Arriving back to mid 60’s temperatures in Madison last Thursday afternoon, I immediately remembered the warmth of Washington, DC I had just left. Not only was DC literally 20 degrees warmer, but also it was the people I interacted with during the three-day Community of Practice Meeting on Farm to Early Care and Education (Farm to ECE). Friendly people from thirteen states gathered, exchanged thoughtful ideas, and shared inspiring practices.

And then I arrived at our family dinner time. I saw my 16-year-old son peeling a banana, which reminded me he used to say, “I like a banana because it’s easy, it’s always there on the table, I don’t have to think.” The two of us, along with my wife, are able to make sure that at least a banana is available every day. It obviously has helped him nurture healthy eating behavior. We know many others are unable to make fruits available, especially low-income communities and people of color.

Equity was at the center of the meeting in DC. It is the understanding that we want to apply equity in early childhood healthy eating. Panelists focused on strategies and evaluation tools that could reinforce those strategies. But it was the reactions from people in the audience that inspired me and brought us down to the local level and what can be the most practical principles many of us seem to forget. 

LeBroderick Woods of the Mississippi Farm to School Network reminded us that communities have done a variety of initiatives in early childhood healthy eating. Building an initiative from the ground, LeBroderick said, can connect people and nurture the collectivity of Farm to ECE. Dorothy Grady-Scarbrough, also from the Mississippi Farm to School Network, said that coming to the community with ideas are good but listening to the ideas from the communities can be empowering. Practitioners seem to forget that if we want people to participate in Farm to ECE, we want to build on ideas that resonate with people’s needs. Wande Okunoren-Meadows of Little Ones Learning Center (Atlanta, Georgia) implored us to really understand how hard it is running a child care program. Before thinking about collecting data and numbers to show the success of Farm to ECE, we all need to think about not adding to the already challenging tasks ECE directors and teachers have to navigate on a daily basis.

Applying Equity to Farm to ECE

Strong intentions, wills, and funding opportunities were put forward when discussing strategies. Holding a series of conversations to come up with the best strategies can take forever. Working on a project with strategies that we know, even if they’re not the best, may be all that we need. “Progression not perfection” as Robert McCall (Denzel Washington) suggested to Ralphie in the 2014’s movie The Equalizer.

This is when a project-based model can be helpful in applying equity to Farm to ECE. Instead of prematurely coming up with policies designed to spur statewide practice, let’s focus on administering really good community-based projects in various local communities. The small scope minimizes project complexities and allows for immediate troubleshooting. The close relationship among local stakeholders nurtures reciprocal partnerships with a deep understanding of the community setting. As more community-based projects are happening, the multi-local projects mobilize collective actions in several communities around the state.

For Kids Forward, this means going beyond foods to focus on racial and ethnic equity for strategies to promote early childhood healthy eating. When thinking about behavior change, we want to self-motivate ECE directors and teachers of color in integrating food in everyday learnings. By that, we mean really thinking what immediate impacts these ECE directors and teachers appreciate the most. This is when we consider practical ways of applying equity in three project areas:

• Not only do ECE directors and teachers of color have little familiarity on local food systems but also on local food producers (due to systemic racism on local food distribution). Learning the field and connecting with the right players will take some time. Establishing reliable early childhood food purchasing with community-oriented organizations can significantly shorten this process. For example, we have worked with community-based nonprofits that run Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) and gleaning models.
• We will have to integrate foods as a learning tool in day-to-day learning. Most importantly, we will have to find ways to introduce healthy foods that excite both kids and adults in child care programs. Indeed, race or culture alone can change our edible education strategies. Developing a set of strategies on culturally appropriate edible education can maximize the impacts for early childhood healthy eating.
• Increasing exposure to fresh and healthy foods at home is essential. Research shows that informing families on practical ways to provide healthy foods at home is not only challenging but also time-consuming. This is when we have to think about relationship-based family engagement. Genuine and impactful relationships will go beyond early childhood healthy eating.

Building Organizational Capacity

As my colleague Daithi Wolfe, indicated in one of the panels, there is really no ECE system. What we have is a set of fragmented ECE activities, formed by individual and relationship-based programs, driven by various program needs. Making the connections between these various programs is key. 

This is why I found essential the little mentioned 3×3 inch booklet shared at the meeting by the Center for Environmental Farming Systems (CEFS, at North Carolina State University). Community organizing has been proven as a strategic approach for nurturing collective action. Building an organizing mind among Farm to ECE practitioners can lead us to significant progress.

As a matter of fact, Kids Forward has forged partnerships with various nonprofits for each of the three focus areas. We want to broaden the Farm to ECE frames that resonate with the visions and missions of other nonprofits. We established the following partnerships two years ago and have learned various lessons for sustaining Wisconsin’s Farm to ECE. 

• For food purchasing, we have developed partnerships with FairShare CSA Coalition. Through its Partner Shares, we have worked with eleven child care programs in four counties in Wisconsin to qualify for a 50% subsidy. The 50 CSA farms located in Southcentral Wisconsin and beyond also offers an outreach opportunity for child care programs around these farms. In addition, we have worked with Healthy Food For All Dane County and Community Action Coalition South Central Wisconsin through their gleaning programs. With them, we have significantly reduced the costs of providing fresh fruits and vegetables to low-income parents with young children. 
• For edible education, we have worked with the Wisconsin Early Childhood Association (WECA) in Milwaukee. A WECA Master Trainer has spent two hours per week working side by side with teachers in classrooms. The goal is to integrate fresh vegetables into the Wisconsin Model Early Learning Standards (WMELS). 
• For family engagement, we have worked with Today Not Tomorrow Family Resource Center on the east side of Madison and Healthy Kids Collaborative. Most importantly, working with a family resource center has helped us focus on experimenting with healthy foods through various activities aimed at supporting adults to be better parents to their young children.

Along with Community GroundWorks and The Parenting Place—two other W.K. Kellogg Foundation-supported organizations—together with the above organizations we have learned from each other and made a commitment to promote early childhood healthy eating. We know that by working with these various organizations, we have enriched our collective knowledge and capacity to sustain Wisconsin Farm to ECE. Most importantly, we strive to promote early childhood eating in an equitable way.

Dadit Hidayat