DEERFIELD, Ohio – For 10 weeks this fall, South Range Schools will participate in a farm-to-school breakfast program through a partnership with Lamppost Farm and Tierra Verde Farm.

Amanda Glass, executive director of Lamppost Farm, said the FarmBridge by Lamppost program aims to improve students’ nutrition by providing fresh, locally grown food.

“It’s very exciting,” Glass said. “Healthy food access is very important, and it just takes people who are willing to get in there, start the communication and connecting to make it happen.” 

After learning about the initiative last spring, Kaitlyn Pierce, cafeteria director at South Range, said she reached out to Glass at Lamppost Farm with her interest in doing a farm-to-table campaign at her school. Starting Sept. 15, every Tuesday and Thursday for at least 10 weeks, the school will be serving fresh eggs and fresh sausage for breakfast from Tierra Verde Farm in Deerfield.

“It’s just a personal passion of mine, wanting to give students the best nutrition, the most nutrient dense things, especially for breakfast,” said Pierce, who has a degree in nutrition.

While many school breakfasts lean toward more carbohydrate and higher sugar offerings, the local farm-raised eggs and sausage will provide a higher-protein option.

About a quarter of South Range students currently eat breakfast at school, but Pierce said excitement grew as she began telling students about the new breakfast options. The football team made a commitment to eat breakfast at school on the higher protein days. For students who pay full price, breakfast is only $1.75 per day. And for those qualifying for free and reduced meals, breakfast is free.

Pierce hopes offering fresh options twice a week will increase participation, and if the program is successful, it could continue beyond the 10-week trial and eventually expand to include other items. 

Pierce said the school may be able to receive reimbursement for some of the costs through Harvest to Hallways, a U.S. Department of Agriculture initiative designed to connect more farms to schools.

Crestview Schools in Columbiana also is teaming up with Glass and FarmBridge by Lamppost. Glass said three meals were prepared at Crestview last year, including a lunch featuring fresh barbecue chicken drumsticks for elementary school students. Another meal for seniors included grass-fed, nitrate-free hot dogs and grass-fed hamburgers produced by Tierre Verde Farm. 

Through FarmBridge by Lamppost, Glass said the focus is to reduce obstacles for schools to purchase food from local farmers and sources.

“We’re trying to be that facilitator,” Glass said. “Farmers don’t have time to network with the schools, and the schools don’t have time to network with the farms. So we’re really initiating that with the school districts. We’re keeping the same mission as Lamppost, keeping the same values of regenerative agriculture because we know it’s a higher nutrient density product, and also creating and keeping those meaningful relationships in our community through good food.”

Glass said Youngstown State University’s dietetics program is interested in studying some of the data on how the food children eat affects their concentration and behavior in the classroom.

“We know when they eat a very carbohydrate-heavy breakfast, they can have blood sugar spikes,” Glass said, “and that’s not putting our children in a great position to learn because they’re not able to focus as well. They might be more hyperactive, and then you have fatigue and mood swings after that.”

Glass hopes to keep partnering with more Mahoning Valley schools and helping to connect them with locally sourced food. She would also like to connect with local dairy farmers to bring higher-quality milk into the schools.

“We’re really excited to be partnering with these schools and hopefully keep growing and connecting with more school districts,” Glass said. “Our pilot program with South Range will tell us a lot about how to replicate this and do it with a bigger school district.”

But people don’t have to be students to get fresh meats, non-GMO products and locally sourced items from Tierra Verde Farm, which offers grass-fed beef and lamb, as well as pasture-raised pork, chicken and turkey from its store at 2212 Alliance Road, Deerfield. Visitors to the farm’s store also can find pastured eggs, small batch sourced raw honey and pure maple syrup. The store is open from 1-6 p.m. Monday through Friday and 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. Saturday.

Steve Montgomery started Lamppost with his wife, Melanie. The nonprofit began by teaching regenerative agriculture. 

“Our mission was to reach and teach through agriculture,” Montgomery said. “The experiences on the farm were how we did that.”

But at the end of 2025, Montgomery decided to step back from leading Lamppost, and Glass took over leadership of the effort.

“She was the obvious choice because of her skill set and her passions,” Montgomery said. “Amanda is the right person to take that ball and run.”

Montgomery has been focusing on Tierra Verde Farm, where he serves as farming mentor, and building an organization called Fireberry.

“Our desire is to empower farmers to know how to do what we do and to replicate,” Montgomery said, adding he would like to see their regenerative agriculture processes used at more and more farms.

Pictured at top: Steve Montgomery and Amanda Glass.