds Orchard over 200 community members enjoyed a delicious meal and musical entertainment from Cabot School musicians and singers we hope to make the invent an annual tradition during this project we studied the process of making artisan bread to give us a background knowledge for our project on sustainability we learned about bread science fermentation and how to use consumed sugar released in CO2 which makes the bread rise we learned why it's more sustainable to make your own bread instead of buying the 50 plus ingredient loaves of bread on supermarkets our class made 30 loaves of bread for the harvest supper which not only supported the community but also allowed our class to have a hands-on activity that connected to our projects another way the farm school program has been integrated into student work through our innovative middle school jobs program Cabot Leads Cabot Leads is a leadership program that empowers students' voice cultivates new skills and provides authentic opportunities for personalized learning and taking an active role in the community all fifth through eighth grade students apply for three posted jobs with a cover letter and an interview for those jobs positions range from working in the library to being a tech assistant but there are a number of jobs each year that are part of our farm school program we have students working in the kitchen every day as well as assisting in special meals students planning and maintaining the gardens starting seeds and farm practices working at several local farms Silas worked on the culinary team as a sixth grader and this year he is part of the gardening grounds team last year he apprenticed at Molybork farm a ninth generation organic dairy about 70 milking jerseys and an international reputation for reading stocks Silas and his team each followed a young calf tagging to weaning to moving to the heifer farm this year's team has met with the farm's veterinarian to learn about the milk cycle and reproduction every visit there are new opportunities to learn about animal health the economics of managing a small farm and the history of agriculture in cattle students clean calf pens do other small calves around the farm and get their questions answered really interesting questions this has been a life changing experience for our farm teams we have a number of relationships with local farms whose children and grandchildren attend cattle school and we are building more connections with greenhouse growers and other producers as part of our farm school program our farmers are keenly interested in passing on their knowledge to the next generation and they enthusiastically give up their time every week to share their love of farming as Jen Churchill a wonder why farm has said to me on more than one occasion kids need to know where their food comes from and how it is being produced in their own community Brock Miller our chef and food service director is a core member of our farm to school team and Cabot and although he was unable to be with you here today he is deeply committed to healthy food sustainability and farm partnerships he has revolutionized our lunch and snack offerings participation in and enthusiasm for food served at Cabot is at an all time high good food is a centerpiece of our community events and celebrations Brock offers this assessment of the farm to school program and this is his testimony that I am going to read here thus far our harvest supper has been the most impactful portion of our farm to school experience it was a way to involve nearly all the students in the school many local farmers and a significant amount of the community in the one night event that truly brought us together as a large family the farm to school program funds spent on this meal enabled us to collect donations for future harvest suppers with the goal of making the event more for many years beyond grant students took ownership of their roles and still speak about this event as a time that they learned many things and felt like a part of the larger community without farm to school this would not have been possible farm to school technical assistance has helped us build a stronger wider network with the many small producers in our region and this brings significant benefits to the local ag economy although we are a small school we are surrounded by relatively small producers cabin school is potentially the largest customer for some of them and a major source of income for others technical assistance has also made local purchasing accessible by creating bid templates that are user friendly for the purchaser as well as for the farmer producer this is essential as procurement rules from USDA are very specific and confusing at times these templates make the process less tedious for food service staff and farmers alike who might otherwise choose not to participate if the process is too difficult and time consuming to do so as a provision to universal meals school food program with a high participation rate and a large amount of full pay students participating the increase in reimbursement that is being proposed would have a tremendous effect on our ability to purchase locally and increase the quality of the ingredients we use I feel that universal meals are extremely important our community lives well below the poverty line on average and the school food program provides many of our students with their highest quality and consistent meals students receiving these meals regardless of their families ability to pay is important on many levels erasing any stigmas of eating a lesser quality lunch ensuring that all students are well nourished and able to concentrate and learn and exposing students to food they may otherwise never get to try are just a few ways that universal meals are of the utmost importance we are grateful for the financial support coaching and technical assistance that comes with being a farmer school grant recipient this work is having a significant positive impact on capital students and the broader community thank you for investing in Vermont's farm economy and the farm to school program thank you for giving us the opportunity to share some of our story with you here today I have two questions one is how do you manage the fact that the growing season and our school year are don't line up that conveniently I mean the hardest happens after the school year has begun but there are so many you know is that something that you manage to get a lot of the kids into summer program or put it into storage I'll take a stab at the beginning of it the first thing to be really clear about is we're not trying to grow 100% of the food we eat on the campus we have this philosophy sort of like a edible garden where students can drift by and grab a carrot or a tomato and we do with that said we have provided the food service program with a bounty of fresh produce during the fall specifically to your question there is a summer meals program for the district and our food service director has used some of that produce for Twin Field and Cabin Summer Program and then we're getting smarter about how we organize the planting and so we're trying to plant as late as possible and sometimes plant maybe a second crop or something later and so we're getting smarter about it it's our third year of education around it and we're really looking to grow the program the other thing that's worth mentioning is in the winter months obviously we're not growing anything and our long term goal is we'd like to build a greenhouse slash outdoor classroom that we heat with residual heat from our wood chip plant there's plenty of excess heat for that and our hope is that we can grow enough grains to support the salad bar school year around the second part of my question is the curriculum descriptions are so amazing and I'm wondering and this may not be a question for you but how much of that is shared so that it can be used to prompt other schools to take up some of these really exciting topics and processes well I mean we're very open to sharing I think we're fortunate we're connected with other schools and organizations that are doing a lot of this great work and Farmer School is one of those networks and I think this has been it's been a process and I've been at Cabin 16 years and I've been able to help shepherd that process in my time here and fortunately you have motivated teachers who are willing to go down that path and then motivated students who recognize the benefits of being able to be more self-directed in the driver's of their experiences and our model project-based learning gives students the opportunity to design their own projects based on some aspect or some interest of their own right and so some of the descriptions you may see in front of you those are what students design and in their own writing their own projects and so Cameron was talking about delivering a TED talk she literally stood up and delivered a TED talk and as an eighth grader and that may seem it may have seemed like oh she just did it in front of the camera and played it or whatever no this is a room full of people and an eighth grade student stood up and delivered a compelling TED talk in that style and that was her artifact and that's a public exhibition of learning and so that to me is fuel and that really blowed me away and it's what keeps me teaching the to qualify for your universal meals program did you have to do any outreach in your community to get people to fill out paperwork properly so you could qualify or just come? Yeah and I think just to be clear I'm not I'm not equipped to answer that question specifically although I do know in regards to paperwork that was a barrier and this is our third year as universal meals you know so our food service director would have a long or more involved answer for you but I think the paperwork part was problematic and then they I think got smarter about how they sent out that paperwork and what channels they used to make sure it came back we had we I mean that's the greatest program and we had some schools that lost out on universal meals program this particular year so it's too bad I gotta say we're very fortunate because I think this program works because of the people involved in it and I think a lot of times people look at grandmoney and they're like oh $15,000 in technical assistance and they they get it and they do something for a year or two and it can wither teachers leave food service directors leave and from the first day we thought about applying for this grant we thought about how are we going to make it sustainable that was our fundamental goal so when I leave and when these guys graduate or when rock leaves that the person stepping in steps into a structure that is ready to go for them so we need to make our mission really reflective of what this looks like we need to make the food service job description like oh farm school is a part of that and that doesn't exist yet but that's sort of our next stage of development what we are doing now on the ground is looking at this curriculum ladder and how do we build curricula where when a new teacher comes in here are some samples of farm school lessons that you can teach here is your garden bed that you can plant so there are no barriers for folks Rose? so thank you all and I would love to hear your TED talk you recorded it you said it excellent and it's really great to see you both so involved in this as students so thank you for all of that I'm sure you're inspiring other kids to get involved and I think you're school I'm wondering if you so I'm sorry I don't remember your position I'm a middle school teacher so you may not know this information I'm wondering if you have any idea of what percentage of local food service program purchases I don't know but I can get the information for you so we're peers and I are the bill that we're working on for local foods we're just trying to get a sense of where schools are at and then also similar to what Senator Starr just asked about the paperwork and how big of a barrier would the paperwork be for getting the local foods accepted I don't know the number but what I can say specifically is that with the assistance Abby was phenomenal and she came in and worked with Brock to sort of clear the path without that structure it would not have happened in Brock she helped him set up a system to track so the system has already been set up in your school but he said we wouldn't see this sort of ripple effect until next year because when we were doing this we were past the point of purchasing and one of our obstacles and I don't think we're alone in this is