Powered by chocolate milk

KIEL, Wis. — After a busy day of classes, students at Kiel High School can get energized before heading to sports practices or other after-school activities by grabbing a carton of chocolate milk. The beverage is complimentary, thanks to local dairy farmers who are helping keep a milk cooler at the school stocked with free milk.

The Kiel FFA Chocolate Milk Initiative kicked off in January 2024. A local dairy farmer, Julie Maurer, of Soaring Eagle Dairy near Newton, helped spearhead the program.

“Anything we can do to help build demand for dairy products is helpful,” Maurer said. “Young people love chocolate milk and giving them a free milk choice after school is hopefully instilling in them that milk is not only suitable for mealtime but is also a great snack any time of the day.”

Kiel High School’s agricultural education teacher and FFA adviser, Emmy Newberg, heads up the initiative. She worked with the school’s athletic director, who helped purchase the cooler and get it up and running.

“Soaring Eagle approached us and the school board with the idea, and we ran with it,” Newberg said. “It took about a year to get it going.”

The milk cooler is strategically located near the weight room, pool and locker rooms.

“Chocolate milk is the best recovery drink after a workout, which is why we have it in the location that we do,” Newberg said. “It’s in a centralized location for all our extracurricular activities.”

Any student involved in an after-school activity — from sports to drama — can help themselves to the free milk.

“The kids love it,” Newberg said. “There were a couple of times the cooler was empty, and the kids were like, ‘When are you getting more?’”

The cooler is helping students consume more milk than they would otherwise, Newberg said.

“The only other option for milk is at lunch,” she said. “We don’t have milk in vending machines, but I think that would be cool.”

Newberg unlocks the cooler at the end of the school day around 3. The weight room supervisor then locks it up between 5:30-6 after practices conclude and the weight room closes.

“The kids get excited when they see me come unlock it,” Newberg said. “Right now, we’re going through 150 cartons a week, if not a little more. It depends on the season and how many kids are participating in sports or working out after school. We go through a lot in the spring because track is so popular here.”

The milk order is placed through the school’s food service department. FFA students stock the cooler twice a week, usually on Monday and Wednesday. Each student is allowed two cartons of milk per day.

“There are tons of competition in the snack and beverage space but none as delicious and nutritious as milk,” Maurer said. “Chocolate milk’s combination of carbohydrates, protein, fluids and electrolytes helps to restore energy, repair muscles and rehydrate the body after strenuous exercise. For those students participating in sports, it helps them refuel.”

More than 400 students attend Kiel High School. There are 150 kids in the agriculture education program, where Newberg teaches vet science, natural resources, horticulture, hydroponics, intro to agriculture, large animal science and food science classes.

“Ag has always been a huge thing in this area,” Newberg said. “I don’t have a lot of kids in FFA who come from farms, but they want to be involved in agriculture in some way.”

Soaring Eagle Dairy is one of the farms sponsoring the cooler by providing funds the FFA program uses to purchase milk. Maurer sent a letter to local dairies in the Kiel school district asking for sponsorships to help fund a week or a month of milk.

“When we reached out to other dairy farms in the district and asked them to support the initiative, we had to lead by example,” Maurer said. “The response from local farms and our local dairy promotion committee was strong enough that two years later, there are still funds available to keep the program going.”

Football offensive line coach and dairy farmer, Jay Binversie, of Robinway Dairy LLC near Kiel, is also a sponsor of the milk cooler.

“As a football coach at Kiel, I’m involved in the weight training program and understand the importance of milk,” he said. “I like to see these young athletes consume milk in their diet. It helps with muscle growth and putting on good muscle mass. I also like to see kids in school drink milk. So why not give them a free opportunity to do that?”

Binversie has been coaching football for 10 years.

“We used to go buy it on our own for kids after weightlifting, and then FFA came up with this idea to have a cooler,” Binversie said. “The milk is always available right after weightlifting, and I think most of our football players grab two. I make them. You have to get that protein into them, especially if they’re underweight.”

Binversie said kids who play a sport and lift weights need to consume over 3,000 calories a day.

“If you want to be an elite athlete, you have to do that,” he said. “We want these kids to have good calories and protein sources, and milk is a great part of the diet. Chocolate milk is a good, quick way to get that protein after you lift.”

The chocolate milk program was copied from another school district, and now the program at Kiel High School has been copied by at least two other schools as well, Maurer said. The names of the dairy farms donating money to support this cause are recognized on the front of the milk cooler. The Manitowoc County Dairy Promotion board is also part of the list.

“I even had dairy farms from other school districts reach out to me saying, ‘If you need more money, let us know,’” Newberg said.