Recognizing Our Newest School Food Changemakers
August 26, 2021 | By
Meet the newest members of The Chef Ann Foundation’s Advisory Board. In this blog we introduce our new advisors and share their goals for the upcoming school year.
Erin Primer
My connection to school food is both being a mom of two little ones as well as working to change institutional food programs throughout my career. School food has such an opportunity for change, especially this upcoming school year! With universal free meals for the entire nation for the new school year (both CA and ME beyond), we can really rethink school food and design programs that prioritize access to fresh, healthy, real, local foods at school. Our program goal for the new year is to serve such high quality and delicious foods that ALL students participate! We are launching an in house baking program and plan to start the new school year with homemade cinnamon rolls on the menu. We just hired a Nutrition Coordinator (RD) and an Executive Chef so we are poised to really elevate our in-house, scratch made menu items in the new year!
Erin Primer
My connection to school food is both being a mom of two little ones as well as working to change institutional food programs throughout my career. School food has such an opportunity for change, especially this upcoming school year! With universal free meals for the entire nation for the new school year (both CA and ME beyond), we can really rethink school food and design programs that prioritize access to fresh, healthy, real, local foods at school. Our program goal for the new year is to serve such high quality and delicious foods that ALL students participate! We are launching an in house baking program and plan to start the new school year with homemade cinnamon rolls on the menu. We just hired a Nutrition Coordinator (RD) and an Executive Chef so we are poised to really elevate our in-house, scratch made menu items in the new year!
April Kindt
As a Regional Chef for Brigaid, what connects me to school food is the belief that every person should have daily access to delicious, thoughtfully prepared meals and that care and hospitality are important values we should model for students through our own actions. For the 2021/2022 school year my main goal is to welcome twelve newly-hired Brigaid Chefs to our team and help them get the training program in Denver Public Schools off to a strong start. On top of offering my support and guidance through the process, I’d also love to show them that school kitchens are a fun and rewarding place to share our skills, to work, learn and grow as chefs and leaders.
April Kindt
As a Regional Chef for Brigaid, what connects me to school food is the belief that every person should have daily access to delicious, thoughtfully prepared meals and that care and hospitality are important values we should model for students through our own actions. For the 2021/2022 school year my main goal is to welcome twelve newly-hired Brigaid Chefs to our team and help them get the training program in Denver Public Schools off to a strong start. On top of offering my support and guidance through the process, I’d also love to show them that school kitchens are a fun and rewarding place to share our skills, to work, learn and grow as chefs and leaders.
Omar Guevara-Soto
I am the assistant director for Minneapolis Public Schools Culinary and Wellness Services. We oversee all the food services in all of the 68 schools that our district has. Our district has an enrollment of close to 36,000 students. We’re here for the community. We’re really proud of what we do, and I hope once we are back in school, we can keep up with this and work on ending that stigma of school lunch or school food. It’s food in the schools. We serve good food in schools. And people need to know that. And for any youth, our hope is that they can continue getting access to fresh food, learning about food, where their food comes from, and how the food ends up on their plate. And hopefully they can grow to make their own decisions. We want people to actually start being thoughtful about what’s happening in that natural action that we all know as eating.
Omar Guevara-Soto
I am the assistant director for Minneapolis Public Schools Culinary and Wellness Services. We oversee all the food services in all of the 68 schools that our district has. Our district has an enrollment of close to 36,000 students. We’re here for the community. We’re really proud of what we do, and I hope once we are back in school, we can keep up with this and work on ending that stigma of school lunch or school food. It’s food in the schools. We serve good food in schools. And people need to know that. And for any youth, our hope is that they can continue getting access to fresh food, learning about food, where their food comes from, and how the food ends up on their plate. And hopefully they can grow to make their own decisions. We want people to actually start being thoughtful about what’s happening in that natural action that we all know as eating.