storage and so you want to be able to buy as much of whatever it is and store it you know if it's something that can be stored obviously but that's something that we have to contend with and you know we're going to use farmer school funds to purchase it and they're cooler so that's part of our strategy is how do we look at purchasing John two of the stars the agency of agriculture, food and markets are graduates of your school and so I was wondering if you've been able to share your achievements and some tenants are dying on that well Anthony was there when we received the award and he is I think somewhat aware of what's going on at Cabot but we are really grateful to be in this community and I think we have philosophically we try and use not just the school building as our classroom but looking at the community as a way to foster learning opportunities for all our students and we use our K through 12 structure as more of an advantage than a detriment and I think it can be challenging to try and meet kids at all those different levels in this day and age but the reality is if we can build programs that have cross-aged teaching and learning opportunities or programs where kids are working the garden together breaking bread together so to speak that's a real example of a community not isolating a certain age of students in one spot to be together so it's worked for us but it's been a labor of love and we're very deliberate about it now your bread's delicious you need to try and make it and when I was eating that I got the thinking you know you've got a couple of good candidates right here to participate in the iron chef program you should mention that because I think that's one of our goals for next year is to get a team in the and I think Brock has been a judge for that he's worked with that group I'm one of the judges this year I wouldn't think about the bread the bread the flour for this bread came from you know Champlain Mills and we're trying to purchase local flour to make these breads when we did the bread for the harvest do you want to speak to that? yeah so we accumulated a bunch of different I think it was like four different I made four different types of bread that people could choose from and I actually made a little information about each of the individual and their different health benefits where they came from the differences between them we used all ancient green flowers and researched the importance of ancient grains in our diets and compare us into the refined grains which have some of their nutrients stripped away and then sometimes enriched and added back but we did a deep dive into the science of bread and the importance of ancient grains and grains in our diets I think I heard you say students had to apply as if they were looking for a job which I think is such a not of our colleagues would think of that as a better thing far from the school I think but it's a wonderful cross-pollination of what you're all doing one of the hurdles that one of the questions which come up around this incentive idea is how do you account for food that's actually been grown on the ground so if you have to say we're aiming for 25% of food to be low hold but you don't pay anything for the produce out of your garden we need to figure out how to account for that and I'm wondering seems like that would be a good student you know math project for the form okay so that's not crazy that would be good thank you so much any other questions please I guess you passed thank you thank you thank you the students from Berlin are wondering if they might be able to change the order and go next well would that take you all alone no if they like to come up and respond so first part of this presentation I was upstairs fighting for better funding for pre-k special ed so it takes a lot to get me away from this event I love it, I love seeing kids pretty good I just want something from me sending things thank you I just want to announce that the students are in charge we're here if you're welcome here the ones that are presented made these posters and would like to share whatever they have and answer any questions that they can well I bet you we haven't got a question that they couldn't answer those aren't any buttons so you're up first because you tell us your name and you go from there good morning my name is Kaymus and I'm a sixth grade all of us here are from Berlin elementary school I will give you a little history about how Berlin has benefited from from the school in 2012, Berlin became a final school school we were awarded a final school implementation grant for $16,000 to build a better since then many final school related activities have helped all students pre-k to sixth grade to learn how to take care of ourselves and the environment for example, gardening, recycling composting, cooking building a garden, nature trail using classroom re-useables planting an orchard and blooming at local farms and a healthy snack program and a dishwashing station at the school picnic and a math and science skills with the mystery box program wow I assume you're as surprised as I was to learn about all of these options I just started attending Berlin school last year I came from another Vermont school and they did not have all of these amazing activities please support from the school so that more students have access to hands on learning opportunities focused on our local farms food, recycling and composting thank you and I'm in fifth grade my family has a home so far with vegetables fruit, chickens and bees so I'm used to having fresh food however, aren't a school at Berlin has helped me realize that not all students know how to garden however, since Berlin has a huge garden with 17 raised beds every classroom pre-k to sixth takes care of their own bed it is so cool seeing kids surprise to dig up potatoes and onions we also have a shed to store all of our garden tools and apple orchard and other perennial fruit bushes every student plants seeds, waters, weeds and harvest food to share with the community and cook in our classrooms we also maintain the garden walkways by spreading no chips it is wild to see all the kids with forests, shovels and wheelbarrows we're all like worker bees my name is Sophia and I'm in sixth grade every year in September our school does an open house