Katie is the Executive Director and Co­Founder of the Louisiana Farm to School Alliance, a statewide network representing more than 100 organizations working in food, farming, nutrition and education to share resources and support for new and existing Farm to School efforts. LFSA builds a dialogue for statewide farm to school programming. She has worked in food education and policy since 2012 when she began coordinating the “local food in schools initiative” for KIPP New Orleans School’s signature program: The Healthy School Food Collaborative. In 2014, she worked alongside Tulane PRC to successfully pass Louisiana’s first farm to school legislation. Working collaboratively with key stakeholders, Katie focused on reforming procurement policy in Louisiana so that schools could easily purchase products from local farmers and in 2015 her team gained full support from the Louisiana State Legislature. She is the designated state lead in Louisiana for the National Farm to School Network (NFSN). With the support of NFSN and Market Umbrella, she is leading Louisiana in a $1.5 million dollar tri­-state initiative called “Seed Change” that builds capacity for Farm to School activities and create long-term program sustainability at the state level.

Impact

During the Startup Accelerator Program, Louisiana Farm to School Alliance: Farm2School Database completed and facilitated seven partnerships between schools, school food service companies and local farmers. Farm2School plans to launch the database some time in 2016.