Pure Food Kids
Beecher's and Dammeier also fund and develop "Pure Food Kids: A Recipe for Healthy Eating", an outreach and educational program, run by the Flagship Foundation, for elementary and middle-school children in the Seattle Public Schools, with the goal of teaching children about healthful foods and eating habits. The program was initially developed by Dammeier and his wife Leslie, after they learned about and were unhappy with the state of school cafeteria meals in Seattle, where their three children attended public school. Established in 2005, 1% of the total sales for Beecher's and Dammeier's other business, Bennet's Pure Food, Maximus/Minimus, and Pasta & Co., are used to fund the Pure Food Kids program. The Pure Food Kids program is staffed by trained volunteers, including Dammeier himself.
Fourth through sixth grade elementary school children are educated on the effects of food additives, eating healthful foods, reading food labels, and about marketing of food aimed at children. According to Chip Wood, co-founder of the Northeast Foundation for Children, fourth through sixth grade children will typically be between the ages of 9 and 12 years old. The program is provided at no cost to the children and their families. To date, over 15,000 children have participated in the educational program. Pure Food Kids is taught in classrooms, after-school events, and at Parent-Teacher Association events, with all supplies and materials provided by Beecher's, although there is explicitly no promotion or use of any products from any of Dammeier's businesses.
Read more about this topic: Beecher's Handmade Cheese
Famous quotes containing the words pure, food and/or kids:
“We are not naïve enough to ask for pure men; we ask merely for men whose impurity does not conflict with the obligations of their job.”
—Jean Rostand (1894–1977)
“From my experience with wild apples, I can understand that there may be reason for a savage’s preferring many kinds of food which the civilized man rejects. The former has the palate of an outdoor man. It takes a savage or wild taste to appreciate a wild fruit.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“And when discipline is concerned, the parent who has to make it to the end of an eighteen-hour day—who works at a job and then takes on a second shift with the kids every night—is much more likely to adopt the survivor’s motto: “If it works, I’ll use it.” From this perspective, dads who are even slightly less involved and emphasize firm limits or character- building might as well be talking a foreign language. They just don’t get it.”
—Ron Taffel (20th century)