Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer Protection

or Bill Cosh, Communications Director, 608-224-5020, william2.cosh@wi.gov

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Do you hear that? That’s the sound of over one million students, teachers, farmers, health care providers and others crunching into fresh apples grown across the six Great Lakes states. And those one million crunches make a lot of noise to support local farmers, build community and celebrate healthy eating.

In celebration of National Farm to School Month, schools, hospitals, colleges and other organizations are crunching into locally grown apples for the Third Annual Great Lakes Great Apple Crunch at noon local time on Thursday, October 13. This regional event supports farm to cafeteria efforts across Wisconsin, Minnesota, Illinois, Michigan, Indiana and Ohio, and provides a platform for schools, and others supporting healthy and regional foods, to promote and celebrate their good work through a fun event.

As part of the celebration, Wisconsin’s Agricultural Ambassador, 69^th Alice in Dairyland Ann O’Leary, will be on hand at Marshall Middle School in Janesville to participate in the noontime “Crunch.”

For this third year of the event, organizers set a lofty goal of one million registered Crunchers. As of early this week, almost a million students, teachers and others are registered. Events locations range from school cafeterias to public libraries, college dining halls to office break rooms. The collective crunch supports local apple orchards, celebrates healthy eating, and connects rural and urban communities together.

A robust social media component helps amplify the Crunch across the region too. Schools and other registered Crunchers will document their events through photo and video, and share them through social media with the hashtags #GreatAppleCrunch and #F2SMonth. The Great Lakes Great Apple Crunch maintains a Facebook page where people will post Crunch celebrations as well. (www.facebook.com/GreatLakesGreatAppleCrunch).

The Center for Integrated Agricultural Systems at UW-Madison is lead organizer for the event, collaborating with Extension, universities, nonprofits and state agencies such as the Wisconsin Department of Agriculture Trade and Consumer Protection to organize and carry out the event. Not only is CIAS organizing the event, and crunching, but for the first year multiple UW entities are registered to participate. UW Housing has registered 7,000 students to Crunch, and Agroecology Program, Urban and Regional Planning Department and CALS Academic Affairs offices will all Crunch.

For more information, to crunch with us, or to determine who is participating in your area please contact Vanessa Herald at 608-263-6064 // vherald@wisc.edu.

For more information about the Great Lakes Great Apple Crunch, visit www.cias.wisc.edu/applecrunch and our Facebook Page, www.facebook.com/GreatLakesGreatAppleCrunch.

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