Summer Meal Kits in Full Swing Across Windham County

It’s been a busy summer in Windham County, and there’s still a month to go! Across the region, teams from Windham Northeast Supervisory Union (WNESU), Windham Southeast Supervisory Union (WSESU), and West River Education District (WRED) have been hard at work assembling and distributing free summer meal kits for kids and teens.

These kits have included products from local producers like Cabot Creamery, Miller Farm, Vermont Bean Crafters, Mi Terra Tortilla, All Souls Tortilla, and The Bread Shed. These kits represent community effort rooted in local support.

It’s not too late to participate. Meal kits are still available for children and teens up to age 18 throughout August. Each district has its own schedule and pick-up locations, so be sure to check with your school or supervisory union for the most up-to-date details.

Here’s where you can still pick up free meal kits this summer:

Bellows Falls Union High School (WNESU)
 Wednesdays, 1:00–3:30 PM

Brattleboro Union High School (WSESU)
 Thursdays, 12:00–3:00 PM

Leland & Gray or Jamaica Elementary (WRED)
 Thursdays, 12:00–3:00 PM

A heartfelt thank-you to the school food service teams, community volunteers, and local producers who continue to make this program possible. This work ensures that every child in our communities has access to nutritious meals this summer. We believe that is something worth celebrating!

Bellow Falls Union High School staff attend Northeast Farm to School Institute

In June 2025, a team from Bellows Falls Union High School, including staff and a local community member, attended the Northeast Farm to School Institute (NFTSI) kickoff event at Shelburne Farms in Vermont. 

Photo courtesy of Shelburne Farms

This marks the beginning of a year-long professional development journey to expand what the school offers to its students and local community.

Organized by Vermont FEED, the Northeast Farm to School Institute brings together educators, food service professionals, school administrators, and community advocates. Through dynamic speakers, interactive workshops, and tailored coaching, the program helps teams build effective, sustainable Farm to School programs that benefit students, schools, and local communities.

The Bellows Falls team is enthusiastic about bringing fresh, engaging experiences to their students in the coming school year. Their vision includes integrating Farm to School concepts with the Vermont Harvest of the Month program—a statewide initiative that highlights seasonal, locally available foods each month through recipes, posters, and classroom resources.

“Farm to School is about helping students make meaningful connections between what they eat and how it affects their health, the environment, and their local economy,” said one team member. “It’s education that goes beyond the classroom.”

During the four-day kickoff event, the team participated in a wide range of sessions.  Workshop offerings included curriculum planning, planning school gardens, student-centered taste tests, composting and recycling in schools, cooking with students, and even creative arts like printmaking with natural dyes.

Photo courtesy of Shelburne Farms

As the new school year approaches, the Bellows Falls team is ready to continue the work. They are committed to making the effort a collaborative one—welcoming students, staff, and community members to be part of the conversation and the hands-on work of building a thriving Farm to School culture.

With this foundation laid, Bellows Falls Union High School is poised to not only enhance student learning but also strengthen ties between the school and the local food system.

Attendees of the Northeast Farm to School Institute. Photo courtesy of Shelburne Farms

Written by: Adelaide Petrov-Yoo

From Garden to Storefront: BUHS Launches a Hands-On Culinary Program

Brattleboro Union High School is launching a new initiative that combines career readiness, academic credits, and community service. The pilot program, called CAVE Kitchen (Culinary Agriculture Vocational Education), offers students a therapeutic work environment while they learn both soft and hard employment skills. 

Unlike traditional classroom settings, CAVE Kitchen allows students to earn academic credit while working in a commercial-grade kitchen and operating a storefront. 

Last week, students led a tour of the facilities, which include a flourishing kitchen garden, a fully equipped commercial kitchen, and a campus storefront named The Daily Bear. The atmosphere was professional: students were familiar with the kitchen, moving with purpose, chopping garlic scapes, loading industrial dishwashers, and preparing home-made snacks like chocolate zucchini snack cakes. 

