California Profile

California-based organizations and school districts led by Occidental College’s Center for Food and Justice are working towards advancing and institutionalizing the Farm to school concept throughout the state. Project partners include the Community Food Security Coalition, Community Alliance with Family Farmers, Center for Ecoliteracy, Davis Joint Unified School District, Winters Joint Unified School District and the UC Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program. While these organizations provide capacity to carry out this work, the long-term leadership for accomplishing and institutionalizing the goals of the program has come from parents, teachers, farmers, youth, food services staff and children.

With a year round growing season, California is blessed with fresh produce throughout the year. As of 2004, there are about 30 school districts operating farm to school programs in the state. Most programs in California use the salad bar model (with or without the hot entrée option) to include farm fresh fruits and vegetables in the school lunch program With support from the W.K.Kellogg Foundation, the California Farm to School Program is working towards establishing systems to ease out the barriers to developing farm to school programs in schools. In particular, the program is working to:ul>

Research and develop models for marketing and delivery mechanisms for family farmers to sell to school districts in California which meet the needs of both the school district and the farmer.

Develop a viable business plan to assist school districts in the transition to farm-to-school meal programs. Check out Rethinking School Lunch at http://www.ecoliteracy.org/

Provide farm-to-school technical assistance to farmers, school food service staff, educators, community organizers, and others around California. Two farm to school workshops have been conducted in 2003 and more are planned for 2004-05. Check this website for more information on upcoming workshops.

Develop farm to school related state, local, and district food policies in collaboration with other groups in California. See http://www.foodsecurity.org/california/index.html for details.

Further develop model pilot programs in Davis and Winters school districts, with a system that supports the marketing, procurement and serving of locally grown fruits, vegetables, nuts, and legumes in school meals. The Davis and Winters programs serve as Demonstration Sites for the California program, hosting site visits for interested food service directors and organizers, and conducting outreach about the program. Starting October 2004, Compton Unified School District began to serve as a Farm to School Demonstration Site as well.