Thinking About Jumping into Farm to School? Follow These Steps:
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Start small by choosing to focus on either purchasing, serving, or teaching about local foods. Don’t take on too much! Let your activities naturally integrate into current education, food purchasing, and serving practices.
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Start with what you have available to you. Do you know a local producer interested in selling to the school? Do you have space to grow food in a raised bed garden outdoors? Maybe you have space in a classroom and are interested in growing seeds indoors.
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Connect with your local Extension office! Find the Ohio State University Extension office or the Central State University Extension educators in your area. Extension may be able to help connect you to sources of local foods and provide nutrition education resources.
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Ohio Farm to School resources. Visit the Ohio Farm to School webpage or contact the Ohio Department of Education’s Farm to School team for technical assistance in procuring, serving, marketing or educating students about local foods.
Elizabeth Douglass Farm to School Program Manager
Rebecca Naab Local Foods Procurement
Amy Parker School Gardens
Robin Carrasquillo Food, Nutrition, and Agriculture Education
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Learn from others! Join the statewide farm to school network meetings and get connected with your regional farm to school lead. Mark your calendar for the next meeting on December 8th and find more information in the events section below.
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Find more information from the National Farm to School Network here and USDA here. Contact Haley Scott with farm to school network questions.
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Farm to School Month Features Around the State
Lorain, Ohio Horizon Education Center’s Bill Reuter organized a field trip for children served at Horizon to enjoy his community garden. Reuter spoke about the different techniques for planting, growing and harvesting, and shared how the plots are tended to by different families from diverse cultural backgrounds which are represented in each approach to growing in the garden
 Lodi, Ohio Lodi Family Center 5-18 Club and 4-H Spin Club are after-school programs serving youth up to 18 years old. They offer activities galore, including three on-site themed gardens. The main garden is pirate themed, where youth explore and hunt down veggies hiding in a treasure chest with prizes. The next is a sensory garden including a gaga ball pit, sunflower house, and tactile plants for youth to play with to decompress. These gardens also featured various types of corn: edible corn for humans, crops for livestock, and even popcorn! The 3rd garden features a volcano and archeological dig site where dinosaur bones, fossils, dinosaur eggs, and other treasures have been found! The organization benefits from partnering with Kish Family Farms for garden education classes.
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In 2022 alone, youth at the site grew, harvested, and prepped 116 pounds of produce including cucumbers, zucchini, peppers, lettuce, spinach, tomatoes, and potatoes. The harvests are used in a produce bar onsite as well as in friendly competitions such as Lodi Family Center’s signature “Kids Cutting Board Challenges” and “Kids Battle Chef”. “We found that because the kids grew, harvested, then prepped it, they happily ate more veggies every day,” said Program Director Rebecca Rak.
Southeast Ohio For the eighth year in a row, Rural Action and additional partners are leading a regional Apple Crunch celebration! Rural Action is working with seven School Districts and twenty schools to distribute 7,500 local apples to students in Athens and Morgan Counties.
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The apples are sourced from Wagners Fruit Farm in Waterford, Ohio, where volunteers, Americorps members, Athens County Health Department staff and students help to pick and grade them, reducing the cost while supplying needed labor to the orchard. From the orchard, the apples are taken to the Appalachian Center for Economic Networks’ (ACEnet) shared use commercial kitchen in Nelsonville for washing and counting. From the ACEnet facility they are delivered to multiple schools.
The celebration is made possible by a “Pie Day” fundraiser at the Chesterhill Produce Auction, where individuals and businesses donate pies for an auction and sampling. Proceeds from Rural Action’s local produce buying club, and some districts and PTO’s as able also support this effort. In Washington County, Fort Fry Local School District is partnering for the second year in a row with Hickerson’s Fruit Farm to host their Apple Crunch Day.
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Southwest Ohio The first season of the Growing Our Teachers program was a success! Twelve teachers from the Greater Cincinnati region participated in ten sessions held over the course of the school year to learn how to strengthen their school garden programs and build a support network with each other and beyond. The next cohort, beginning on October 12, will include 14 members! Each session is facilitated by Ellie Falk of the Civic Garden Center and Nicole Gunderman of Gorman Heritage Farm, with support from the Greater Cincinnati Regional Food Policy Council and funding from a USDA Farm to School Implementation Grant.
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The Greater Cincinnati Regional Food Policy Council (GCRFP) and Hamilton Co. R3Source organized an Educators Workshop at the Hamilton County Fair in Cincinnati for all educators in the Greater Cincinnati area. Participants gathered on the fairgrounds to hear from partner organizations about the pillars of a successful outdoor learning program. Based on the Greater Cincinnati Regional Farm-to-School Curriculum Guide, currently in development, presenters offered interactive opportunities for educators to engage in the essential components to promote the procurement and consumption of local food. The connections educators can make for students between garden knowledge, edible education, school meals, and career pathways is a formula for improved academic performance and better health outcomes. For additional information, contact Cynthia Walters at Green Umbrella.
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West Dayton, Ohio West Dayton Food Access Collective Impact Project held a Garden Partner Tour featuring four local community gardens in the Dayton area. Community partners were invited to tour each of these community gardens and learn the operations and needs of each garden/agency. It was an eye-opening experience for all who attended and really raised the question of, “How can we increase the conversation of farming in schools and in our community?” said west central region’s Farm to School Regional Lead, Quentina Konah.
 Yellow Springs, Ohio Agraria is hosting a Fall Youth program called “EcoGrowers” for children ages 6-12 to be immersed in Agraria’s food growing spaces as they connect to the natural world, each other and their community. During these sessions, kids will participate in fun weekly garden and farm themed activities, observe and explore nature through a gardener’s lens, and build green growing skills. EcoGrowers takes place in the Spring and the Fall. Stay updated on Agraria’s website here.
Fall School Garden Planting Update
 Looking for tips on growing in your school garden over winter? Check out this new course on growing vegetables all winter long, linked here.
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