Bright Futures Daycare and Preschool plants seeds of health and hope in Muskegon
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EmailSome of Muskegon’s youngest community members are taking up gardening to increase community food access and nutrition education.
MUSKEGON, MI — In a community where access to fresh produce is limited, the children at Bright Futures Daycare are getting their hands dirty, discovering where food comes from and growing healthy habits along the way.
For over 30 years, SNAP-Ed, or the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program Education, a federally funded nutrition program has helped to equip individuals and families with the skills they need to make lasting, healthy changes for themselves and their families.
Aditi Kulkarni, a Michigan State University Extension community nutrition instructor who works under SNAP-Ed, has been partnering with Bright Futures Daycare and Preschool to support their desire to develop a new garden.
With support from MSU Extension’s SNAP-Ed mini-grant, Bright Futures installed an edible teaching garden to promote nutrition and to give hands on experience to the daycare kids. The $1,500 grant helped purchase raised beds, soil, plants, tools, and watering cans. The daycare’s facilities team assembled the garden and the children helped plant and care for the herbs and vegetables.
Since then, the garden has become a living classroom.
MSU Extension partners with the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services to provide SNAP-Ed throughout Michigan. SNAP-Ed focuses on good nutrition, stretching food dollars, living physically active lifestyles and engaging partners to build healthier communities.
