Day 76: Project Lean and Green Kids

     Today I started to once again going through my stash of pamphlets, movies, and newsletters I accumulated at the Animal Rights Conference that I attended on day 53. After sorting through the huge pile I picked out a flyer titled "Project Lean and Green Kids".

     This organization focuses on working towards better nutrition education, healthier school meals, and green food policies in many schools across the country. Those of you who have children know that you want them to grow up healthy an accumulate good eating habits, but often our public schools are feeding your children loads of junk food and teaching them unhealthy eating habits which will impact their adult life. If any of you watched last season of Jamie Oliver's Food Revolution you got a chance to see first hand what the Los Angeles public school district was feeding their children and how it affected them.

     The Project Lean and Green Kids provide teachers with lesson plan material for various types of classes that can be easily put in the curriculum. For those of you that are not teachers there are many other things you can do to help.

How you can help:

1) Call or write the Nutrition Director and Superintendent of your child's school district, and ask them to incorporate more plant based vegetarian meals into the school lunch menu.

         - If you live in California, Hawaii, New York, or Florida make sure to check out the state's veg lunch legislation in those states.

2) Work with your school district wellness committee to amend the district's "Wellness Policy" (all schools are required to have one) to integrate more organic, locally grown, and plant-based vegetarian school entrees.


3) Submit progressive health articles for the school newsletter.

4) Volunteer to teach the award winning, multi-cultural, and plant centered nutrition curriculum in your child's class or after school program.

5) Volunteer to read veg-themed children's story books in your young child's class, such as Victor the Vegetarian and Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving, which you can find at your local library.

6) Start a Lean and Green Kids campaign in your school district.