Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project

ASAPs Growing Minds program connects education, health, and wellness programming with local agriculture. This program provides support and resources in order to create healthy food environments and experiences to better the health of all members of our community, including children, their parents, teachers, and school staff. The program provides workshops and other training to educators so that they can integrate local food, healthy eating, and farm-based activities into their work. Implementation is supported through tools, resources, materials, and funds distributed to teachers and community health professionals across the region. This helps to facilitate the creation/maintenance of school gardens, provide cooking demonstrations, support local procurement for classrooms and cafeterias, or take farm field trips. The program facilitates positive local food and farm experiences for thousands of children throughout our service region. Dietetic Interns from partner colleges and universities are trained to implement farm-to- school activities in their future professions. ASAP continued the Growing Minds @ Community Colleges to embed farm to preschool into NC Community College early childhood education programs. Growing Minds co-facilitates the NC Farm to Preschool Network and serves on the advisory committee for the Farm to School Coalition of North Carolina.