where each classroom makes a different finger food snack to share with our families from our garden we've made through the showroom and edible perennial in our garden it's called sorrel and it's really sour it was funny watching the camera man's face after he tried it sixth grade each classroom has a band of reusable bowls, cups and silverware from a brand funded by a central Vermont Solid Waste School Zero Waste Bank when we have classroom celebrations or cooking we use real cups, bowls and silverware instead of single use plastic and paper we're learning to keep unnecessary trash out of our landfill and taking responsibility by washing our own dishes each classroom even has a driver my name is John and I'm in sixth grade another nice farm for school activity at our school is the mystery box right now all students in third and fourth grade participate in a weekly mystery box lesson Allison Levin from Community Harvest of Central Vermont brings a box with a mystery vegetable by asking questions we have to figure out what is and then do a math and science activity we measure, play draw, compare research to vegetables origins and finally eat it it is a nice way to learn about how different vegetables look and taste when they are raw we learn about vegetables we might not be familiar with like celery, plurabi, fennel and ground cherries since our principal is sick today he started attending Berlin school last year the healthy snack program at Berlin this is how it works every day a different fresh fruit or necessary have ever eaten like canned chips and roasted asparagus we all heard kids say gross when they try it my teacher told me that this program was funded by the agency of education child nutrition grant we all think it is really worthwhile having opportunities like the healthy snack program so kids can try new options, offsite composting and composting in 2018 a big composting was built in government with the help of high school students from Central Vermont Korea Center I have been a brain student for two other schools how to use this compost each week we weigh one bucket of cacti to waste we go outside mix it with these into the temperature last year was the first year we were able to use our own free compost to fertilize our gun I love doing this because we have to use our muscles and mass fields and we have to use our waste grater Gavin just told you about three ways our school already compost so you might think it is crazy that we need another way to deal with our classroom food waste to address act 148 but we do this fall I was one of the seven sixth graders here who wrote and were awarded the Central Vermont Solid Waste we tried to use other systems but for many reasons they didn't work the cool thing about this tumbler is that the sixth graders will be able to take care of all classroom food scraps by ourselves because the tumbler will be located outside a clearer view of the office we will also be able to use the compost we make to fertilize our garden for free unlike the cafeteria food scraps that are taken off site hey my name is Lucas I'm a sixth grade I'll explain how this tumbler will deal with our classroom food scraps after snack time kids put their food scraps in a small little bucket here at the end of every school day teams of sixth graders will collect all the buckets and then dump the food scraps into the tumbler we will add wood chips turn the tumbler rinse out buckets and return buckets to the classroom we will make up to 10 cubic feet of compost for our school garden beds all by ourselves at the end of each school year the sixth graders will train the fifth graders how to do the job so this process will continue year after year as a sixth grade community service thank you for supporting farm to school projects as you can see we have learned so much about ways to make our lives healthier since we are a farm to school well, school we got some questions from him yes so one of you I think maybe was Sophie you mentioned that you have an orchard do you have a school orchard did you all plant the trees and how does the orchard work um oh yeah you and Teddy said we have a garden and such bushes planted all around along with trees we have plum tree, apple tree, pear tree so we just wait yes it was a four year time we got it and Cindy got your orchard sure so we worked with Mary Burberry and they helped us with financing of it we also worked with Dave Wilcox who is the state forestry and the students from from the very career center came and helped also so it's been a new project and the trees are this is their very winter we are getting a few apples last fall but mostly the ones around the garden are longer and those are very warm do you have people who come and help take care of the trees and all that kind of things Dave Wilcox and the very career center students from the band of garland I don't know if you know her but she is quite involved excellent the universal meals at your school that's universal meals is where you don't have to pay for your lunch no we don't have that you have to pay that's not so great especially if you have no but how many children do you have in your school we have about 200 that's a good question do you have any further children from garland well thank you very much very proud of all of you thank you for coming thank you guys staying here thank you thank you thank you jobs and building minds I first I want to thank you for your time and attention and thank you for carrying the burden of responsibility of managing the state's resources I'd like to thank bond school I acknowledge them for all the silent and tireless work that they do and have done I wouldn't be doing the work I am doing with schools and institutions that they hadn't already done so much before we I also want to honor all the remanters that I come across many many remanters who are within one or two generations who are currently being dispossessed from the land I think a lot of times we forget that this is an ongoing story I think part of my story today is kind of how I see addressing and maybe changing that story so I believe this is the second year in a row where farm schools had to ask for additional funding I they asked me to come down and testify I've spent a fair amount of time sitting with that and trying to figure out what