Awards issued prior to january 20, 2025, were funded under previous administrations and may not reflect the priorities and policies of the current administration.** 1, the current issue/problemthe…

Awards issued prior to january 20, 2025, were funded under previous administrations and may not reflect the priorities and policies of the current administration.** 1, the current issue/problemthe current issue/problem is that too many of our communities in america DON't have affordble access to healthy food options. As the pandemic taught US, the need for fresh, local-grown produce is crucial. In our communities of color, the racial wealth GAP exacerbates the probelm of food insecurity. In the ST. Louis region, in the promise zone, the povery rate is 35%, the school drop out rate is above 5%, and the unemployment rate is 21%.(promise zone factsheet, 2015). There is also a lack of black and indigeonous farming leaders. According to the 2017 census of agiculture, the 207 black farmers in missouri make up less that 1% of the farmers in the state – a 92% decrease over the last 100 years (ST. Louis public radio, 2021). These facts create a colossal challenge: how do we increase the knowledge of agricultural practices, improve the nutritional health of children, the elderly, and the overall health of the community? How do we contributre to fixing the wealth GAP and food insecurity issues among youth, and the ST. Louis region communityat large?2, the basic methods and approaches to be used to collect/measure data:we will use different types of measurment systems to collect and measure data. For the enrichment spaces in schools, we will conduct interviews, give pre-post tests, conduct surveys, ask questions about the process, listento feedback and, record the information. We will compare IT with our post test and record the difference. For enrichment spaces, we will record the number of planted fruittrees, fruit bushes, mushrooms, and other indigeonousedible plants. We will measure the studentsgrowth of knowledge, regading the identification and production of fruit from the trees, bushes, and mushroom spores. We will measure the change in attitudes and behaviors towards native environments as places to plant and grow edible foods, and attitudes and behaviors towards conservation. For participation metrics, we will measure the actual amount of students who participate in the project. We will measure the number of students who attend the farmers markets, and finally, we will measure the pounds of food grown at each location, and take surveys to measure the attitudes about preparing healthy meals at home. We will purchase a license for survey monkey to conduct our surveys and communicate to familes about how we insure the privacy of their data and how IT adheres to research data.3. Theultimate goals of theproject, what IT plansto achieve, and the general impact expectedthe ultimategoal of the spanish lake local food networkis to build a strong local-grown food network. We will use a montessori based approach to teachsustainable farming. We plan to partner with various organizations, i.e., schools, churches, community centers and farmer's marketswith an aim to supportblackand indgeonous farmersto build a robust local-grown food network. We plan to educate the community about how to grow food by the sustainable metho, D, and access local-grown food throughcommunity gardens, urban farms, farmer's markets and other local-grown food outlets we planto increase the number of food production sites in low resourced neighborhoods. We plan to increase the knowledge base for sustainable food production, and we plan to increase the production and consumption of affordable, accessable, local-grown fresh produce for familes dwelling in the communites that we impact. The general impact expected is the normalization of all of these foodgrowing activities which will be passed down to their children, others in their families and the entire community.