Lucas Bogard is fundraising
Blue Sky Café- An Agrarian Kitchen
FED UP! We are putting HEALTHY back on the menu!
Welcome to our campaign. We are Sky Islands, an independent, non-profit, public high school, heading into our 9th year in Tucson. Reconnecting students to their place, their food, and to others is at the heart of a healthy school—it supports a strong academic program and that is our goal. To that end, we are establishing a new program that will create a place where students can find the simple pleasure of gathering and cooking with produce as close to the source as possible. We are calling this the Blue Sky Café -- an agrarian kitchen—a teaching kitchen program that will provide integrative tools for enriching the life of the wider school community. The concept design above provides a vision of where we are headed. It’s a good place to meet, to share a healthy meal, and just gather together.
Through our project-based, experiential activities here, students have restored the school’s watershed, planted 100+ native trees, and created a cactus garden, pollinator garden and an edible orchard. This agrarian kitchen experience further commits us to supporting local growers and the cycle of real food with near-zero miles to plate. It is a celebration of the seasons, based on subsistence and sustainable farming without the use of chemicals or artificial fertilizers. Our students will learn practical skills about growing pesticide-free foods in our desert region, as well as how to turn those foods into delicious, aesthetically pleasing, and nourishing daily lunches.
We believe it is important for the health of our students and the health of our ecosystem for students to see, smell, touch and taste their way around gardens and kitchens. Perhaps surprisingly, many students do not pack a lunch, or they graze at Circle K for bags of chips. As part of this program, the day will begin with students who will plant, tend, and harvest schoolyard gardens in the mornings, and then those students will take what they've grown—or we’ve purchased at local farmers’ markets and the Community Food Bank— and prepare healthy, nutrition-rich lunches. Designed to provide students with an authentic kitchen and dining experience, as well as paying attention to minimal waste, the Blue Sky Café will feature real glass, flatware and tableware (not paper or plastic), provisions for vegan dishes, and opportunities for select menu choices. Menu planning based on seasonal ingredients will allow us to do this at a very low cost to students—the goal is that every student, regardless of income, can afford a Blue Sky Café lunch.
But this takes intentional work—and funding. Here is where you come in. To transform this vision into reality, we need to retro-fit the kitchen to bring it up to code—from cobwebs to health code. This requires a mechanical engineer, fees and permits, fire suppression upgrades, new plumbing and sinks, a stove, as well as kitchen staples, racks, and utensils. We have the staff in place—are you there too?
Learn more at: https://skyislands.org/blue-sky-cafe/
Sky Islands is non-profit 501 (c)3 organization, and all donations are tax deductible.
Welcome to our campaign. We are Sky Islands, an independent, non-profit, public high school, heading into our 9th year in Tucson. Reconnecting students to their place, their food, and to others is at the heart of a healthy school—it supports a strong academic program and that is our goal. To that end, we are establishing a new program that will create a place where students can find the simple pleasure of gathering and cooking with produce as close to the source as possible. We are calling this the Blue Sky Café -- an agrarian kitchen—a teaching kitchen program that will provide integrative tools for enriching the life of the wider school community. The concept design above provides a vision of where we are headed. It’s a good place to meet, to share a healthy meal, and just gather together.
Through our project-based, experiential activities here, students have restored the school’s watershed, planted 100+ native trees, and created a cactus garden, pollinator garden and an edible orchard. This agrarian kitchen experience further commits us to supporting local growers and the cycle of real food with near-zero miles to plate. It is a celebration of the seasons, based on subsistence and sustainable farming without the use of chemicals or artificial fertilizers. Our students will learn practical skills about growing pesticide-free foods in our desert region, as well as how to turn those foods into delicious, aesthetically pleasing, and nourishing daily lunches.
We believe it is important for the health of our students and the health of our ecosystem for students to see, smell, touch and taste their way around gardens and kitchens. Perhaps surprisingly, many students do not pack a lunch, or they graze at Circle K for bags of chips. As part of this program, the day will begin with students who will plant, tend, and harvest schoolyard gardens in the mornings, and then those students will take what they've grown—or we’ve purchased at local farmers’ markets and the Community Food Bank— and prepare healthy, nutrition-rich lunches. Designed to provide students with an authentic kitchen and dining experience, as well as paying attention to minimal waste, the Blue Sky Café will feature real glass, flatware and tableware (not paper or plastic), provisions for vegan dishes, and opportunities for select menu choices. Menu planning based on seasonal ingredients will allow us to do this at a very low cost to students—the goal is that every student, regardless of income, can afford a Blue Sky Café lunch.
But this takes intentional work—and funding. Here is where you come in. To transform this vision into reality, we need to retro-fit the kitchen to bring it up to code—from cobwebs to health code. This requires a mechanical engineer, fees and permits, fire suppression upgrades, new plumbing and sinks, a stove, as well as kitchen staples, racks, and utensils. We have the staff in place—are you there too?
Learn more at: https://skyislands.org/blue-sky-cafe/
Sky Islands is non-profit 501 (c)3 organization, and all donations are tax deductible.
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