IDEAS For Us works to develop ideas, fund action, and scale solutions that solve the world’s most pressing environmental challenges. Their flagship program, Fleet Farming, transforms individual lawns into micro-farmlettes. By doing so, they teach community members across Orlando how to grow their own food while building a local food system. Through their Sprouts grant, IDEAS For Us will enhance operational aspects of their Fleet Farming program with the purchase of a farm pick-up truck and the purchase of commercial kitchen equipment that will be used to complete a commissary kitchen where they can process and store produce before selling it at their farmer’s market.

Through the power of food, Jones Valley Teaching Farm (JVTF) creates opportunities for academic exploration, environmental stewardship, personal growth and leadership, and pathways to employment for young people across Birmingham. They operate seven Teaching Farms where students can learn, create, explore, and grow a healthy future for themselves. With the goal of making these resources more accessible, JVTF is building a Center for Food Education, allowing more students, teachers, and community members than ever before to grow, cook and share food together. Their Impact Grant will be used to support operations at the Center for Food Education.

National Farm to School Network is an information, advocacy and networking hub for communities working to bring local food sourcing and food and agriculture education into school systems and early care and education environments. This grant will be used to support National Farm to School Network’s work to address their Call to Action, that by 2025, 100 percent of communities will hold power in a racially just food system. This Call to Action will guide their work over the next five years, underscoring what National Farm to School Network needs to do as an organization to realize their vision for a just, community-based food system.

Out Teach works with schools in creating rich outdoor learning environments, increasing student performance and teacher engagement with the power of experiential education. Through hands on, garden-based lessons, students learn science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) while also enjoying the social and emotional benefits of spending time together outdoors. Their Impact Grant will be used to support teacher training and outdoor learning programs at 10 underserved schools across North Carolina.

Denver Urban Gardens has been helping Denver residents create sustainable, food-producing neighborhood community gardens for over 35 years. Their Impact Grant will be shared among 14 community gardens, providing enhanced support for new gardeners, and helping to fund sustainability features and season extension elements. Additionally, Sprouts’ grant will support the launch of DUG’s Garden Equity Project, ensuring that every one of its community gardens is adequately resourced to thrive, regardless of a community’s ability to fund the human and physical resources needed for success.

Spaces of Opportunity is a community farm that has been serving the residents of South Phoenix for more than five years. The farm contains 10 acres of incubator farm plots, an on-site farmer’s market, and additional plots for family gardens. Through a collaboration among five nonprofit partners, the teams who work at and cultivate spaces aim to break the cycle of generational poverty in South Phoenix by improving access to healthy food and nutrition education and by providing a neighborhood hub where people can work, learn new skills, and earn a living selling goods back to the local community. Funding from Sprouts will be used to develop operational infrastructure and to support program implementation at Spaces, helping to strengthen the organization and to create additional economic opportunities across South Phoenix.

From 2015 to 2020, UT Austin ran a study called “TX Sprouts” which offered elementary-aged children the chance to experience hands-on garden, nutrition and cooking lessons during the school day. The success of this study led UT Austin researchers down a path of wanting to know what creates long-term sustainability of a school garden program, in which teachers continue using the garden year after year. Sprouts’ funding will support this research, as well as an internship program in which student interns from UT Austin will lead hands-on gardening lessons across local elementary schools, building upon the foundation established through TX Sprouts.

Partnership will serve 38 school sites in San Diego County with cooking carts and program-related materials for school-based nutrition and cooking programs, and funding for educational staff to operate the program.

Program support for the National School Garden Support Organization Network, including collaboration, conferences and sharing best-practices resources. The Foundation’s support for Life Lab will refine and share a new program model for highly integrated school garden and nutrition education programs currently being piloted in the Parajo Valley and east San Francisco Bay areas.