ST. PAUL, Minn. – A Minnesota private school is putting lunch leftovers to good use, and residents of the principal’s hobby farm are quite appreciative.

Laurie Jennrich took over as principal of St. Pascal’s Baylon Catholic School in St. Paul this year and decided to do something about school lunch leftovers that were piling up in the trash, KMSP reports.

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“I think it’s a life lesson,” she said. “I think we go through life and we have to be resourceful. And I think we have to put to good use the things we don’t use.”

That’s why Jennrich convinced students to separate their lunch leftovers by setting aside food scraps in 5-gallon buckets, which Jennrich hauls to her hobby farm Smiley Acres to feed to two young pigs. The hogs are about 70 pounds now, but Jennrich estimates they’ll reach about 300 pounds before their “extreme makeover,” according to the news site.

The principal said the pigs are digging the baked potatoes, salad, fruits and other grub, but there are some cafeteria foods they won’t touch, either.

“They oink and get pretty excited about their dinner,” Jennrich said, but “they don’t like oranges.

“So on the days we have orange slices, the kids have to put that in the trash,” she said. “The pigs will pick them out and push them under the fence.”

The St. Paul school’s table-to-farm program is one of several across the country that have emerged in the wake of tightened federal school food regulations championed by first lady Michelle Obama. Since the limits on calories, fat, sugar, sodium and other nutritional elements went into effect in 2012, more than 1.2 million students have dropped out of the National School Lunch Program.

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The changes also boosted food waste from the program by more than $1 billion annually.

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The idea to recycle school food for pig feed is one several schools have turned to in an effort to deal with the massive increase in waste. New Mexico’s Galloping Grace Youth Ranch takes in five tons of discarded fruits, vegetables and other foods from elementary schools in the Rio Rancho area, for instance, according to EAGnews.

The food is gobbled up by the farms hogs, goats, chickens and other animals.

Rhode Island’s My Blue Haven Farm also collects scraps from North Smithfield and Burrillville schools to feed to its roughly 3,000 pigs, the Woonsocket Call reports.

In other places, schools are working with agriculture interests to use the food for vermiculture.

Lincoln, Nebraska schools are working with the Nebraska Farmers Union to get 11,600 pounds of food discarded by students to a local worm farm that’s eventually turned into useful compost, district recycling coordinator Brittney Albin told the Journal Star.

“Composting gives them more hands-on experience,” she said. “They can see how their waste is going to be turned into a useful product rather than going into a landfill.”

Here is KMSP’s story: