Thanks to The Jew & The Carrot friend, Robbie Friedman, for this guest post.

Rectangular pizza, sloppy joes and canned corn — classic components of a school lunch. Many of our schools still spoon out such unwholesome foods, yet a growing number of them are turning the greasy corner.

Since New England born physicist Benjamin Thompson founded the Poor People’s Institute in Munich, Germany in the late 1700’s, providing daily staples such as potato soup, barley and peas to children during the course of their studies, our social institutions have constantly “sought to develop meals which would provide the best nutrition at the lowest possible cost.”

This approach has undoubtedly fed countless mouths, but it has also led to the deterioration of food quality. Today the struggle to nourish our children persists, due in part to school systems’ ailing budgets, parents pressed for time and our own lack of nutritional knowledge. However, a failure to deliver a wholesome source of vitamins, minerals, proteins and healthy fats to our children’s plates is a detriment to their development. People, including Jews, are beginning to take the matter into their own soiled hands.

Food programs that connect children with invaluable nutritional resources are germinating across the country. In Philadelphia, for example, the non-profit organization Urban Nutrition Initiative offers an after-school program in which high school students are paid part-time to learn and model techniques for healthier eating. Students spend five weeks engrossed in educational curriculum that propels them into their schools, as well as nearby community centers, nursing homes and youth groups, to teach and demonstrate healthier eating habits, such as reading food labels or cooking with whole grains.

Edible Schoolyard in Berkeley, California is another shining example. Funded privately, the program operates at Martin Luther King, Jr. Middle School and incorporates organic gardening into students’ classroom curriculum. With over an acre in cultivation, four garden educators (sponsored in part by AmeriCorps) and a full kitchen on-site, over 900 children each year are exposed to a sustainable source of nutrition — first-hand.

As Jews, we are grounded by such principles as bal tashchit (do not destroy), prevention of tza’ar ba’alei chayim (suffering of living creatures) and tzedakah (justice). Thanks to programs such as Hazon’s Min Ha’Aretz and Teva Learning Center, these cultural values are manifesting with greater importance in our religious day schools. Another organization has recently stepped into the forefront of nutritional education, the Jewish Farm School, which works to create greater access to sustainably grown foods within the Jewish community and the cities in which we live.

Like the old saying goes, you are what you eat — our children are no exception.

Robert Friedman is a writer, photographer, educator and member of the Jewish Farm School. He resides in western Massachusetts with his wife and dog.