With funding from the 2024 USDA Patrick Leahy Farm to School Grant, Feed Our Future is piloting a youth ambassador program for students in middle school. The goal of the project is to give students a chance to have their voices heard in conversations about school meals. Students in 6-8th grade at Crestwood Intermediate School, Crestwood High School, and Marion C. Seltzer (Cleveland Metropolitan School District) have been involved in the planning and creation of the program. We spent the 2024-2025 school year, creating the program with feedback from students. Collecting student feedback was crucial in order to ensure the program was designed for students. Through shared decision-making students, school administration and Feed Our Future staff created the program from the ground up.
Next school year, students will be tasked with being advocate’s and leaders among their peers and to bring in more tasty, healthy and local food into their school meals. Students will make an impact by:
- Helping to add more fresh, local food to your cafeteria menu
- Learning about food & where it comes from with local experts.
- Leading school-wide change and inspire your classmates.
- Sharing the mission with stickers and other cool swag.
During the 2024-2025 school year, students were engaged throughout the year to create the program. In the fall, focus groups were held with students that expressed interest in making their school meals healthier. Recruitment for the focus groups included a presentation with all 5-8th graders in each school district about being a farm to school youth ambassador. Students were then able to sign up for a focus group session. The focus groups helped us understand how to make the program FOR students, WITH students. During this time, we asked students a number of exploratory questions to understand their perspectives on healthy eating, school meals and starting a youth ambassador program.
Some of the questions included:
- When you think of a “healthy lunch,” what three things appear on your plate?
- If you were in charge of creating the program, what would be most important?
- What would you like best about being a student ambassador?
- What kind of farm to school activities would you like to see in your school?
- Why is it important to you to make school meals healthier?
- Imagine it’s a year from starting the club. What positive changes have you made in your cafeteria?
After collecting student feedback, we began the next phase of creating the program. In partnership with Muse Content Group (MCG), we utilized the feedback and insights from students to create the name, logo and branding for the program. Based on student feedback, we created a survey of different name options. The students involved in the focus groups then voted on their favorite name for the program. And thus- the Food Leaders Alliance (FLA) was born!
Next up: The Food Leaders Alliance logo. Student’s gave initial comments and image mockups for a logo for the program. MCG created different versions of the FLA logo and students from each school joined a partner meeting with MCG to give their feedback on the logo options. MCG, then took the feedback from students and created final logo options. The final logo that students voted on is reflected in the photo above.
In the spring, recruitment for the FLA started at Crestwood Intermediate Schools, Crestwood High School and Marion C. Seltzer. A total of 85 students signed up to be Food Leaders among the three schools. At the end of the school year, we met with all the Food Leaders to discuss ideas for next school year. We can’t wait to work with these amazing leaders in bringing healthier, local and tasty food into their school meals. Stay tuned for all the excited news and changes that Food Leaders make in their cafeterias.
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