Regional News
What’s happening with Farm to School in our region? See below for the latest in Farm to School activities, ideas, programs, and important news for our region.
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Let’s help the schools make better food choices for our kids
Post Date: Wednesday, February 11th, 2009Wednesday, February 11, 2009
By Denise Miller
Of the Journal
Mornings are hectic at my house. The kids are eating breakfast, coffee is brewing, my middle-school daughter is preparing her lunch, and I’m usually tripping over someone to make lunch for the boys.
My kids rarely buy lunch, so I am lucky enough to know most of what they will eat each day. Lunches aren’t fancy — lots of peanut butter, local raspberry jam, whole grain bread, sliced turkey, carrots, apples and dinner leftovers.
But in New Mexico, where 218,000 children are eligible for free or reduced-price lunch, sending a brown bag isn’t always an option, according to the fiscal impact statement for the Senate bill SB107 seeking $1.44 million for more produce for school lunches.
The challenge for school food-service directors is to provide a balanced meal when, after expenses, they are left with $1 per meal, and 30 cents of that is spent on milk, according to the fiscal report on SB107.
New Mexico, like most other states, doesn’t spend a penny on school lunch, according to Mary Ann McCann, school nutrition coordinator for Taos Municipal Schools, and Corrine Lovato, retired state director of school nutrition. State budget allocations only assist with school breakfast.
In 2007, $85,000 was set aside under the Valley Cluster program to give 6,000 Albuquerque Public Schools students two more servings of fruits and vegetables — locally grown when available.
Eight school districts are serving New Mexico-grown produce to 165,000 children statewide, according to the fiscal impact report for a bill before the House of Representatives to fund an increase in the amount of state produce in schools.
The proposed program would more than double that existing fruit and vegetable provision.
Mind-numbing statistics about obesity in today’s youths and the related health risks of diabetes and heart disease are easy to find. More fruits and vegetables can help combat the potential health epidemic our country may face.
Worried about our cash-strapped economy? Remember the current economic costs of health care related to obesity and diabetes in New Mexico are estimated to be $324 million and $876 million, respectively, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and the American Diabetes Association.
Rep. Rhonda King, D-Santa Fe, introduced HB386 seeking $3.3 million to buy New Mexico grown fruits and vegetables for school lunches. A second, similar House bill also has been introduced.
Sen. Pete Campos, D-Las Vegas, is sponsoring a similar bill, SB107, seeking $1.44 million.
An interim committee of Health and Human Services has designated the issue a priority. The New Mexico Department of Agriculture has supported farm-to-school programs for years.
We all know it’s going to be a tough year or two at the Legislature.
But when it comes to the health of our kids and our economy, perhaps the real question is whether we can afford not to fund the bill.
So here’s a recipe for a healthy school lunch:
~ One dedicated cadre of school food-service personnel;
~ One committed partner at the New Mexico Department of Agriculture;
~ One large helping of New Mexico farmers eager to have their produce consumed by school kids;
~ An informed, vocal public that tells legislators they want them to support the bills to add New Mexico produce to school lunches;
~ A passing vote on the bills at the Legislature and the governor’s signature.
We have most ingredients. With everyone’s support, we will have all of them. The value of this recipe is priceless.
Topics: Education, Health and Nutrition, Partners & Other Links, Regional News |
Healthy School Report Card Announced
Post Date: Wednesday, September 17th, 2008For Immediate Release
Contact: Beverly Friedman
September 8, 2008
(505) 795-0180
Governor Bill Richardson and Education Secretary Veronica García Announce Statewide Healthy School Report Card
SANTA FE- Governor Bill Richardson and New Mexico Education Secretary Veronica García today announced plans for a statewide report card that will measure how New Mexico’s public schools are responding to increasingly alarming child health issues.
“We’ve eliminated junk food from our schools, increased physical education and doubled the number of school based health centers,”
Governor Bill Richardson said. “This report card will help us track our progress in ensuring that New Mexico’s students are healthy and ready to learn.”
This school year, 67 schools across the state, including all Santa Fe public schools, will use the Healthy School Report Card developed by the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. It will measure each school’s efforts to promote physical activity, provide nutritious foods and encourage family involvement in the health and education of their children.
All New Mexico public schools will begin using the report card within the next three years. Each school’s data will contribute to the statewide report card.
