Three years ago, Erin Primer had an idea for a new summer program for her school district: She wanted students to learn about where their food comes from. Primer, who worked in student nutrition in California’s public school system for 10 years, applied for and got grant funding from the state to kick off the curriculum. Students planted cilantro in a garden tower, met a local organic farmer who grows red lentils, and learned about corn. “A lot of kids didn’t know that corn grows in a very tall plant,” Primer said. “They didn’t know it had a shell.”
The curriculum, which focused on bringing the farm into the school, had an effect outside the classroom: Primer found that after learning about and planting ingredients they then used to make simple meals like veggie burgers making, students were excited to try new foods and flavors in lunch. One crowd pleaser happened to be completely vegan: a red lentil dal served with coconut rice.
“We’ve had students tell us it’s the best dish they’ve ever had in school food. For me, I was upset to hear that,” said Primer, who leads student nutrition for the San Luis Coastal district on California’s central coast, which means she develops and ultimately decides what goes on all school menus. “It really builds respect into our food system. So not only are they more likely to eat it, they are also less likely to waste it. They are more likely to eat it all.”
Primer’s summer program, which the district is now considering making a permanent part of the school calendar, wasn’t meant to inspire students to embrace plant-based cuisine. But that was one of the things that happened — and it’s happening in different forms across California.
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A recent report shows that the number of California schools serving vegan meals has skyrocketed over the past five years. While experts say this growth is partly a reflection of demand from students and parents, they also credit several California state programs that help school districts access more local produce and prepare fresh, plant-based meals on-site.
The cultivation of meat for human consumption takes a tremendous toll on both the climate and the environment; the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that livestock production contributes 12 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. Specifically, cattle and other ruminants are a great source of methane. Animal agriculture is also extremely resource intensive and uses up immense amounts of water and soil. Reducing the global demand for meat and dairy, especially in high-income countries, is an effective way to lower greenhouse gas emissions and mitigate the rate of global warming.
The climate benefits of eating less meat is one reason school districts across the country have introduced more vegetarian — and to a lesser extent, vegan — lunch options. In 2009, Baltimore City Public Schools has removed meat from its school lunch menus on Mondays, part of the Meatless Mondays campaign. A decade later, New York City Public Schools, the nation’s largest school district, did the same. In recent years, vegan initiatives have built on the success of Meatless Mondays, such as Mayor Eric Adams’ “Plant Powered Fridays” program in New York City.
But California, the state that first put vegetarianism on the map in the early 20th centuryled the country on plant-based school lunches. “California is always ahead of the curve, and we’ve been eating plant-based or plant-forward for many years — it’s not a new concept in our state,” Primer said. A recent report from the environmental nonprofit Friends of the Earth found that among California’s 25 largest school districts, more than half — 56 percent — of middle and high school menus now have daily vegan optionsa significant jump compared to 36 percent in 2019. Meanwhile, the percentage of elementary districts offering weekly vegan options has increased from 16 percent to 60 percent over the past five years.
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Student nutrition directors like Primer say the foundation that allows schools to experiment with new recipes is California’s universal free lunch program. She notes that when school lunch is free, students are more likely to actually try to enjoy it: “Free food plus good food equals a participation meal increase every time.”
Nora Stewart, the author of the Friends of the Earth report, says the recent increase in vegan school lunch options was also in response to a growing demand for less meat and dairy in cafeterias from climate-conscious students. “We see a lot of interest from students and parents to have more plant-based [meals] as a way to really help limit greenhouse gas emissions,” she said. A majority of Gen Zers — 79 percent — say they will eat meatless at least once or twice a week, according to research conducted by Aramark, a company that provides food services to school districts and universities, among others. And the food service company that recently introduced a vegetarian menu in the San Francisco Unified School District recognizes students with “led the way” to ask for less meat in their cafeteria. The menu includes four vegan options: an edamame teriyaki bowl, a bean burrito bowl, a taco bowl with a pea-based meat alternative and marinara pasta.
Stewart theorizes that school nutrition directors are also increasingly aware of other benefits of serving vegan meals. “Many school districts are recognizing that they can integrate more culturally diverse options with more plant-based meals,” Stewart said. In the past five years, the nonprofit found, California school districts have added 41 new vegan dishes to their menus, including chana masala bowls, vegan tamales and falafel wraps. Dairy-free meals also benefit lactose-intolerant students, who are more likely to be students of color.
Still, vegan meals are hardly the standard in California cafeterias, and in many places they’re unheard of. Out of the 25 largest school districts in the state, only three elementary districts offer daily vegan options, the same number as in 2019. According to Friends of the Earth, a fourth of the California school districts they reviewed offer no plant-based meal options; in another fourth, the only vegan option for students is a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. “I was surprised to see that,” Stewart said.
Making school lunches free of animal products is not just a matter of ingredients. It’s also a matter of knowledge and resources — and the California legislature has created a number of programs in recent years aimed at getting those tools to schools that need them.
In 2022, the state spent $600 million for it Kitchen Infrastructure and Training Funds program, which provides funding to schools to upgrade their kitchen equipment and train staff. This kind of leveling allows kitchen staff to better incorporate “scratch cooking”—essentially, the preparation of meals on site from fresh ingredients—into their operations. (The standard in school lunches is sometimes jokingly referred to as “cooking with a box cutter,” as in heating and serving pre-made meals delivered in a box.) Another state program, the $100 million School Food Best Practice Fundsgive schools money to purchase more locally grown food. And the Farm to School Incubator Grant Program awarded approx $86 million since 2021 to allow schools to develop programming focused on climate smart or organic agriculture.
Although only the School Food Best Practices program explicitly encourages schools to choose plant-based foods, Stewart credits all of them with helping schools increase their vegan options. Primer said the Farm to School program — which provided the funding to develop her school district’s farming curriculum in its first two years — has driven new recipe development and testing.
All three state programs will run out of money by the end of the 2024-2025 school year. Nick Anicich is the program manager for Farm to School, which is run out of the state Farm to Fork office. (“It’s a real thing that exists in California,” he likes to say.) He says when state benefits expire, it’s up to schools to see how to further the things they’ve learned. “We will see how schools continue to innovate and implement these initiatives with their other resources,” Anicich said. Stewart says California has set “a powerful example” by improving the quality and sustainability of its school lunches, “to show what’s possible nationwide.”
One takeaway Primer had from the show is to reimagine food that’s better for the planet as an expansive experience, one with more flavor and more depth, rather than a limiting one — one without meat. Both ideas may be true, but one seems to excite more students.
“It was a very important focus for us. We want [to serve] food that’s just as good, everyone wants to eat it,” Primer said. “Whether it has meat in it or not is almost secondary.”