it is that I needed to do here because clearly this isn't a value questioned my accounting just spent $50,000 last year busting around three students from a high school to a tech center I say that without judgment I just think it demonstrates that when our values are in alignment with what we want to see with our vision the resource question disappears so I'm not here to talk about value I'm not here to talk about quantifiable things I'm not here to talk from my head I spend a lot of time in there I spend a lot of time watching root crops by myself in an entire room but I really think that I'm here today to talk more with my heart it's probably going to sound pretty awkward I'm not used to doing that I would ask that everybody who's listened to everybody today just really think about their values because I think at the end at the bottom of it all we don't really know what our values are but I think we all share the same values so a little bit about me I've been farming for 17 years I started out in the Upper Valley moved out to Johnson I started my own farm called originally called Free Grows Farm now called West Farm in 2012 same year my son was born that was not advisable starting a farm and again at the same time well we survived it I'd say that's a probably good way to put it we started out in about a three quarters an acre and we do pretty much all wholesale we are about seven to ten years of vegetable production right now still pretty much all wholesale three years ago I 2017 it was the first year I started getting into some of the institutions and schools and was it necessarily my idea but I'm very glad that we did it farming is hard wholesale farming in commodities is even harder and institutional sales are just about the hardest so it's been a challenge I think all of us recognize the pieces of that challenge we're all part of that challenge we're all negotiating and sometimes it feels like as I said to somebody earlier today we are trying to dump out a puzzle and have all the pieces fall together at the same time so I I started selling to schools and hospitals I think about 12 schools in my county and another county I sold the two hospitals Cotley and Northwestern Medical and it's all very small proportions but that's it is definitely a work of progress so I want to kind of pause that narrative and just kind of really a story of going to visit a friend a few years ago the wife is very much in passionate about dairy farming and has a mother of dairy her husband she's a first generation farmer he's multi-generation farmer and he doesn't really farm dairy farming most of it and I was talking to him and he kind of out of the blue said to me and I'm going to withhold a profanity but he said I am so sick of farming and there was a real, real bitterness there and it's not I think an uncommon bitterness for people who have been in the business of farming for so long because the business of farming is a bitter, bitter thing sometimes but it left me shocked because since I've gotten into this business I've been super passionate about it I find a lot of joy in it I find a lot of meaning in it so it was kind of something I couldn't reconcile this past year was really challenging there's a lot of reasons for that I think it's just for me more than anything I could say economics I could say whether I could blame it on any number of things I think it's for me just mental and maybe a deeper process of doing the same thing over and over again working harder and harder every year and feeling like success is I'm sorry farther away and I hit that point this fall where farming really sucks and it was pretty dark I don't I think I had to sit with that and thankfully we have seasons in the state where one can sit with things and reflect on them I didn't know this isn't a logical problem it's the meaning I found in my work vanished overnight and I can't farm without some sort of meaning I think some people do it for the money and they're successful at it but most people aren't farming or working on the land or working with children for money sorry for the person so yeah I sat with that reflecting on it I'm working through and I think I had to come to terms with two things really a kind of reflect on these things and the one first is I had to let go of making a difference because making a difference suggests that I know what changes what's good what the right vision is that it's plentiful I don't know I don't have a sort of insight into that I have intuitions I think that like I said we share the same vision at our core I think we have a hard time reconciling ourselves to our different expressions of that shared vision when we get there I don't know but it's pretty freeing to me to realize that it's not up to me to make a difference it's not that I give up or that I'm not motivated to have a positive impact but I don't have to do that counting of what is my difference what does it mean and the second thing the second part of it is the what and the how of what I'm in service to what is I'm is it the land is it the kids is it my family is it the sick people is it my employees is it my business partners is it my predators what am I in service to and the obvious answer to that is what we call community and then the how is the part I'm still learn and the how is by building relationships and I'm starting to value that a lot more than I did I'm pretty slow in starting with these things when I go to do a taste test at my son's school he's very excited he's really excited to do that and I'm starting to get more excited to do that stuff but you know he gets it he gets it he wants to take the food which is a gift from the land and give that food to his friends and his teachers he knows this intuitively and I'm the dumb dumb who's just figuring it out and that's really I think the core value of local food and what this is all about we can talk about nutrition we can talk about economics we can talk about all sorts of things but the core at the core of it I think is this relational aspect of food that has been missing it's been degrading as our communities are degrading there's no meaning so I can quantify what it means or what difference it makes when I go to a school and get kids to try sauerkraut beats they might not make any difference at all but it does establish