Research shows direct links between student health and academic progress. About a quarter of New Mexico students are considered overweight or obese and increasing percentages are suffering from preventable diseases, such as type two diabetes, caused by poor nutrition and sedentary lifestyles. The problem is worse among the state’s Hispanic and Native American students.
“In New Mexico we know that healthy students make better learners, which is why Governor Richardson has placed a focus on the whole child in New Mexico’s school reform efforts,” said Secretary Veronica García.
“The Healthy School Report Card will provide our schools with a cost-effective planning tool in order to affect positive change, determine policies, and establish programs at the local level.”
In addition, the report card will help districts and schools meet the state’s wellness policy mandate, which requires school health advisory councils to provide twice-yearly data-based recommendations for improving student health.
“We need a community approach to address rising rates of obesity among our students,” said Health Secretary Dr. Alfredo Vigil. “Getting schools more involved in promoting healthy lifestyles is an essential key to helping youth develop patterns now that will carry with them through adulthood.”
Des Moines Municipal School in Des Moines, New Mexico is one of 11 school and district sites from across the United States and Canada that have been using the HSRC to involve their communities in improving student health and academic performance as part of a pilot study. The school opened a school-based health center last August that provides physical, dental, and mental health care for students, staff, and the surrounding communities.
“The work at Des Moines Municipal School epitomizes community collaboration to ensure all children are healthy, safe, engaged, supported, and challenged,” said Gene Carter, Executive Director of the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. “I admire and applaud Governor Richardson and Secretary Garcia’s commitment to providing resources so that all New Mexico schools can work with their communities to address a critical - but often overlooked - element of academic achievement.”
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Topics: Education, Health and Nutrition, Regional News |
Chef’s tips help students enjoy healthful snacks: Paradise Valley school cart is big hit in lunch room
Post Date: Thursday, June 5th, 2008The Tribune, Mesa, Ariz. May 19, 2008
May 19–Renowned Valley chef and restaurateur Eddie Matney was joking with the lunch crowd he served Friday, addressing most customers by name as he handed out fruit and vegetable kabobs and low-fat cookies.
And it’s a good thing he knew them, too, because the students shopping at Chef Eddie’s Snack Wagon in the Cherokee Elementary School cafeteria are also his son’s classmates at the school in Paradise Valley.
Even though Matney sometimes comes in to see the students and help serve, the local television personality doesn’t claim this is his venture.
The idea for the snack cart came from Sue Bettenhausen, the Scottsdale Unified School District’s food services director, as a way to encourage kids to eat healthful snacks while reducing the wait time in the lunch line.
“The entire trend is once they get out of the meal line, anyone who is interested in additional items can go to the snack table,” Bettenhausen said. “We’re not encouraging kids to eat a fruit stick first before their entrees.”
It was an accident that Matney got involved at all.
Bettenhausen wrote a letter home to parents explaining the benefits of the a la carte options coming to campus. Matney saw the e-mail message and responded, asking if he could help.
So Matney came in and met with the schools’ fourthand fifth-graders, asking what kind of food they’d want. He took those requests and made some sample dishes for Bettenhausen’s staff to look at, who weighed those and other options as they developed the menu.
Matney said the students’ top request was roasted salmon. While that hasn’t made it on the menu — at least, not yet — there are several other healthy options, like fruit with yogurt dips and salads.
Matney hopes that giving students healthy food options will encourage them to keep making healthy choices, even outside the Cherokee cafeteria.
“It’s awesome that the kids say they want hummus and pita chips,” Matney said. “They can’t keep edamame (a soybean concoction) in this place.”
The food cart has proved popular so far. Cafeteria staff said it brought in about $370 its first day of operation and generally attracts between 320 and 350 of the school’s approximately 550 students daily. The upscale snacks go for 50 cents to $2 apiece.
And this is just a pilot project — Bettenhausen wants to replicate the carts at other elementary schools starting this fall.
“I’d like to see two more starting at the beginning of the (school) year,” she said. “We weren’t even sure it was going to be successful, but now it is.”
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Copyright (c) 2008, The Tribune, Mesa, Ariz.
