Who Gets to Eat Well?
In The Problem with Feeding Cities, sociologist Andrew Deener shows how the systems that move food, trucks, stores, packaging, policies, are a kind of social infrastructure. They create abundance for some neighborhoods and scarcity for others. Our project starts from that truth and builds a different kind of infrastructure, small and close to home.
We grow lettuce on school-site hydroponic towers and turn it into 100 free, plastic-free salads each week. A $10 partner salad at local restaurants funds the loop: hyperlocal production → direct funding → community benefit. It’s simple on purpose. Less distance, less waste, more trust.
This is not just gardening; it’s redesigning how food gets to people. Students run the system, learn ag-tech and business, and publish real metrics, water saved, plastic avoided, CO₂e reduced, cost per head, so anyone can see what changed and by how much. The goal is to keep building the scaffolding that lets more students, families, and schools eat well and to prove that when we change the infrastructure, we change the outcome.
7700
Salads Served
382,50
Gallons of Water Saved
630
Plastic Produce Bags Avoided
Healthy Salad Meals began with one question: what changes when students can see and eat food grown right where they spend their day? Our policy brief, Ten Feet from Tower to Tray, documents how a student-led hydroponic lunch program became part of a real public school food system. It explains the model, the barriers, the partners, the food safety routines, the cafeteria coordination, and the grant language that could help more schools test campus-grown food pilots.The brief connects Healthy Salad Meals to the national conversation on scratch cooking, farm-to-school programs, plant-forward meals, and school meal innovation.
Related Founder Research: Jackson’s essay, How Much Is the Value of the Future?,explores environmental policy, discount rates, irreversible harm, and the responsibility governments owe future generations. The essay connects to the broader thinking behind Healthy Salad Meals: practical action today should protect the choices available to people tomorrow.
Timeline: Idea to Thousands Served
2024
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Idea Begins
After researching food insecurity in AP Environmental Science, Jackson begins designing a way to grow fresh food directly on the Dos Pueblos campus.
2024-25
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8-Months of Building
Students clear the site, level the ground, lay pavers, install hydroponic towers, run electricity, and work through school and food-safety approvals.
January 2025
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1st Salads Served
The first school-grown lettuce travels about ten feet from the hydroponic towers into the cafeteria kitchen and onto students’ lunch trays.
2025-2026
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100 Salad a Week
Tuesday and Thursday harvests become part of the school week. Students grow, harvest, wash, prepare, and serve roughly 100 free salads each week.
May 2026
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7600+ Salads Served
Healthy Salad Meals receives outside recognition and begins developing a model other schools can replicate.
August 2026
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Still Growing, New Team
Nine hydroponic towers now support the program. Fifteen students take on defined roles in growing, harvesting, food safety, operations, and expansion.
3-Step Impact Loop
1
We Grow
School-site hydroponic towers produce fresh romaine with ~90% less water and minimal single-use plastic. Students run seeding → transplant → harvest, logging pH/EC, yield, and cost per head so every salad is traceable and safe.
What it means: local food, real skills, clean data.
2
We Partner
Local restaurants add a “Peace Salad” to the menu and contribute $10 per salad. Sponsors can fund a tower at a school and receive quarterly impact reports (salads funded, water saved, plastic avoided, CO₂e reduced).
What it means: dollars flow directly into production—no middlemen.
3
We Serve
Those dollars become free salads for students, teachers and faculty at Dos Pueblos High School —about 100 each week. A loop that pays for itself.
What it means: hyperlocal production → direct funding → community benefit.
Join Us
Restaurant
Put a Peace Salad on your menu and contribute $10 per sale: 1 Peace Salad funds 5+ free Healthy Salad Meals.
What you do
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Feature the Peace Salad (we provide menu copy + pricing guidance).
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Share a short blurb at the table/online with a QR to our live impact dashboard.
What you get
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Quarterly impact report (salads funded, water/plastic/CO₂e saved).
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Co-marketing kit: table tents, window decal, social assets, press blurbs.
Student
Grow food. Run ops. Lead a team.
Join the lettuce team to seed, transplant, harvest prep and track.
What you get
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Hydroponic growing and nutrient management
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Food-safety and sanitation procedures
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Harvest and yield tracking
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Team scheduling and operations
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Community food-system management
Want a Salad Program?
We can help you help you design a program that fits your school community.
We provide
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Tower specs, SOPs (food safety & sanitation), and training.
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A ready-to-use impact dashboard + quarterly reports.
Funding options
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We help you write grants, connect you with potential restaurant partners, give guidance on approaching your school board and parent programs.
Jackson Simmons-Furlati - Founder and Team Leader
Cash Herrick - Environmental Engineer and Avid Weather Enthusiast
AWARDS & RECOGNITION
We Advance UN Sustainable Development Goals
What we do: Provide reliable access to fresh, nutritious salads for students and families.
What we do: Give away fresh, fiber-rich meals; teach food safety and hygiene.
What we do: Hydroponics recirculate water, using ~90% less than conventional fields.
What we do: Run pumps on solar either tapping into campus power or installing.
What we do: Deploy small-footprint, sensor-enabled towers; standardize SOPs
What we do: Hyperlocal supply shortens the chain and builds community capacity.
What we do: Plastic-free salads on campus; reduce spoilage with harvest-to-service timing.
What we do: Cut transport, packaging, and grid energy; report CO₂e per salad
What we do: Eliminate single-use on our campus as plastics often become marine debris,
What we do: The Peace Salad model connects restaurants, schools, and students.