This Minnesota high school is stocking its salad bar with lettuce it grows on-site

WINONA, MINN. – For the latest lessons on sustainable agriculture, high school students here are getting something to chew on.

Since the start of the school year, students and staff at Winona Senior High School have operated six hydroponic gardens, known as “Flex Farms,” right inside their cafeteria.

While the soil-free gardens were rooted in the idea of providing a hands-on learning experience, they have since become a real source of nutrition for the school’s more than 800 students. Led by sophomore Miriam Jackson, the school now grows up to 200 pounds of fresh lettuce each month in the cafeteria.

“It’s been awesome for everyone to see the hands-on experience and just watch it all the way through,” Jackson said. “It’s stuff like this that helps get kids more involved in agriculture.”

Hydroponic lettuce goes from seed to salad bar in about four weeks, Jackson said. Seedlings spend their first three days in a dark, moist unit before moving to a germination table for light and constant watering. After that, they’re transferred to the garden, where they grow for roughly three weeks before harvest.

For now, most of the gardening is limited to lettuce — mainly iceberg and romaine — though Jackson said they’ve also started experimenting with basil and cherry tomatoes.

“For me, it’s been exciting to watch the impact you can have as just one individual,” said Jackson, who spends about 10 to 15 hours a week testing pH levels and managing nutrients in the gardens.

Jennifer Walters, the school’s nutrition director, said the idea for the farm dates back to the COVID era, when the school secured two gardens for use in the agriculture department. Then, last summer, the school received a grant from the state’s Urban Agriculture Grant Program to purchase four additional gardens for about $5,000 each.

Walters said she hopes to expand the program to the district’s middle school, with the goal of promoting both sustainable practices and healthy eating habits.

“What’s been interesting is that we haven’t really seen a decline in the amount of lettuce we bring in,” Walters said. “We’re just seeing kids eat more lettuce.”

Rachael Queen, a cafeteria worker at the high school, said the efforts by Jackson and Walters haven’t gone unnoticed. She said she often hears from students and staff about the difference in flavor.

“It makes a huge difference,” Queen said. “They get a taste of what real lettuce is like, versus us throwing it from a bag into a pan like we don’t care. This is showing them we care.”