a relationship between me and them and their food and their access to the land to the relationship to the land and to their community and right now I think that's what's really important I think I've kind of said what I need to say hopefully that wasn't too much of a train wreck well thank you Angus are there questions for Angus I think we're commended doing all this work supplying food to hospitals schools you know sometimes you don't feel like you're rewarding but watching those little kids run around watching sick people get better those are some of the rewards that you don't really get directly but indirectly you know so thanks a lot you do spread the good word and make sure people are that healthy foods I appreciate that I guess probably along the same lines of what senator star just said I think it would be a mistake to assume that you don't make a difference every day they're just differences we can't measure yes I think that's the quantitative aspect of it the value driven analysis I don't think makes sense and I don't need there to be a quantitative reward or any sort of reward I think it's just intrinsic from understanding what my value system is I the reward is the process the reward is whether the school buys one bag of carrots or 20 bags of carrots it's just not to say that there's not a lot of work to do there's not a lot of more that can be done but I also think it's a shame to be coming back here every year and having the same conversation because it says to me that our values aren't in the line because this should be a question I want to echo the thank you and I particularly appreciate the image of the puzzle what did you say don't make the puzzle out and hoping that it all fits together perfectly and I would just offer I think I'm going to play with your analogy a little bit we don't get to dunk it onto a table but the monotony system has this dumping and on the bed of needles and so hoping it's even more unrealistic and we all live in that system too because the state government can't overcome that on its own and I just offer that because it's a powerful image that you've offered me that this is talking about community where we are trying to wrestle through this system that is unquestionably broken at a national level at what are you internationally but I also take great hope from farms like you're doing and the kids that are coming up not just here today but telling us all over the state that this is meaningful to them and last year we heard from kids who had severe learning disabilities and different kinds of um characteristics that made them not a good fit in the classroom and they were not sort of brought to life in a sense until they started working on a farm every day and to have these kids come and tell us stories where their teacher would say you know they never used to speak at all things like that there are little elements of it and I think for all of us we're trying to roll those together and build something so you're really part of that and it's not much but thank you I can't offer much but thank you and um I guess I would kind of echo that back to you and that I agree that it's not up to the state to fix the problem the state is not all nobody is all-powerful to solve this problem this is this is this sort of rebuilding of community healing it's up to all of us and um you know I hope the state can do as much as they can to nourish that wherever it's expressed can I just anchor something it's good also getting a motion years ago Pete Seeger who many of those people know came to my house he was doing a benefit for the progressive alliance in Browbro which I was a member of and he stated our house and one of the days I was doing dishes he was sitting at my grandmother's school and I said how do you keep it up how do you keep up this work and he said well Harold it's really sometimes very hard his one of his major projects was cleaning up the house in the river and there were and he said but this is what I likened to and in my head I imagine a seasaw and at one end there are some really massive rocks and at the other end there's a basket with sand and there are people like you and people like me who go by the basket of sand and pour a spoon full on and it leaks out of the basket and it begins to tip within it but he said if we just keep putting the sand in there for people that's a beautiful idea thank you well thank you very much and good luck alright thank you that's not no you're going to tag James good with power numbers up to Mary good morning my name is Mary Feldman and I'm the Executive Director of the Parent Child Center of Rotman County which is one of 15 of the Parent Child Centers in Vermont we're an organization that's currently in our second year of the Farm to School Grant and Early Childhood Education Grant and the perspective that I want to offer you is what the grant looks like on the ground and more so from the eyes of the children but the other side of the eyes of the children first of all I want to thank you for the grant because the grant makes the difference the Parent Child Centers operate with a reasonable deficit so to do very important things like break the food to farm a pipeline we need the funding that you provide and we're deeply grateful for it during the past two years the staff of the Parent Child Center Rotman County noticed that many of the families that we serve were experiencing food insecurity health and wellness it took the form of ramen noodles three-year-olds coming to school we call our program a school to our ECE program with a packet of cookies and very calorie rich foods and so one of the things that was really important to me as an executive director was to cancel what I call the tin can culture of the feeding program at the Early Childhood Education Center so we want to move away from those giant cans and get connected to our local community and the food that was found there it's very difficult to see children who are three experiencing food insecurity and that was offensive to me as a human being that other human beings should have to live like that so these low income and working families as well as their young children do not have access to healthy foods they're unable to afford consistent meals and they experience the stress of worrying about providing food for