If you don't like the food being served in your or your child's cafeteria, do something to change it! Below you'll find guidelines on what to do, how to do it, and examples of successful initiatives underway around the country.

If you can't convince your school decision makers to start buying locally grown, sustainable food, start with one or two items. Work to have milk from a local dairy served, along with the usual dairy products. Have one or two vegetables sourced from farms nearby. Sometimes starting small opens school administrators to the possibility of larger change. And over time you can work to introduce more and more wholesome, sustainable food.

What you can do
Below are links to resources that can help you develop an initiative to bring local, sustainable food into your school.

• Buy Local Food and Farm Toolkit
  38-page report that offers step-by-step instructions on how to get sustainable food in schools, as well as realistic ideas on what each of us can do. (Oxfam America, July 2002)
• Farm to School Program
  A Community Food Security Coalition project that aims to partner local farmers with nearby schools. Towards that end, the Program provides case studies, training, and technical assistance to catalyze farm to school projects in communities throughout the nation. CFSC also has a Farm to College Program.
• Massachusetts Public Health Association’s Community Action to Change School Food Policy: An Organizing Kit
  This 68-page report gives details on how to organize citizens and school officials to create and implement policy that sets more healthy standards for foods and beverages sold on school campuses.
• The National Farm-to-School Program
  This program incorporates purchasing from local farmers, curricula, school gardens and farm tours/farmer in the classroom activities. There is a farm to school guide for parents, educators, community leaders and food service professionals available for purchase. (Funded by the USDA)
• Organic Food in Schools: Eleven Tips for Change
  Eleven things you can do to help bring organic food into your school. From The O'Mama Report, a site for women interested in organic agriculture and products. Also included on the site is an article called Organic Food in Schools which discusses the success stories and obstacles of getting organic food into schools. (The Organic Trade Association)
• Sustainable Food on Campus
  Read our simple guide for ideas on how to bring local food onto your campus.

Schools that are making a difference
Below are examples of what schools are doing to bring more sustainable food to their students.

• Brown University’s Cafeteria
  The Brown University cafeteria program is committed to locally grown and produced purchases, social and environmental sustainability, and fair trade, and even hosts a on-campus farmers’ market.
• For examples on how some New York schools are eating sustainable, including the visionary Ross School in the Hamptons, visit Cornell's Farm to School Program.
• Penn College of Technology
  Technical school in Williamsport, PA, decided in 2000 to expand its purchase of local foods to include hormone-free milk from a family-owned dairy farm in the vicinity.
• University of Northern Iowa
  UNI Local Food Project, which is affiliated with the Practical Farmers of Iowa, seeks to connect industrial buyers (colleges, restaurants, hospitals, prisons, etc.), as well as consumers, with local producers. Information provided in this report, especially the "Lessons Learned" section, can help anyone interested in getting sustainable food into a school.
• Wisconsin Homegrown Lunch Program
  A grassroots program whose goal is to enhance the Madison, Wisconsin, public schools' existing meal programs by introducing fresh, nutritious, local and sustainably grown food to children, beginning in the city's elementary schools. The program currently operates in 3 elementary schools.
• Yale University
  Food from the Earth, a part of the Yale Student Environmental Coalition (YSEC), was able to bring an organic food option to the campus, with the vocal support of alumni. One college (cluster of dorms) on campus will be serving only organic food starting in fall 2003. See also: Yale Residential College Goes Organic

For more information:

• Citizens for Healthy Options in Children’s Education (CHOICE) promotes a choice of wholesome meals and nutrition education in our nation's schools. CHOICE also provides teaching materials and support to teachers, administrators, other educators, and parents.
• The San Francisco Farm-to-School Report: Results from the 2003 Feasibility Study
  A study done by San Francisco Food Systems to identify opportunities for the San Francisco Unified School District to buy agricultural products from local farmers in order to improve the school meals program.
• School Lunch Report Card
  The Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) conducted their fourth annual review of the food served in school lunchrooms and compiled this comprehensive "report card" on school lunches. This report, which examines 11 of the nation’s largest school districts, also evaluates nutrition education programs. (Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine, 2004)
• Spoiled Lunch: Polluters Profiting from Federal Lunch Programs
  Outlines environmental, health, and labor law violations committed by giant slaughterhouses and meat processing plants that supply pork, chicken, and beef to our schools through the federal School Lunch Program. (Sierra Club, 2001)