SCC Receives Grant to Incorporate Specialty Crop Curriculum, Nebraska Crop Awareness

Southeast Community College’s (www.southeast.edu) Culinary/Hospitality program received a $37,463 grant to incorporate specialty-crop curriculum and promote awareness of Nebraska specialty crops. SCC’s student-run restaurant, Course, and its coffee shop, Course Ground Coffee, also will be able to showcase some of the crops in the menu items they produce and sell, giving consumers the opportunity to taste and hopefully increase the use of these food items. The grant came from the Nebraska Department of Agriculture’s Specialty Crop Block Grant Program, and specialty crops are defined as fruits and tree nuts, vegetables, culinary herbs and spices, and medicinal plants, as well as nursery, floriculture, and horticulture crops.

Starting this summer, the grant also allows for students and faculty to attend local farmers’ markets and have a chef provide demonstrations and educational experiences about these specialty crops to the public. In addition, SCC was able to fund a campus garden with raised planter boxes, located right outside the Course restaurant on SCC’s Lincoln campus, east of the main campus building. SCC maintenance staff constructed the 12 planter boxes, which have since been filled with a variety of Nebraska specialty crops that students will grow, maintain, harvest, and use to prepare food. Plantings this year include basil, sage, thyme, oregano, dill, cilantro, rosemary, pineapple sage, bee balm, mint, eggplant, cherry and heirloom tomatoes, varieties of carrots, spinach, beets, turnips, serrano peppers, and a variety of flowers!

“Hopefully it will increase awareness and knowledge to the general student population and campus visitors,” said Rob Epps, director of the Culinary/Hospitality program. “The hundreds of students and visitors walking by the space daily can see the growth of these crops and will have the opportunity to learn about them from the signs and educational events built around the garden.”

Southeast Community College is committed to providing accessible, dynamic, and responsive education to a diverse variety of students in more than 50 programs. For more information about SCC’s Culinary/Hospitality program, visit www.southeast.edu/culinary.