their families it became too clear to us as an agency that we need to serve families who did not qualify for assistance but we're still struggling to make ends meet we call them the working poor we look at food that our agency is health and I really appreciate what Mr Baldwin said that food is a gift from the land that resonated with me the PCC understands that nutritious food is important to brain development in children and that nutritional deficiencies contribute to a plethora of problems including learning among infants the greatest amount of brain development happens with babies and toddlers there are emotional problems language development and the overall general health of children who have food insecurity the parent child center believes that all children and families have the right to food and that poverty and childhood should not express itself through an individual's life and that's what happens with food insecurity so we decided to do something about that by making a commitment to tackling food insecurity in Rowland County and building a vision plan around this throughout our entire agency and I keep looking at Beth because she was very instrumental making that happen for our community the farm to school grant has been critical in allowing us to do this in our early childhood education program the vision plan that we developed included leaving the importance of food security nutrition throughout all of our programs especially our early childhood education center and alongside the parents which is something we don't talk about when we think about the farm to school it really gets home it's farm to school to home we believe in a whole family approach at the parent child center and that to incur long term change the parents are a vital part of the process we establish a food pantry we utilize a take what you need policy and the pantry is stocked with fresh produce dairy and shelf stable items but the things that the parents were taking home are things that the farm to school grant allow the children to come into contact with in their school setting we have built into our parenting groups a healthy community meal and the opportunity to help prepare it we've created cooking classes to introduce cooking with fresh local fruits and vegetables and have begun to better integrate fresh local foods and early childhood education programs through our farm to school grant healthy children today there's a healthy workforce in 20 years and so that's really important that's also a way of stabilizing our economy and our workforce our goal with our farm to school grant is not just to feed one child at a time the farm to school grant although committed to our children can be seen woven throughout all of our programs we want to educate children and their families our system provides a full ray of experiential learning for our little friends from the biology of plants and chemistry of soils to food harvesting, storage preparation, cooking I grew up with the projects in Philadelphia I really did not understand that chickens and eggs went together so it's very important that our children especially as Vermonters which one came first still working on that the funding came first and she would give a kid some food and you fed her for a day teach a kid to plant, grow, harvest, prepare and cook food and you fed her for life our parents have the same opportunity to learn about food and our parenting classes our ECE programs have family nights regularly food is love from where I come from so we share that with the parents and children at our family nights so making sure we have all the food is a very basic step but we're going beyond that we educate when we come together in community over our meals seeing food as an act of local culture and a commitment to a healthy life we are working with local farmers producers to stop the shelves of our pantry and flesh out the menus for our programs the conscious linkage of our food system with our wider ecological and cultural landscape gives us a larger and deeper sense of home and the security and confidence that comes with that we're proud of the positive outcomes of our food program that it's having on our local community these outcomes could only have been achieved with the farm to school grant because we live in an ethical relationship with grants that we receive so although we don't have money for a lot of what we do this grant enabled us to focus on the food coming to the parent child center of Rutland is entering a caring community where many needs can be addressed the farm to school grant provides the parent child center staff with the technical assistance that was needed as well as the funds to achieve our goals our children come to the early childhood education program center to eat fresh produce learn about food learn where it comes from learn about the health, the impact of food and our little friends our youngest members of our community learn to discriminate life long habits around eating and healthy habits of eating and that their relationship to the local community we believe quality food is one of the best investments we can make because of the farm to school grant and we can achieve this goal Michael Pollan which the students quoted earlier today says the shared meal elevates eating from the mechanical process of fueling the body to a ritual of family and community from the mere animal biology to an act of culture and you know what's coming next in order to continue this good work we are requesting $500,000 annually for the farm to school and LHL program and we please ask you to make sure that the base of $231,000 does not decrease additionally please support the local purchasing incentive bill to increase the amount of local food served in school nutrition programs and to support Vermont farms and our local economy and to develop our healthy workforce in 20 years these two bills work together to support access to healthy local food for all Vermont children Michael, would you like are you up next I am we're sort of up together from the same organization so yeah I mean certainly I can go next you can ask Mary questions and then I can go well if you're from the same crew we are we'll go for it and then we'll ask great, great and I'll try not to be reflective here so good morning and I'm the community impact