Beyond cooking, the program immerses students in the full scope of food service. Students handle everything from menu planning and knife skills to ordering supplies and maintaining a clean work environment. Students also help grow and harvest produce in the garden, giving them a seed-to-sale understanding of food systems.

Importantly, CAVE Kitchen builds technical skills and a place to learn and practice soft skills crucial to long-term employment success; professional communication, teamwork, punctuality, and problem-solving.

A student-run store, The Daily Bear, will be open to the 45 businesses located on the Winston Prouty campus, as well as to the general public. It will offer grab-and-go meals, providing a convenient, on-site food option, and valuable business experience for students.

Winston Prouty “campus tenants…are impressed by the garden and are enthusiastic about the prospect of being able to pick up a drink and snack right on campus someday soon,” says Emily Webb, campus director of Winston Prouty Center. 

Chloe Learey, executive director of Winston Prouty Center, said she is “inspired by The Daily Bear. It is a great example of what we hope to accomplish on the Prouty campus, offering space for creative, innovative opportunities that help strengthen and connect our whole community.” 

This project is a part of a four-year University of Vermont Extension 4-H grant called Youth Innovators Empowering Agriculture across America (YEA), funded by the USDA.  There are four other projects in New England funded by this grant, all focusing on improving access to 4-H experiential learning opportunities. 

Unlike many grant-funded programs that vanish when funding ends, CAVE Kitchen is built for sustainability. Proceeds from The Daily Bear will be reinvested to support the continuation of the program.

CAVE Kitchen’s value goes beyond being just a culinary class, it’s also a therapeutic, empowering environment that prepares students for real-world employment, while building confidence and life skills. With built-in sustainability and strong community ties, this program could become a model for other school districts seeking creative, meaningful ways to prepare students for life after graduation while also meeting students where they are.

Read more about the program in the Brattleboro Reformer’s July 25th, 2025 article on the student’s successes. 


Written by: Adelaide Petrov-Yoo

Growing Together: a Farm to School Community of Practice

A seed was planted in the fall of 2024 by Mandy Walsh, school librarian and experienced Farm to School (FTS) educator at Westminster Center School. She put forward the idea to strengthen the community of educators in southern Vermont who are working towards Educating for Sustainability and strengthening Farm to School education in their schools. 

Food Connects staff, with support from a grant from the Vermont Agency of Education and the Vermont Farm to School and Early Childhood Network, were able to nurture that seed through a 6-month Community of Practice group for educators, and the harvest has arrived! 

Here’s a summary of the growth of this inspiring peer-to-peer professional development program.

After several planning sessions between Mandy, Jody Hauser (school librarian and FTS champion at Central Elementary School in Bellows Falls), Kris Nelson (FTS Program Director at Food Connects) and Sheila Humphreys (FTS Lead Coach at Food Connects), we launched the 6 month discussion series in January 2025. 

Over the past 6 months, 12 local educators from 3 different school districts have participated in these monthly discussions.  Topics, chosen by the educators themselves, and included:

The Community of Practice Model allowed the group to engage in the process of collective learning about a topic that inspires all of them. By sharing their knowledge and experiences with each other, asking questions, and inviting guest presenters to speak to the group on specific topics, all participants benefited from the opportunity to improve their teaching practices. They also were able to strengthen relationships with like-minded educators in neighboring districts and create a shared repertoire of resources.

In addition to curriculum connections, this group of educators also discussed ways to increase family engagement in their programs, from harvest dinners to community work days to school based farmer’s markets. They discussed problems with school composting systems, and brainstormed solutions to better educate their school communities about composting, including working in partnership with Windham Solid Waste Management District’s Education Coordinator, Alex Lacy and doing hands on composting initiatives like vermiculture in classrooms and onsite composting for garden waste.

They explored ways to connect the vibrant Vermont Harvest of the Month Program, which is a great entry point for new schools that are just beginning their Farm to School programs as well as a lasting resource for thriving FTS programs, into EL curriculum and explored best practices for taste tests in schools.

