Laura started her school food journey at Boulder Valley School District (Boulder, CO), implementing the district’s farm-to-school, nutrition education, and local food promotion programs. After nearly three years as the Health Policy & Promotion Program Manager for Idaho’s largest public health district, Laura was excited to return to school food.
As Program Director of Workforce Development, Laura served as program lead for the first-ever federally registered Fellowship program cultivating the next generation of diverse leaders in scratch-cook school food operations. She also led the collaboration with Colorado-, Vermont- and Virginia-based partners to establish the Colorado, Vermont and Virginia Healthy School Food Pathways. The Healthy School Food Pathway program supports workforce readiness to expand the pipeline for the next generation of school food leaders. From entry-level positions through school food management, these professionals will impact millions of children with greater access to fresh, healthy food.
As Executive Director of Programs, Laura continues to engage in workforce development, leading the teams focused on California, Colorado, Vermont and Virginia and developing the long-term organizational strategy to grow the Healthy School Food Pathway opportunities for school food operators across the country. Laura also oversees the program strategy, implementation and execution of CAF’s online learning program, the School Food Institute; grant programs, Salad Bars to Schools and Bulk Milk; operator resource website, The Lunch Box; and project management for CAF’s technical assistance and systems change programs, Get Schools Cooking and unique district builds. Through these programs, the Chef Ann Foundation is committed to helping school districts build, implement, and sustain a self-operated, cook from scratch program. We provide a continuum of programming that meets districts and school food operators where they are, and helps support them in moving their program and their careers forward.
Laura received her B.A. in Psychology from Bates College (Lewiston, ME) and Masters of Public Health from the Colorado School of Public Health (Ft. Collins, CO). Laura currently lives in Colorado with her husband and their very fuzzy cat.
