Meeting: MONDAY, July 20,2009

7-9pm at the MAREC Building in Muskegon.

PRESENT: Gordy Alderink (GVSU), Diane Miller, Ken Freestone(West Michigan Strategic Alliance), Cynthia Price (Grand Rapids Food Systems Council), Kellie Gale-Butto, Tony Gale-Butto, Mindy Grant (Chartwell), Terrie Hampel, Spencer Norman, Doris Rucks, Ellie Dennis, David R. Hill (Principal, Grand Rapids Child Discovery Center) Floyd Cook, Jr., Mike Gavin (Gavin's Orchards), Chris Bedford.

We met to discuss what we will do on September 21, 2009 -- Healthy Local Food in School Day. We began by acknowledging our limitations and parameters. 

1. We had no budget to purchase local food for any meals that day.

2. Legal questions of liability would prevent us from bringing food in from outside in a systemic way.

3. Whatever we do, we want it to reach as many children as possible in Muskegon County.

Mindy Grant from Chartwell reported that they were going to bring seven foods (apples, celery, blueberries, sweet corn, green peppers, cabbage, potatoes) , purchased locally, in the six Muskegon County School Districts they operate the food system in. (Muskegon, Muskegon Heights, Ravenna, Holton, Orchard View, Mona Shores).

The group made a major decision to focus on the POSITIVE message of 100% local organic food. Instead of talking about prevention of disease, we have decided to focus our campaign on how food can improve performance. Spencer Norman suggested the line EAT4MEAP as one idea for our September 21, 2009 event. 

Doug Wood reminded us how much of the school's energy is focused, early in the year, on MEAP (Michigan Educational Assessment Program) that tests children early in the fall (October). Teachers, administrators, and students are focused on the testing as school begins. The group decided that connecting our goals to MEAP would help us reach into the entire educational establishment on September 21st.

Discussion continued with Floyd Cook suggestion that we expand our food-for-performance idea to all aspects of the school experience -- sports, arts, academics, etc.  We decided to elicit ideas for how we can use this good-food/good-performance theme from teachers and administrators in our September 21, 2009 outreach. 

Doris Rucks pointed out that we can't produce the same message for all student age groups. After discussion, we decided to focus on Muskegon County Middle School students (Grades 6-8). We also decided to solicit ideas and involvement from these students as well.

We decided to meet on Monday, July 27, 2009 to discuss the content of our outreach.