The last 2 sessions were held in-person, on-site, in school gardens at Westminster Center School and Academy School.

We look forward to watching how this inspiring community of educators continues to grow and blossom over time!

Student Power on Full Display at the 2025 FEAST Conference

When was the last time a teenager planned something for you? Was it a meal? A vacation? It can be hard for adults to hold back the “helpful suggestions” or comments when supervising a student project. However, when we stand back and let youth lead, the results can blow you away. This month, I had the pleasure of being an adult participant at a youth-led conference, stepping back to witness Vermont students shine. 

In 2025, for the third year in a row, five students from across Vermont met online every Monday for months to plan a youth-organized conference with keynote speakers and workshops. 

The result was the third annual FEAST conference (Food Education And Sustainable Thinking), hosted at American Flatbread at Lareau Farms in Waitsfield, VT. This annual event is a program of the Vermont Farm to School and Early Childhood Education Network and made possible thanks to generous donations and funders of the Network.

 It was planned and hosted by five students from high schools across Vermont: Champlain Valley Union High School in Hinesburg, Harwood Union High School in Duxbury, Leland and Gray High School in Townshend, and Middlebury Union High School. 

Video of 2024 FEAST activities

This year the student leaders chose to invite a keynote speaker from Migrant Justice, a local Vermont organization advocating for workers’ rights in Vermont. 

FEAST’s youth planners identified and invited collaboration with an important ally, Migrant Justice, connecting our students to real-life experiences in Vermont’s farms and food systems. Migrant Justice connects community members with farm workers. 

Enrique Balcazar spoke about his experience working on dairy farms in Vermont. For any students wondering “what do I do?” or “how do I help?” to strengthen our local food system, Enrique shared the steps that his organization took when fighting for Milk With Dignity, to demonstrate how to build support from within a community and also how to persist with one’s goals even when there are setbacks..

In the case of the Milk With Dignity campaign, first Migrant Justice made agreements with farm owners who would promise to protect good working conditions for their employees. They then contacted Ben and Jerry’s to ask that they only buy from farmers who were proven to respect workers rights. Finally, when Ben and Jerry’s wasn’t interested, they rallied, collected signatures, and gained support until Ben and Jerry’s changed their mind. Now Migrant Justice is asking Hannafords to join the Milk With Dignity program and rallying support for this movement.

After the keynote, attendees joined student-run workshops. 

These workshops were planned and run by students! Many of these workshops featured hands-on activities and take home projects, like succulents, mushroom grow-kits, and letters to state representatives. 2025’s workshops were:

  • Food Systems of the Future & Mushrooms by Pacem School 

  • Legislative Advocacy by Harwood Union High School Youth Lobby

  • Creamery Considerations & Cheese Tasting by North Country Career Center

  • Micro-goat Dairy Farming by White River Valley High School 

  • AI, Climate Change, and Water Usage by Champlain Valley Union High School Sustainability Club

  • Sustainable Practices in Maple Sugaring by Harwood Union High School

  • Farm Tour and Work by Lareau Farm 

  • Tortilla-making from Scratch by Montpelier High School 

There were also two workshops for adults. These helped create youth spaces free from adult oversight, while simultaneously providing engaging workshops for the supporting adults. Those workshops were: 

  • “Community Based Learning for High School students” by Jessa Harger, Leland and Gray High School

  • “Felting 101” by Elyse Perambo, Green Mountain Farm to School

As a closing activity, students made seed-bombs and took home free seeds. It was lovely to see students motivated, excited, and happy. Many look forward to joining again next year. If you are interested in being part of the planning committee for FEAST 2026, email adelaide@foodconnects.org.

Sunny Side Up: NewBrook’s Farm & Field Day Delights

The sky was blue and spirits were high at NewBrook Elementary’s annual Farm & Field Day: a joyful celebration of hands-on learning, community connection, and all things Farm to School. Students roared through a vibrant rotation of activities in multi-age teams proudly named Kale, Squash, Carrot, and more.