director for the parent child center of Rutland County we have two sites one in Brandon and one in Rutland we are as Mary said in our second year of the farm to school program so our top priority at the PCC is to help individuals and families in our community who are struggling with poverty that includes working for as Mary had suggested the majority of the children and families enrolled in our programs who struggle with the barriers that keep them in poverty and we believe that one of the best ways to challenge these barriers is to provide with children and families with knowledge of and access to healthy food and farm to school has allowed us that for the PCC farm to school addresses the trajectory of poverty starting with the child and for us that is infant through five through five years as he or she begins to understand their world farm to school and ECE brings nutrition directly into the young children's arena they are introduced to healthy eating sustainable agriculture and the local community culture they are taught about the foods they eat brought by local farmers the children bring these ideas and activities home to their parents the PCC then augments the children's enthusiasm and knowledge by access to healthy food available at our food shop the shared healthy meals created at home then reinforces the learning from the classroom and cafeteria farm to school has also allowed us to build deeper relationships with the farmers in Rowland County who keep our lands working at our bellies filled with nutritional produce and this is oh you are here I wanted to say that when the farmers show up at the ECE program with their food in hand like the joy is powerful it makes such a difference that your your connection to your food but then you bring to that food is delivered to the children like Dracula they got it ok so these little farmers have showed up for the children with produce in hand knowledge and resources all to support our farm to school program we are really excited to learn that the local purchasing initiative this will allow us to increase the amount of local fresh food that we can give to these children through the farm to school network we are creating a community garden 10,000 square feet our early childhood site in Rowland and we have another site in Brandon that is a little smaller and this is where children, parents and PCC staff and community members work together to provide nourishment to provide nutritional food this garden will support the good work being done in the cafeteria and the classroom and will also support the relationships we've built in the community I really want to thank farm to school staff who Cynthia has been there she has been our coach and she has really provided us with a really secure inclusive direction so by inclusive I mean like helping us to gather the community members including the farmers that will really create a sustainable farm to school program are going with great optimism and security into our community garden so let me add one more thing I want to thank the farm honors program which I know is also up for consideration for funding that too really helps to keep the farm to school going like that is feeding directly into our ability to work with more farmers and with fresh produce in our CD program there are questions from committee members I'm assuming the answer to this is yes but just to be sure you're a food service authority, a school food service authority is that correct do you get funding through the agency of education for the CD program and the agency of the CD program yes okay CFA children and child and adult care things but it comes through the agency of education because one of the things we've heard from them is the trying to get more early childhood education programs into that program do you also get federal funding for your program we don't oh actually we do a tiny tiny tiny for your food program okay because that's something we've been talking about is how to draw down more federal funds for early childhood food programs by getting more of your types of programs into the food service just in general but I don't know if there's more possibility for you to get federal funds through what you're already doing but that is an opportunity waiting to come thank you for your work did you say you're going to have a 1,000 square foot garden 10,000 that's I mean 10,000 that's a quarter of a acre that's amazing I'm a little curious about the management and kind of the plan because I'm assuming there's going to be a lot of involvement with the kids and parents if you look at the when you have time I invite you to look at the packet packet of solutions for our 2 Gen Center that we are in the process right now of negotiating a grant and a loan with the USDA for a 1.4 million dollar 2 Gen KSS hopefully we open by June and July this year and that's part of the 10,000 square feet so we have multiple programs we have 10 programs our ECD program is just one of them so we there's different sections of the garden but we have a space that we encourage the parents to garden their children that goes into our food pantry where we're just trying to create the emotion and put the pieces together but we are all of the staff are committed to food as health so with the farm school grant and the planning that has made possible we are beginning with some raised beds so you know we're planning on beginning that this spring through funding with the farm school and also other funds so it won't be 10,000 hello once on that note though we are actively utilizing apartment 10,000 springs or 10,000 right now and so we have a high school program with teen parents who have babies and so while the babies are in our EC program benefiting from the farm school grant the parents are gardening and farming so we coordinate that back together wow if you run the shore to help when your garden serves a column yeah thank you we know you support us I do yeah thank you senator yeah well we'd like to thank you too and thank all of you for your time this morning it was a great show and tell program and I'm sure we came away learning a lot and hopefully we can help the farm school program and growth that increases fill a lot when we're working on that that will proceed and some hopefully we'll feed our children yeah in our elders