DENVER — Schools across the state are celebrating Colorado Proud School Meal Day Tuesday, Oct. 1. Colorado ranches, farms and gardens are in the spotlight and on the menu at over 300 schools, serving around 170,000 students. It’s a day to educate students on where their food comes from, by serving locally grown and sourced produce, grains and animal proteins.
Denver Public Schools is participating and Denver7 got a chance to visit Ashley Elementary School as the kitchen staff prepared for lunch. All the produce being served is local — the sausage is provided by a Denver company and the potatoes were harvested from state soil.
“All the fruits and vegetables are from Colorado. The melons are from our urban farms we have at Denver Public Schools. We have farm fresh apples, cherry tomatoes and we’re excited about the romaine lettuce as well,” Registered Dietician and Community Outreach and Engagement Regional Coordinator for DPS Food and Nutrition Lindsey Long, said.
Long helps DPS create balanced and healthy menus across the district all year long. She told us, DPS puts an emphasis on serving local, whenever they can.
"Agribusinesses contribute $47 billion to the state economy annually and provide more than 195,000 jobs. With more than 38,000 farms and ranches encompassing 31 million acres, it is easy to understand the value this industry adds to Colorado,” the Colorado Department of Agriculture reports.
Long is also grateful for the educational opportunity that a day like this provides. She is a mom of two and said, “When I go walking through the grocery store with them, often times, even as a dietician, my children don’t realize the apple in the store comes from a tree.”
At Ashley Elementary, students can tend to a community school garden, planting and harvesting the fruits of their labor throughout the season.
“One of the things I’m really excited about that we did this year was partner with SustainED farms, and all through the month of September we’ve been providing the kids with garden specific nutrition so they understand that the tomato in the store grew from the ground,” Long said.
Matt Suprunowicz is the founder and executive director of SustainED Farms and a DPS teacher.
"We partner with 40 Denver Public Schools and we provide programming for students about sustainability, about nutrition, and we use the garden as the tool to teach,” Suprunowicz said.
He said the programming has been well received. Students at schools like Ashley Elementary are hands-on learning about gardening, the economic impacts of agriculture, and families who may be food insecure or live within food deserts can also benefit from the garden.
“Recently, we’ve been partnering with Denver Food and Nutrition Services, so that our programming features some of the food that’s going into cafeterias,” Suprunowicz said.