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Topics: Education, Regional News |
Healthy Kids State, Local Partners Kick Off Healthy Kids Initiative in Las Cruces
Post Date: Tuesday, April 15th, 2008Department of Health Leads Obesity Prevention Project
(Las Cruces) – Students at Conlee Elementary School today walked to school, ate a healthy breakfast in their classroom, attended healthy cooking and tasting demonstrations and participated in physical education. The specially scheduled activities were a part of a kickoff celebration and represent the vision of Healthy Kids – Las Cruces a community wide obesity prevention project in Las Cruces.
Health Secretary Dr. Alfredo Vigil joined the city of Las Cruces, Las Cruces Public Schools and several state government departments today to launch the obesity prevention pilot project in Las Cruces. Healthy Kids – Las Cruces connects and enhances community efforts to motivate children, teenagers and families to eat healthier and be more physically active.
As a part of the project, the Department of Health has hired a dietician and physical activity specialist in Las Cruces to provide individual and group counseling for people who are obese. “We are concerned about the rising rates of obesity in New Mexico and how that negatively affects people’s health,” Dr Vigil said. “This project is a tremendous effort by state partners and community leaders who embrace our vision of helping children lead healthier lives.”
The Department of Health is leading the pilot project. Stakeholders representing local and state government, education, health care, social services, agriculture, nonprofit organizations,foundations and businesses worked with the Department of Health to develop a five year vision,goals and action plans for the initiative. “This program will be extremely beneficial to our children, considering the fact that studies have shown if we don’t do something now, in 20 years one out of two children will be obese,” said Las Cruces Mayor Ken Miyagishima.
Healthy Kids – Las Cruces Goals include:
· Create a Safe Routes to School Program for all public elementary schools in Las Cruces by 2013.
· Increase opportunities for elementary students to participate in daily physical activity, learn about nutrition, healthy cooking and how to make healthy food choices.
· Increase availability of affordable and healthy food in restaurants, grocery stores and schools, especially for families with low incomes.
· Increase opportunities for patients to receive health care obesity prevention services.
· Conduct a public awareness campaign that motivates children and families to reduce the amount of soda and high sugar beverages they drink, eat more fruits and vegetables, be more physically active and not watch television as much.
· Create an interactive website that provides information to motivate families to lead healthy lifestyles.
“A child’s health has a direct relationship to his or her educational success,” said Stan Rounds, superintendent of Las Cruces Public Schools. “Healthy students learn better and, more importantly, they learn about nutrition and physical activities that will be used throughout their lifetimes. As the flagship school in this initiative, Conlee Elementary will lead the way in proving that healthy living is possible for children and families of all socioeconomic backgrounds.”
The eight state departments involved in the pilot project hosted healthy events for children and families in Las Cruces this week. Activities included healthy home cooking demonstration classes for clients at the New Mexico Human Services Department’s Income Support Division Office and field trips to Leesburg Dam State Park and Mesilla Valley Bosque State Park, part of the New Mexico State Park’s “Outdoor Classroom” initiative that promotes nature, physical activity and recreation.
“This partnership project will truly benefit New Mexico’s lower income families,” said Pamela Hyde, Human Services Department Secretary. “The healthy home cooking demonstration classes will show families served by the Human Services Department how to use their benefits to make healthier meals and lead healthier lives.”
Healthy Kids – Las Cruces is funded by a grant from the National Governor’s Association and supported by the New Mexico departments of Health, Human Services, Public Education, Aging and Longterm
Services, Children, Youth and Families, Agriculture, Parks and Transportation. Local partners are: city of Las Cruces, Las Cruces Public Schools, Doña Ana Cooperative Extension, New Mexico State University, Las Cruces Metropolitan Planning Organization, Envision New Mexico, Farm to Table, New Mexico Food and Agriculture Policy Council, New Mexico American Heart Association, New Mexico Healthier Weight Council, Rio Grande Medical Group, Retired Senior Volunteer Program, New Mexico Ag in the Classroom, Families and Youth, Inc., Con Alma Health Foundation, La Clinica de Familia, Inc. and Healthy U Magazine.
At CYFD we work very hard to make sure our children are safe and healthy,” said CYFD Cabinet Secretary Dorian Dodson. “That’s why we’re excited to be introducing the Color me Healthy curriculum into child care centers beginning in May. The idea behind the program was to introduce children at an early age to new types of nutritious foods and to help them explore opportunities for physical activity that will become a habit for life. That is precisely the point of Healthy Kids – Las Cruces.”
Topics: Regional News |