Food is a sensory, fun and nourishing experience, and at UNI we create programs that focus on these ideas. Food Education at UNI is a dynamic and holistic program that incorporates the school garden, farmers' markets, community youth and adults, and communities of faith into the experience. It couples youth development, improving the urban food system, creating a link between diet and health, and community improvement. Our programs operate during the school day, in an after-school internship program, over the summer, and we also run workshops and community events. Currently, these programs operate at University City High School within two charters (themed sectors of the school), called Ecotech (Ecology/Technology), and Health.
For more information on these programs, contact Liz Willetts at spartemis at yahoo.com, or Tony Larson at antoniol at sas.upenn.edu.

In-School Programs

UNI works with UCHS teachers to build workshops and weekly hands-on lessons into the school day and into core school subjects such as History and Science. These programs change to adapt to staff interests and teacher interests and availability. Staff and teachers work and learn together in the classroom, and are free to use the garden as needed. Academically Based Community Service (ABCS) courses at Penn provide some classroom assistance for these projects, and some classes are begin out of partnerships with University professors or efforts made by university ABCS students.

• World History & Culture: Bi-weekly workshops cover 5 ancient civilizations and food. These workshops involve presentation of individual fruits, vegetables, nuts, spices, and other ingredients which the youth inspect, taste, smell, feel, observe, and consider in a agricultural, cultural, and scientific perspective. A final snack or meal is made out of these ingredients. Students consider issues of food preservation, transportation, food trading, geography, and the development of ancient diets into modern diets.

• U.S. Civics: Weekly lessons in the Politics of Food are incorporated into this curriculum. Students study issues such as immigration, hunger/poverty, fast food, corporations, shelters, soup kitchens, the development of agriculture/agribusiness, and more.

• Agriculture Science: This course grew out of an environmental science class and incorporates larger issues such as genetic engineering, the global food market, factory farms, urban vs suburban vs rural growing environments, etc. Youth also run their own growing experiments in the school greenhouse.

• English: This class includes an environmental writing component and reflections on environment and identity. Students complete observation assignments, analyze environments presented in literature, and evaluate characters and environments in literature. This class doesnþt focus on food directly, but includes connections between a nourishing environment and personal health.

• Nutrition: This class includes food workshops and food science into the weekly class. Workshops include hands-on food lessons, recipe-making, and kitchen skills and bring food into the classroom. Food science labs and experiments help students couple visual and physical learning with the nutritional science presented in the text. Both of these experiential learning techniques help make the connection between diet and health and help emphasize the idea of food choices and meal preparation.

• Lunch Club (Food Soldiers): Students volunteer during lunch period to partake in a fast-pace 50 minute healthy meal preparation series. Meals incorporate whole foods and cooking skills within a healthy context. This program currently runs in the Health Charter of UCHS.

• Senior Service: Senior High School students work on service learning projects that address high school food issues, community nutrition concerns, and the obesity crisis. Some of the projects are: running the Drew Elementary fruit stand, starting a high school fruit stand, researching for a health fair, and creating events for Earth Day. They also work one day a week with local organizations and businesses working on local food and nutrition topics. This program is under development in the Eco-tech charter of UCHS.

After School Food Education Programs

UNI runs an after-school internship program. This program builds on the in-school curriculum and provides an outlet for students to engage themselves, their peers, their community, and their families in positive ways. Students apply to work as garden interns where they grow, harvest, sell, and recycle food or as peer food educators where they learn about food and diet and lead community youth in weekly recipe lessons and adults in community workshops.

Summer Program

UNI runs a large summer program for interns to work 20 hours per week for 6 weeks. Youth intern on various projects, including the year-long garden project, peer food education, creating wood constructions (for garden), as summer camp counselors, on a technology project, and on a food cooperative business project. The link for Youth Development has more information on this program.

Workshops and Community Events

• Seasonal Garden Festivals
• Community School and Fitness Night Cooking Demonstrations
• Farmers' Market Cooking Demonstrations