Bedford – Beef and veal have been popular this past year within middle and high school culinary classrooms across the state. For its seventh year, the Pennsylvania Beef Council (PBC) with support from Mountain States Rosen, Marcho Veal and the Center for Beef Excellence provided beef and veal grants to family and consumer science educators during the 2018-2019 school year with approximately 9,500 students benefitting from the grant program.
Lewann Alexander, educator at Eisenhower Middle and High Schools in Russell, PA commented, “I truly appreciate this program for many reasons, but mostly it allows teachers to offer a lesson for which we wouldn’t normally be able to offer, due to monetary reasons. The students are able to learn the importance of making food from scratch and modifying for personal health reasons.” Lewann executed a ground beef lesson with her students, discussing the benefits of making and storing beef meatballs ahead of time. One student stated, “I’ve only ever had meatballs that you buy at the store. These are so much better!” Another student commented, “I feel so accomplished!” All of her students discussed how impressed they were with their ability to make something instead of purchasing it already made. This testimony speaks volumes to the impact the program has within our state.
The PBC was on-hand Friday, April 12, 2019 during the Pennsylvania Association of Family & Consumer Sciences Conference, sharing the many resources available to educators within the state. The conference also served as an opportunity to launch the Beef & Veal in the Classroom program for the upcoming 2019-2020 school year.
Each year, 60 Family and Consumer Science classrooms are selected to participate in the Beef & Veal in the Classroom program. Teachers are either offered reimbursement for beef purchases of veal product delivered to their school for in-classroom lessons. For more information about the 2019-2020 grant program, please visit the PA Beef Council’s website.
To view more photos from the program’s activities, visit the PA Beef Council Facebook page.
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The Beef Checkoff Program was established as part of the 1985 Farm Bill. The checkoff assesses $1 per head on the sale of live domestic and imported cattle, in addition to a comparable assessment on imported beef and beef products. States may retain up to 50 cents on the dollar and forward the other 50 cents per head to the Cattlemen’s Beef Promotion and Research Board, which administers the national checkoff program, subject to USDA approval. Internal links within this document are funded and maintained by the Beef Checkoff. All other outgoing links are to websites maintained by third parties.