Each station offered a new way to explore the natural world.

Students raced to sort compost, recycling, and trash in a waste relay with Alex from Windham Solid Waste. Chris guided curious eyes through the many treasures to be foraged and found in the forest, including cool skulls and mushrooms.

Tails wagged and hearts melted as Cindy from Monadnock Therapy Pets introduced students to a friendly therapy dog. Students also met rabbits and their farmers, Seren, Rick, and Cedar of Giant Journey Farm, and learned what it takes to raise animals with care.

Nearby, Shiloh led fiber arts activities and brought along a lovable goat named Vax, who quickly became a crowd favorite. Kids crafted their own environmental pins with Suzanne and Lucia Paugh, pedaled their way to fresh smoothies on the bike blender, and baked up fun in the school’s pizza oven.

At the Harvest of the Month tasting table, hosted by Food Connects, deviled eggs took center stage in celebration of eggs as May’s highlighted crop.

“Cheese” group visits Harvest of the Month table.

Kids eagerly lined up, half for the chance to build their own deviled eggs, half excited to share everything they’d learned about birds, eggs, and even ostriches.

They could hardly contain their excitement, and when it came time for questions, hands shot up:

“Can I eat a robin’s egg?”
“I know how to poach an egg!”
“Sunny side is my favorite!”

But probably the most asked question was:
“Can I have another one?”

One student even asked for a handful of chives, and happily munched them like candy while waiting his turn to crush eggshells for compost, the follow-up activity that demonstrated how to make your own calcium additive for the garden.

At its heart, Farm & Field Day is a celebration of connection. 

It brings together students, families, farmers, educators, and community members to highlight how farm to school programming touches every part of our lives, from the food on our plates to the ecosystems around us.

Devan Monette and Amy Duffy, Newbrook Garden Coordinator

With the sun shining down on us, nothing was more clearly illuminated than the power of food to bring a community together. Whether it’s sharing a slice of wood-fired pizza, learning about the animals that call our neighborhood farms home, or laughing over the smear of yolk on a smiling kid’s nose as they scarf down a deviled egg, food has the power to teach, to heal, and to connect.

NewBrook Elementary celebrates the end of Farm and Field Day by singing the Vermont state song with Principal Scotty Tabachnick.

And at schools like NewBrook, where students get the chance to grow it, cook it, and share it with their classmates, families, and the greater community throughout the year, we witness the kind of education that sticks. It’s the kind of learning that builds confidence, encourages curiosity, and plants the seeds of lifelong wellness.

by Devan Monette

From Lemurs to Leafy Greens, Welcome Tobi Buchman to Oak Grove School

As the heartwarming Pixar film Up reminds us, 'Adventure is out there!', and thanks to new Garden Coordinator Tobi Buchman, it’s coming to the students of Oak Grove Elementary School.

Tobi’s path to Oak Grove School has been anything but conventional. From sailing the Pacific Ocean as a ship's cook to studying lemurs in Madagascar, their life has been filled with wild, wonderful adventures. Now, as Oak Grove School’s new Garden Coordinator, they’re bringing that same sense of curiosity, joy, and spontaneity to the soil.

Tobi looking at newly sprouted plants in the Oak Grove raised beds.

“When I was a kid, I wanted to work with animals.” That desire stuck all the way through college and came up in an unexpected conversation with the university president that led to a surprising opportunity. “He asked me what I wanted to do, and I said I wanted to work with lemurs, maybe in a zoo or in the wild. And he just casually goes, ‘Oh, like my friend Jack Hanna?’” Tobi recalls. “I literally chased him down after class and was like, ‘Wait, do you actually know Jack Hanna?’” A few emails later, Tobi was invited to the Columbus Zoo to meet a childhood hero. 

Post-graduation, their childhood dream became reality when they did fieldwork studying lemurs in Madagascar, tagged fish in the Florida Keys, and spent years aboard educational tall ships: floating classrooms where college students learned about science, navigation, and life at sea.

