October 15, 2026

By Sara Millhouse

Photo courtesy of Nancy Eastman

Nancy Eastman, food services director for the Riceville Community School District,  is the self-described “goofball,” the “documentary girl,” the “fruits and vegetables girl” who doesn’t hesitate to make an impromptu announcement in a crowded mall or embarrass her best friend by telling everyone it was her friend’s birthday, even though it wasn’t.

Eastman came to her local Riceville Community School District after years as a general manager for a restaurant franchise in Rochester, Minnesota, about an hour away. Her demanding job and long commute made it hard to spend time with her family, and she saw an opportunity to make better meals for her children and their neighbors.

When Eastman goes around the lunchroom at the Riceville, Iowa, schools, she connects with each kid. She asks them what they like and don’t like. She talks to them about the food on their trays and where it came from.

The burgers and the pork are from the Riceville area. She bid on the cantaloupe, watermelon and tomatoes at the Cedar Valley Product Auction down the road. Cucumber, zucchini and squash are from the Iowa Food Hub in Decorah.

The kids eat local sweet corn and Kittleson’s potatoes. They’ve even had all-local lunches, where every ingredient came from the region.

And those delicious Sno Pac frozen peas that the kids love on the salad bar on Monday’s? Those were grown in Caledonia, Minnesota, not too far away.

Photo courtesy of Nancy Eastman

Eastman is passionate about local food. “I think the kids deserve the best,” she said. “Local, fresh, non-chemical products that are not processed are better for the kids. And I think we should support our local community.”

When schools can buy local food, those dollars stay close to home, and studies show that these dollars increase regional economic benefit two to four times. Nationally, money spent on the Local Foods for Schools program leads to more than a billion dollars in economic benefit, as dollars continue to circulate locally. 

Today, finding the dollars for local school food can be a challenge. Eastman shaves every dollar she can off lunchroom expenses so that she can focus on high-quality nutrition. She received $16,000 from the USDA’s Local Foods for Schools program and $1,000 from the $70, 000 Choose Iowa program allocated in 2024, which helped schools across the state buy from local producers.

In 2022 the USDA launched the Local Food for Schools and Local Food Purchase Assistance programs to invest in local food systems and support the purchase of locally raised foods. The program was supposed to continue to 2028 but was cut in March of 2025. Iowa farmers and institutions lost an estimated $11.3 million in federal funding.

Photo courtesy of Nancy Eastman

The Choose Iowa Local Food for Schools Program awarded $200,000 in funding this year to 125 public and private schools through the 2026 Iowa Farm Act.  The Riceville Community School District was awarded $1,600 in “match dollars.”

In the cafeteria, Eastman performs taste tests with her students and constantly asks their opinions on new recipes and ingredients. She tells them repeatedly that it’s OK if they don’t like it.

But they mostly do. “The kids love, love, love, love microgreens,” Eastman said. They prefer local to store-bought yogurt. They even give a thumbs-up to pickled herring from a Twin Cities producer.

Students do sometimes complain, though, when the salad bar runs out of Otter Creek apples at the end of the season, and the cafeteria has to go back to apples that come “off the truck.”

On taste test days, Eastman puts out a USDA sign for “Make Today a “Try-it-Day” and passes out stickers to youngsters who try new foods. In this small school district in northeast Iowa, her attitude and no-judgment enthusiasm establish a clear expectation for the kids.

“Your opinion matters,” she tells them. “The students want to know that they have a say in what they’re eating.”

Eastman organized an elementary school farmers’ market, with the kids purchasing produce from local farmers with Wildcat Paw tickets that were distributed for good behavior and acts of kindness. “They love the fact that they know the farms that their food is coming from,” Eastman said. “They love to talk to the farmers.”

The farmers enjoy talking to the kids, as well and seeing the kids getting excited over the foods they produce.

Eastman has earned statewide and even national recognition for her education on local foods. Riceville Community School District earned the Golden Root award in 2023, 2025 and 2026 from the Iowa Farm to School and Early Care Coalition. With Marie Morud of Healthy Harvest of North Iowa, Eastman was a national finalist in 2025 for the Farm to Cafeteria, Innovation in Education Awards in Albuquerque, N.M.

“I want to make sure that the kids’ bellies are full,” Eastman said. “I want to make sure that they are getting the best of the best, and I want to put Riceville on the map.”

That job has proved infinitely rewarding. “With kids, they come up, and they hug you and say ‘Thank you,’ and ‘Oh, we love it,’ and they give you these little pictures, and you know what?” Eastman said. “It makes it all worth it. It makes you want to do more.”