Hot off the press!
The Michigan Department of Education (MDE) released its 2017-2018 Legislative Report on the 10 Cents a Meal for School Kids & Farms pilot program on Tuesday, March 20.
10 Cents a Meal provides grant-winning school districts with up to 10 Cents a Meal in matching funds to purchase locally grown fruits, vegetables, and dry beans.
- The report is also available for download at tencentsmichigan.org on the home page and on its Tools for Communities page.
- The same content, slightly re-designed for use as five stand-alone hand-outs, also is available on the Tools for Communities page.
- To print the full pages of the reports or hand-outs (and not clip off a tiny portion of the map on the bottom) select “print to fit” for in-house printers.
Please share widely! The report includes loads of fun quotes from food service directors, farmers, and kids, along with data showing the impact that Michigan’s investment in local food for school meals is having.
Our state, schools, Michigan farmers, and other local food businesses are making a difference for our kids and our economy.
Also, please like, share and follow the 10 Cents Facebook page — and if you post about 10 Cents or Michigan farm to school, don’t forget to tag @TenCentsMichigan.
Diane Conners is senior policy specialist at Groundwork Center for Resilient Communities. Groundwork edited the 10 Cents report and conducted stakeholder interviews with farmers and nearly all of the 32 grant-winning school districts in the 10 Cents a Meal program.
The report includes quotes from those stakeholder interviews and food service director responses to monthly surveys conducted by the MSU Center for Regional Food Systems in collaboration with MDE. FarmLogix provided receipt data. Public Sector Consultants provided lunch data from an evaluation pilot. 10 Cents grantees provided numerous taste test results and photographs.