Carolyn Villa
My connection to school food resides in my work at Boulder Valley School District, as a District Manager for their Food Services, but it’s really rooted in my years as a Food Services Director in a small, rural school district. Originally, I was drawn to school food through my work in quick service restaurants - I worked for a restaurant that delivered fast food to local schools every morning for students to purchase during lunch, and I felt a strong moral objection to the practice. School food is the basis of nutrition for so many kids in America, and I strongly believe that kids have a fundamental right to nutritious food as a foundation of lifelong health. In the coming year, I hope to see a return to normalcy in the school feeding environment through reintroduction of salad bars and greater social opportunities for kids during meal periods - I think the concept of community suffered in the pandemic, and shared meals help to create one’s community!
Carolyn Villa
My connection to school food resides in my work at Boulder Valley School District, as a District Manager for their Food Services, but it’s really rooted in my years as a Food Services Director in a small, rural school district. Originally, I was drawn to school food through my work in quick service restaurants - I worked for a restaurant that delivered fast food to local schools every morning for students to purchase during lunch, and I felt a strong moral objection to the practice. School food is the basis of nutrition for so many kids in America, and I strongly believe that kids have a fundamental right to nutritious food as a foundation of lifelong health. In the coming year, I hope to see a return to normalcy in the school feeding environment through reintroduction of salad bars and greater social opportunities for kids during meal periods - I think the concept of community suffered in the pandemic, and shared meals help to create one’s community!
Emme Collins
I have a very interesting connection to school food. I was born In Brazil and immigrated to Seattle when I was in the first grade. In Brazil, lunch is the most important meal of the day and as elaborate as a typical American dinner. Coming to America and being introduced to a typical school cafeteria meal was very shocking to me. I’ve always remembered that feeling and now that I am the Chef for the same school district I came to as an immigrant, I have really strived to provide the students of SPS with culturally-relevant, scratch-made foods that will provide them comfort with the nutrition they need to take on the school day. I also have three children at home and know how important school food is for our children’s health and wellbeing. My long term goals for the upcoming year is to be able to continue to explore different cuisine and cultures through food and work with more and more local vendors and farmers.
Emme Collins
I have a very interesting connection to school food. I was born In Brazil and immigrated to Seattle when I was in the first grade. In Brazil, lunch is the most important meal of the day and as elaborate as a typical American dinner. Coming to America and being introduced to a typical school cafeteria meal was very shocking to me. I’ve always remembered that feeling and now that I am the Chef for the same school district I came to as an immigrant, I have really strived to provide the students of SPS with culturally-relevant, scratch-made foods that will provide them comfort with the nutrition they need to take on the school day. I also have three children at home and know how important school food is for our children’s health and wellbeing. My long term goals for the upcoming year is to be able to continue to explore different cuisine and cultures through food and work with more and more local vendors and farmers.
Megan Flynn
As Life Time Foundation’s Nutrition Project Manager, I get to work with our school district partners on their efforts to serve the highest quality meals possible. Specifically, I help to identify ingredients of concern, find clean label alternatives and increase menu items made from scratch. One of my goals I’m most excited about for this upcoming school year is to support school districts, purchasing cooperatives and manufacturers in implementing the updated Ingredient Guide for Better School Food Purchasing. This science-based guide is a resource for school food leaders and manufacturers who are committed to improving the overall quality, nutritional value, and safety of food provided to all students in every school.
Megan Flynn
As Life Time Foundation’s Nutrition Project Manager, I get to work with our school district partners on their efforts to serve the highest quality meals possible. Specifically, I help to identify ingredients of concern, find clean label alternatives and increase menu items made from scratch. One of my goals I’m most excited about for this upcoming school year is to support school districts, purchasing cooperatives and manufacturers in implementing the updated Ingredient Guide for Better School Food Purchasing. This science-based guide is a resource for school food leaders and manufacturers who are committed to improving the overall quality, nutritional value, and safety of food provided to all students in every school.