Today, Tobi is planting more literal roots here in Vermont.

“This is the first time I’ve really felt like I want to get settled somewhere. The garden here is the perfect place to do that. It’s hands-on, creative, and the kids kind of run the show. I love it.”

Tobi sees the garden not just as a space for growing vegetables, but as a living laboratory and playground. Whether it’s cooking spinach with students for taste tests, experimenting with dehydrators to create plant-based pigments for art projects, or planting on the fly with kids racing the clock, every day in the garden is filled with learning and laughter.

One of Tobi’s favorite parts of the garden right now is the Mystery Bulb Bed, an unknown mix of transplanted bulbs inherited from last year’s garden. Instead of tossing them out, Tobi gave them a new home and a name.

“I just started calling it the Mystery Bulb Bed because I had no idea what was going to come up. It could be garlic, onions, flowers, who knows? I think it’s hilarious, and the kids love the surprise. It’s the perfect metaphor for this job: we plant, we wait, and we see what grows.”

Tobi and the “Mystery Bulb Bed”.

From mung beans to mystery bulbs, adorable zucchini leaves to sunflowers that sprouted indoors but not out, the garden under Tobi’s care is a place of delight, discovery, and a little bit of chaos, just the way they like it.

Tobi put it best: “When I was a kid, I just didn’t hear that it was okay to try things and see what would happen, without worrying about messing up. Maybe it wasn’t missing, maybe I just didn’t hear it. But I was always so focused on making sure nothing went wrong. Now, with this job, it’s kind of like my mission to get messy.”

Even though the school year may be drawing to a close, Tobi is excited to deepen the garden’s role in the Oak Grove community. With activities inspired by Harvest of the Month programming they look forward to bringing more science, cooking, and art to students, along with a healthy dose of fun. Whether they’re leading a lesson on plant identification, cooking up scrambled eggs with fresh spinach, or letting kids vote on the cutest leaf, Tobi’s approach is rooted in joy, curiosity, and letting things grow wild.

Written by Elyse Morckel

When Students Become Teachers: A Take-Home Lesson in Nourishment at Academy School

Teaching aims to equip children with the life skills they need to lead successful, healthy, and fulfilling lives. It does this by showing them how; giving them opportunities to practice; and—perhaps most powerfully—inviting them to share what they’ve learned with others.

Often, the most impactful learning happens in this last step, when students step into the role of teacher themselves.

That’s what made a recent project at Academy School so special.

Thanks to a Community Schools Foundation Grant from the Vermont Agency of Education, Lisa Nichols of the Brattleboro Food Co-op, with support from the Food Connects Farm to School team, launched an innovative take-home cooking kit project this spring.

Each student received a packed lunch cooler filled with fresh ingredients and a simple, multilingual recipe—everything they needed to be the chef for their family. The first round featured fruit and cheese skewers, led by Academy's youngest learners. It gave students the chance not only to prepare a healthy snack but to nourish their families and build confidence in the kitchen.

Within each kit contained all the ingredients to create an enriching experience for families– local Cabot cheese, fresh blueberries, apples and oranges all created a window for students to share a little of what they learn in the rich Farm to School programming happening at Academy. More importantly, they provided a hands-on opportunity for students to take the lead, experience food in an empowering way, and develop a deeper sense of ownership over their choices.

At its core, Farm to School is about sparking curiosity and creating space for meaningful exploration in the choices we make around food and the community. When students are invited to cook, taste, test, and share, they build real-world skills and find joy in the process—learning what they like, what they don’t, and what it feels like to care for others through food.

These are some of the strongest motivators of learning because they ignite the passion within the student that draws them to the experiences that best resonate with them.

Cooking with your family is just one example of the many ways Farm to School programming hopes to make this type of real, meaningful learning possible—and Food Connects couldn’t have been prouder to help make it happen.

