Giving Compass' Take:

• Food Tank highlights The Charlie Cart Project, a mobile kitchen that is traveling across America teaching children and adults how to make healthy food choices and environmental health. 

• How can funders help empower organizations and programs like this? 

• Here's how school garden initiatives are making an educational impact. 

The Charlie Cart Project is an all-in-one, hands-on learning program using a kitchen on wheels to teach both children and adults how to make healthy food choices. “Imagine walking into a classroom of 4th graders studying math. At the front of the room is a bright, colorful kitchen: that’s the Charlie Cart. The students are using the mortar and pestle to make guacamole and learn about early civilizations,” says Carolyn Federman, Founder and Executive Director of The Charlie Cart Project.

Federman—former lead at The Edible Schoolyard Project in Berkeley, California—brought together an expert group of designers and educators to work on increasing access to food education. The result was a mobile kitchen paired with an adaptable, fully tested class curriculum. “The Charlie Cart is a platform for education; we provide the tools, curriculum, training, and support for organizations that want to bring hands-on cooking right into the classroom,” Federman tells Food Tank.

Since the project began in 2016, the Charlie Cart now operates in 150 locations across 37 states. “Each of our… sites have come to us by word of mouth—clearly, there is a growing urgency to teach kids about food,” Federman tells Food Tank. Through the Charlie Cart curriculum, children learn how to use fresh foods and essential kitchen tools. Educators link the Charlie Cart lessons to math, science, and English language arts—while connecting the dots between health, food, and the environment.

Read the full article on The Charlie Cart Project by Andrea Oyuela at Food Tank.