Farm to School Grant Programs

Link

https://www.fns.usda.gov/f2s/grant

Additional Links

Notice of Funding Opportunity (Grants.gov) - USDA-FNS-2025-F2S - State Agency
Notice of Funding Opportunity (Grants.gov) - USDA-FNS-2025-F2S - Turnkey
Notice of Funding Opportunity (Grants.gov) - USDA-FNS-F2S-2024 - Implementation

Deadline

Application Deadline: Jan 10, 2025

Sponsor

USDA Food and Nutrition Service (FNS)

Purpose

Offers funding and technical assistance to schools and other eligible entities to plan, implement, expand, and maintain farm to school programs. Promotes collaboration between schools, local agricultural producers, and other community partners, with the goal of increasing access to local foods in schools and providing educational opportunities on topics related to local food and nutrition.

In fiscal year (FY) 2025, applicants my apply for funding through 3 separate Farm to School grant opportunities:

Implementation Grants seek to improve access to local foods in eligible schools by supporting comprehensive farm to school programming that includes local procurement and agricultural education efforts
Turnkey Grants intended to simplify the proposal-writing process by providing pre-designed activities for applications seeking funds for frequently proposed farm to school projects. There 3 Turnkey funding tracks: Action Planning grants; Agricultural Education grants; and Edible Gardens grants.
State Agency Grants support statewide efforts to increase the amount of local food served in eligible schools and facilities participating in Child Nutrition Programs (CNP) and to promote agricultural education

Additional information regarding required program objectives and activities can be found in the funding announcement for each Farm to School funding opportunity on the program website.

Funding priorities in FY 2025 for Implementation and Turnkey grants include:

Applications that serve a high proportion of children, at least 40% or more, who are eligible for free or reduced-price meals
Applications from Indian tribal organizations and eligible entities led or staffed by American Indians and Alaska Natives that serve tribal communities.
Applications from eligible entities led or staffed by Black/African Americans that propose projects to serve Black communities.
Applications from eligible entities led or staffed by people of color that propose projects to serve communities of color.
Applications from small to medium-sized agricultural producers or groups of small to medium-sized producers
Projects operating in and serving eligible schools/sites located in rural areas, which is defined as an area where the school participating in the project, or the location of the site participating in the project is located in the attendance boundary of a school with a locality code of 41, 42, or 43 using the National Center for Education Statistics Tool to determine urban/rural classification.

Amount of Funding

Award information for each Farm to School funding opportunity is as follows:

Implementation grants:

Award range: $50,000 - $500,000
Number of awards: 75
Total funding: $5,000,000

Turnkey grants:

Award range: $5,000 - $50,000
Number of awards: 60
Total funding: $4,000,000

State Agency grants:

Award range: $50,000 - $500,000
Number of awards: 7
Total funding: $3,000,000

The project period for all grants is 24 months. Applicants must provide matching funds of at least 25% of the total project budget. Matching funds can be cash and/or in-kind contributions and must be from non-federal sources.

Who Can Apply

Applications for Implementation and Turnkey grants may be submitted by:

Schools, including non-profit private and charter schools, which operate the National School Lunch Program (NSLP) and/or School Breakfast Program (SBP)
Child care institutions and summer sponsors, including non-school based institutions that have an agreement with the state agency to operate the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) or Summer Food Service Program (SFSP)
Local agencies
Indian tribal organizations and Alaska Native Corporations
Agricultural producers
Nonprofit entities

Eligibility for State Agency grants is limited to statewide government agencies that administer or work in partnership with the agency that administers the federal Child Nutrition Programs (CNP).

Additional information regarding eligibility can be found in the funding announcement for each Farm to School funding opportunity on the program website.

Geographic Coverage

Nationwide

What This Program Funds

Capacity Building • Equipment • New Program • Operating Costs and Staffing

Application Process

Application instructions, requirements, and other information about the online application process can be found in the funding announcements for the Implementation, Turnkey, and State Agency grant programs.

Applicant office hours sessions:

Office hours #2
December 2, 2024
11:00 a.m. - 12:00 p.m. Eastern

Office hours #3
December 18, 2024
3:00 - 4:00 p.m. Eastern

Office hours #4
January 7, 2025
2:00 - 3:00 p.m. Eastern

Contact

For questions regarding the Implementation Grant program:
Anna Arrowsmith
anna.arrowsmith@usda.gov

For questions regarding the Turnkey or State Agency Grant programs:
Jean Bingham
jean.bingham@usda.gov

Rural Awards

Past awards communities received in FY 2024 can be found on the program website.

Rural communities who have received funding include:

Mountain Roots Food Project in Gunnison, Colorado received funding to connect students to the sources of their food by expanding existing farm to school environmental education programming into middle school science classes in the Gunnison Watershed School District. The funds will be used to provide schools with hydroponic growing technology; develop and deliver science education for middles school students; incorporate greens grown by students into cafeteria meals; and start a work-study internship for a high school student to further explore hydroponic farming as a potential career.
The Arts and Sciences Center, in partnership with The Hawaii Academy of Arts and Sciences, in Pahoa, Hawaii will plan, implement, and evaluate a food production operation, with the goal to increase the yield in the existing school garden in order to directly supply the school kitchen with fresh fruit and vegetables.
The Alfond Youth & Community Center in Waterville, Maine plan to hire a part-time Garden Assistant who will work to increase their on-site healthy food production and procurement of local produce for use in their Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP) and Summer Food Service Program (SFSP) to the benefit of their approximately 140 rural youth in their afterschool program.

Topics This Program Addresses

Community Planning and Coalition Building • Health and Wellness • Pre-K to 12 Schools