FoodCorps, partners reinforce school nutrition at Suttons Bay

Photo: Suttons Bay elementary student Megan holds an asparagus spear during a taste test last spring.

By Erin Baumann

Sun contributor

“And plants need love too!” These words came out of a first grader’s mouth last fall at Suttons Bay Elementary School during a lesson on what a plant needs. In addition to the sun, soil, water, and air that plants need to survive, this student was insistent on the fact that plants also need love.

After a year of service with FoodCorps, a national nonprofit that connects kids to healthy food in school, I’m fully convinced that not only do students need the essential blocks of healthy eating, they need care and respect from adults to nurture healthy lifestyles, in the same way that plants need love.

I am a FoodCorps AmeriCorps service member at Suttons Bay Elementary School. Locally, I am partnered with Michigan State University Extension in Grand Traverse County. FoodCorps has partnered with a number of eligible schools in the region for the last eight years, the longest partnership being with Traverse Heights Elementary School. Last year, FoodCorps re-initiated its partnership with Suttons Bay Public Schools after a hiatus of seven years. 

“We need to get these kids to eat well,” said Linda Caswell, Suttons Bay’s assistant director of food services. “It’s important for them to be alert in school and to have the energy they need. It helps their development and their bodies.”

FoodCorps recognizes that healthy eating is important for students, not only for their physical health, but also for their educational success. However, simply telling students that they should eat well does not result in healthier students. Students in low-income areas often face food insecurity. They don’t know where their next meal may come from, let alone if it will be a healthy option. Fifty-seven percent of students enrolled in Suttons Bay Elementary School last year were considered economically disadvantaged and qualified for free and reduced-price meals. In Michigan a family of four that makes less than $32,630 per year qualifies for the program.

FoodCorps service members focus on hands-on gardening and food education, healthy school meals, and a school-wide culture of health to approach student health and their relationship with food at three different levels. At Suttons Bay Elementary School last year, this translated to more than 10 hours of direct, hands-on learning opportunities in three grade levels, 10 school-wide taste tests, and 10 fruit trees being planted by students.

A major success during the last school year occurred during National Farm to School Month in October. On the day of the annual Michigan Apple Crunch, featuring apples grown locally at Bardenhagen Farms, every elementary student crunched into an apple at the same time. One student declared, “these apples are so much better than (apples from) the cafeteria!”

Kitchen staff, with the demands of preparing food for all the students at the elementary and high school, expressed challenges finding the time to implement the funds they had received through the 10 Cents a Meal program. Through my role as facilitator of these initiatives, I was able to help connect kitchen staff to the Michigan Farm Cooperative. Now a delivery of local produce arrives every Tuesday morning. Suttons Bay students can now claim that the apples in their cafeteria taste as good as the Bardenhagen ones they ate during the Michigan Apple Crunch. Fresher, local apples taste better, and end up in the stomachs of students, rather than in the trash can after one bite.

This hands-on learning and support of healthy, local food isn’t possible without collaboration. FoodCorps seeks to connect the dots between existing programs or funders to support gardens, local foods, food education, and forming relationships that would exist even in the absence of a FoodCorps service member in the community. In Leelanau County, a number of programs already support healthy kids in school. Leelanau Christian Neighbors’ Blessings in a Backpack program provides food for students to bridge the gap between Friday’s lunch and Monday’s breakfast by sending students home with a bag of food.

According to Leelanau Christian Neighbors executive director Mary Stanton, approximately 50 Suttons Bay elementary and middle school students benefited from this program each week during the 2018-2019 school year. Another 15 students in the high school received Blessings in a Backpack. Other elementary and middle schools in Leelanau County also received help from Blessings in a Backpack. Last year Glen Lake tallied about 50 students, and Northport and Leland counted approximately 30, each, Stanton estimated. Blessings in a Backpack also serves Leelanau Montessori and Leelanau Children’s Center.

“There are families out there that might be OK, then all of a sudden they suddenly slip over the edge financially,” said Stanton.

Leelanau Christian Neighbors sources high-quality, local food. The nonprofit buys cheese, eggs, and milk; it recently received two cows, three pigs and a lamb donated from a 4H Fair sale, and potatoes and produce often comes from local farmers such as Meadlowlark.

Other businesses have stepped up, too. The Mitten Brewery Company in Northport recently paid off the remaining student school lunch debt at Suttons Bay from last school year.

Joe Symons, a bartender at Mitten Brewing and substitute teacher at Suttons Bay, recently raised the topic of school lunch debt, and school districts threatening parents over their debt, on his Facebook page. That led to a dialogue with Mitten Brewing owner Chris Andrus committing the company’s nonprofit, Mitten Foundation, Inc., based in Grand Rapids, to wipe out Suttons Bay’s school lunch debt of $2,700.

“Lunch is key,” said Symons. “Lunch and recess and smart physical activity go hand in hand with learning. A bad lunch often leads to behavior issues, distractions in classrooms.”

It was also recently announced on the Suttons Bay Public School Facebook page and website that all Suttons Bay Elementary students will receive free breakfast and lunch for the 2019-2020 school year. This is because Suttons Bay school population has demonstrated a high enough need that the Community Eligibility Provision of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s National School Lunch Program allows for free lunch for all, rather than requiring all families to apply for free or reduced lunch.

“For some of these kids, lunch could be a big meal,” said Caswell. “It’s important they go home with a full belly, so if dinner isn’t a sit-down meal, maybe this is the one good meal they get that’s a decent viable option.”

To complement each of these initiatives, FoodCorps provides hands-on learning experiences in food, gardening, and cooking. Without any of them, students would not have the essential building blocks required to be healthy. For example, Suttons Bay Elementary provides a salad bar, but if students are not familiar with a particular food item, it often ends up in the trash can. When I run monthly taste tests with cafeteria staff, students are empowered to try a new food, or a food prepared in a different way.

In a risk-free environment, students may try a new food, and then vote on if they “Tried it”, “Liked it”, or “Loved it”. Next time it shows up on the salad bar, at the food pantry, or on their plate, they are more likely to give it a try. In Northern Lower Michigan, FoodCorps service members use a regional harvest of the month calendar for their taste tests, which many food pantries have adopted. These foods, that can be harvested or found locally in that month, help students learn about seasonal foods, but also support local farmers. We’ve served beet hummus, parsnip chips, fresh asparagus roasted with olive oil, and more.

This structure works. Nationally, a study of FoodCorps programming has shown that students who receive regular hands-on FoodCorps lessons eat three times as many fruits and vegetables as students who don’t receive similar programming. Locally, I’ve been privileged to see how FoodCorps programming has supported this statistic. At the beginning of last school year, I was a stranger to all the students. By the middle of the year, I was receiving hugs every time I walked into the first grade. Every time I saw the fifth graders, they asked if there was a cooking club that day. Students were excited about trying new foods, and participating in hands-on learning together. They are being provided both with the physical support they need to eat healthy, but also the care and respect towards healthy food that they deserve to be shown.

A Madison native, Erin Baumann is serving her second and final term as a FoodCorps service member, supporting Suttons Bay and Traverse Heights elementary schools. Questions about FoodCorps service with Michigan State University Extension can be directed to Sarah Eichberger at eichber2@msu.edu.