For Schools

A school garden can have many benefits on the students. The children can learn the importance of eating healthy food as well as supporting local growers. This resource provides a 4 step process to beginning a school garden program.

A successful garden takes careful planning, good management skills and collaboration.

Farm-to-preschool programs take many forms. These tips from Ecotrust will help get you started.

The Lunch Box provides school district administrators, food service directors, and their teams with the tools and resources they need to serve healthy, nutritious, and delicious food to every student, every day.

A look at how USDA Foods supports local purchasing.

This fact sheet explains the use of geographic preference when deciding which farm to select for purchasing locally grown food.

The Department of Defense Fresh Fruit and Vegetable Program (DoD Fresh) allows schools to use their USDA Foods entitlement dollars to buy fresh produce. Read the article to learn more about how this could impact your school

This resource takes an in-depth look at what makes food truly "local" and how providing healthy, locally grown food is sometimes more than just fruits and veggies.

Farmer Request for Information (RFI) forms are a great way for schools to catalogue the local foods available to your school district. Not sure where to start? This guide will walk you through the process.

This map from Mississippi State University will help you figure out when to plant or harvest crops in your area.

A look at how Boulder Valley School District (BVSD) Food Services made the most out of their U.S. Department of Agriculture farm-to-school grant by focusing on education and marketing.

A report from the Mississippi Farm to School Interagency Council on the progress of the council through December 2014.

Tupelo Public School District’s "Growing Healthy Waves" program worked with FoodCorps to educate students about food and nutrition using farm-to-school principles.

FoodCorps — a nationwide team of AmeriCorps leaders — connects kids to real food and help them grow up healthy.

Good Food for Oxford Schools (GFOS) is an initiative of the Oxford School District in Oxford, Miss., aimed at improving cafeteria menus and simultaneously educating students and their families.

The Partnership for a Healthy Mississippi is has been working with farm-to-school initiatives for years to assist local farmers with the processes of selling fresh, nutritious, local foods to schools and school districts.

The Farm-to-School Calendar showcases the yearly timeline in which it takes to grow the food and how it ends up on the table in schools. This resource provides information on the best time of year to connect with a school or a farmer. 

Visit the Mississippi State Department of Health website for resources on buying and selling local food to early childcare education programs.

This program was introduced to encourage the serving of locally-grown and locally-produced agricultural products in school meals and to recognize the substantial economic and health benefits of serving locally-grown foods. 

The National Farm to School Network brings local food sourcing education into schools. 

 Essentially, this relationship is all about communication. Anything you feel important for the farmer to know about your school/district, or that you want to know about the farmer/farm, just ask!

The mission of the Edible Schoolyard Project is to build and share a national edible education curriculum for pre-kindergarten through high school.

This checklist will help to facilitate communication between farmers and potential buyers.

This curriculum from Delta Fresh Foods is tailored to the Mississippi College Readiness Standards for 5th grade math.

Go NAPSACC works with child care providers to improve the health of young children through practices, policies and environments that instill habits supporting lifelong health and well-being.

This farm-to-school resource for early childcare programs in Mississippi, developed by Lauren Crosby, will help plan any pre-school or daycare program plan a fantastic farm to school program.

From Good Food for Oxford Schools, check out these easy and fun recipes kids can make for themselves.