The healthy local options are given out as samples by Great Valley students, with the help of volunteers and a few interns from local colleges. The farmers' markets, which set up shop at the high school and middle school once or twice a month, are funded though an $8,000 grant from Coatesville philanthropists Bob and Jennifer McNeil.

"Nutrition is a big interest to us. If you don't have healthy bodies, you can't learn very well," Jennifer McNeil said. Bob McNeil is president of Penguin Industries Inc., a Coatesville holding company.

"What we're trying to do is expand their horizons," said Barb Nissle, food service supervisor for the district. Great Valley implemented a similar program in the middle school for the 2005-06 school year, thanks to a grant from the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Nissle learned some valuable lessons from that trial run.

"From our prior experience, we know that the kids aren't willing to pay for fruits and vegetables. But if we give them a fun way to get them, then they'll get excited about it," she said.

At a meeting for local nonprofit agencies in June, Nissle met Jennifer McNeil, laying the groundwork for the grant. Once the funding was secure, Nissle looked for local farms to stock the prospective farmers' markets. Much of the produce on the stands early in the school year came from the Charlestown Farm, a Phoenixville cooperative farm.

Colder weather has forced Great Valley's markets to look outside the area, but Nissle says that as soon as the weather allows local farmers to churn out produce, the district will again look to them.

Great Valley brought in interns from West Chester University and the University of Delaware to help with the management of the markets. For distribution of the food samples and advertising and marketing assistance, the district turned to students in the Desmond Project.

"The students will take samples better from other students than from adults. When adults did it, no one ate it," Nissle said, another lesson learned from the first farmers' market.

"If students see other students trying new foods and getting the word out, I think they think they should try it," said Chris Marroletti, a junior in the Desmond Project, a joint program with the Desmond Hotel that has students organize a banquet, assuming all of the jobs required.

Marroletti is one of about eight Great Valley students who help with the farmers' markets, handing out samples while explaining what they are and their nutritional value. Some of the healthy items, particularly fruit smoothies, have become popular enough for the district to offer them on cafeteria menus.

The markets will run through their initial grant by the end of the school year, and Nissle will be looking for more money to keep the markets running next year and beyond.