This project is a part of the Hispanic & Latinx Heritage Month celebration because
it supports a Latino teacher or a school where the majority of students are Latino.
My Students
As you walk down the halls of our school, students are wearing Uggs and talking about the newest Jordan's. Students all around use the latest technology: iPads, video games, and iPhones. In the cafeteria, students throw away trays full of food because the menu is too “healthy” for their liking.
Our school is located in a high-needs area.
The surrounding community is financially unstable due to low-income combined with weak understanding of finances and money management. Ninety-nine percent of our students receive free or reduced-price meals, including breakfast and lunch.
Our school is proactive in attempts to better the community through workshops, a flexible curriculum, and partnerships with outside organizations such as Cafeteria Culture, an official partner of New York City School Food that seeks to merge financial literacy concepts with sustainability issues. Last year, our partnership catalyzed the styrofoam ban in New York City and earned our students a feature on an HBO series. This year we are using Make Change Messaging interdisciplinary curriculum, where student voices are heard by city officials. This curriculum serves as a model for other schools across the city.
My Project
In ten visits, Cafeteria Culture will complete this unit by focusing on financial literacy and food waste in cafeterias. Every student meal costs approximately $1.07. By tying a financial value to the weight of a tray of food and weighing the discarded food, we will be able to calculate the monetary value of food wasted. Students will use this information to conduct a “waste audit.”
Learning will continue as students use non-fiction text sets, each studying a different topic relevant to the issue, such as organic foods, global food waste, and so on. Together students will brainstorm better ways to spend the money, within the confines of a budget. Students will learn strategies for creating effective budgets by developing numerical fluency using positive and negative numbers, decimals, percentages, and ratios. Students will present their findings and proposals to the Environmental Protection Agency, Region 2, in an effort to implement change.
Our students will learn to recognize wasteful spending, budget money, and prioritize spending to propose changes in an area that affects them daily: school food.
This project will potentially contribute to an even greater cause. New York City schools comprise the largest school food service in the country, more than double the size of any other. If we can make a positive change in our school, we will set a precedent for others across the nation to reduce waste by improving financial literacy.
Nearly all students from low‑income households
Data about students' economic need comes from the National Center for Education Statistics, via our partners at MDR Education. Learn more
Cafeteria Culture (Debby Lee Cohen and Atsuko Quirk)
(Cafeteria Culture will partner with my class, through multiple visits, to focus on food consumption and waste in cafeterias, conducting waste audits to tie a monetary value to the amount of waste produced. Through interdisciplinary studies, students will create a more effective budget for school food being served.)
$1,500.00
Visitor cost
$1,500.00
Vendor shipping charges
FREE
Sales tax
$0.00
3rd party payment processing fee
$22.50
Fulfillment labor & materials
$30.00
Total project cost
$1,552.50
Suggested donation to help DonorsChoose reach more classrooms
$273.97
Total project goal
$1,826.47
How we calculate what's needed
Total project goal
$1,826.47
2 Donors
-$150.00
Donations toward project cost
-$135.00
Donations to help DonorsChoose reach more classrooms
-$15.00
match offer
-$1,667.65
Match offer toward project cost
-$1,417.50
Match offer to help DonorsChoose reach more classrooms
DonorsChoose is the most trusted classroom funding site for teachers.
As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Ms. DeGrazia and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
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