By Devan Monette

Connecting EL Education & Farm to School

Schools throughout Windham County are implementing a new language arts curriculum called EL Education. At Food Connects, we’re looking for ways to support local educators in linking this curriculum with hands-on food, farm, and nutrition experiences in the garden, classroom and cafeteria. 

What is EL Education?

EL, or Expeditionary Learning, is a language arts-focused curriculum that intersects with other subject areas like science and social studies. It provides a great opportunity to link with current Farm to School (FTS) programming because it, “emphasizes hands-on, experiential learning and the integration of academic content with real-world experiences.”

EL is the curriculum currently being used in Windham Southeast Supervisory Union (WSESU), Windham Northeast Supervisory Union (WNESU), and West River Education District (WRED). From K-8th grade, there are four modules per grade. At the high school level, EL starts with a guiding question, and there are several components, including: classroom expeditions, experts, fieldwork, community engagement, Intensives (3-4 days that are not curricular and are focused on team building), and an authentic product at the end.

How are teachers integrating FTS with EL?

Whether it’s 2nd graders at Academy School reading about India and then working together to make vegetable tikki masala, 3rd graders at Grafton Elementary School learning about overcoming learning challenges and experimenting with seed saving while reading the book Zoe and the Seed Garden, 8th graders at Dummerston School using the EL anchor text The Omnivore’s Dilemma to launch a study the local food system including visits to Bunker Farm and Walker Farm, or high schoolers at Leland and Gray participating in a maple sugaring intensive co-led by Devan Monnette of Food Connects, there are many ways that FTS can enrich the EL curriculum. 

There are even opportunities to link these EL modules to the Big Ideas of Farm to School. Recently, Food Connects facilitated a community of practice group discussion for FTS focused educators in WSESU, WNESU, and WRED interested in digging deeper into the connections between EL and FTS, and Oak Grove School recently worked with Food Connects and Shelburne Farms to create a professional development workshop focused on strengthening the connections between FTS and EL.

How can FTS support EL?

Schools with active FTS programs are well-positioned to integrate with the EL curriculum, because FTS education, with its emphasis on gardening and cooking with students and connecting students to local farms, is inherently experiential, hands-on, and connected to real world experiences. Contact us for more information on making connections like this at your school.

 https://eleducation.org/core-practices

Written by Sheila Humphreys

Sprout Kits Pop Up in Classrooms Across Vermont

Teachers returning from April Break found a special delivery at their doorsteps: Sprout Kits! These kits contain a bucket of soil, seeds, tin trays, and instructions for sprouting your own edible pea and sunflower shoots.

Check out what teachers across Vermont are saying, along with some fun photos!

“The Kindergartners in my class LOVED using the sprouting kits. It really brought to life our science study of living vs. nonliving things, and it was a tasty snack that was enjoyed by all. Thank you Food Connects!”

- Amelia Fontein, Kindergarten Teacher, Academy School

“These photos are from Union Street School, Springfield's garden club. The students loved their sprout kits. I heard lots of exclamations of, "They are growing!!!!". I included a picture of our courtyard where we also have garden beds that we are working on. Thanks for the lovely opportunity.”

-Jan Rounds, School Counselor, Union Street School 

“We enjoyed planting our seeds today--we are turning them into gifts for Mother's Day, and the kids couldn't have been more excited to plant their seeds, pat down the dirt, and are ready to watch the seeds grow!”

-Jennifer Dodge, 2nd Grade Teacher, Elm Hill School

Elm Hill Sprout Kits

We were able to offer these kits for free thanks to the generosity of several local businesses. Browne & Roberts Ace Hardware, Coast of Maine, and Blue Seal donated soil, while Tito’s contributed 2,000 takeout trays—and, yes, that’s why the kits might remind you of burritos! New Chapter’s generous donation helped cover the cost of supplies that weren’t donated, like seeds.

A huge thank you to Retreat Farm for letting us use their space to assemble the kits, and an extra shoutout to Retreat Farm staff members Laura and Amy for jumping in to help put them together. This community project was only possible because of the amazing support from our local partners.