Overall Rating Silver - expired
Overall Score 58.11
Liaison Elizabeth Drake
Submission Date April 19, 2017
Executive Letter Download

STARS v2.1

Swarthmore College
OP-8: Sustainable Dining

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 1.88 / 2.00 Aurora Winslade
Director of Sustainability
Office of Sustainability

Criteria

Institution’s dining services support sustainable food systems in one or more of the following ways. The institution or its primary dining services contractor:

  • Has a published sustainable dining policy that includes specific criteria to support the procurement of environmentally and socially preferable food and beverage products and/or includes guidelines to reduce or minimize the adverse environmental and social impacts of dining operations;
  • Sources food from a campus garden or farm;
  • Hosts a farmers market, community supported agriculture (CSA) or fishery program, and/or urban agriculture project, or supports such a program in the local community;
  • Has a vegan dining program that makes diverse, complete-protein vegan options available to every member of the campus community at every meal;
  • Hosts low impact dining events (e.g. Meatless Mondays);
  • Hosts sustainability-themed meals (e.g. local harvest dinners);
  • Hosts a sustainability-themed food outlet on-site, either independently or in partnership with a contractor or retailer;
  • Informs customers about low impact food choices and sustainability practices through labeling and signage in dining halls;
  • Engages in outreach efforts to support learning and research about sustainable food systems; and/or
  • Other sustainability-related initiatives (e.g. health and wellness initiatives, making culturally diverse options available)

Part 2

Institution’s dining services minimize food and dining waste in one or more of the following ways. The institution or its primary dining services contractor: 

  • Participates in a competition or commitment program (e.g. U.S. EPA Food Recovery Challenge) and/or uses a food waste prevention system (e.g. LeanPath) to track and improve its food management practices;
  • Has implemented trayless dining (in which trays are removed from or not available in dining halls) and/or modified menus/portions to reduce post-consumer food waste;
  • Donates food that would otherwise go to waste to feed people;
  • Diverts food materials from the landfill, incinerator or sewer for animal feed or industrial uses (e.g. converting cooking oil to fuel, on-site anaerobic digestion);
  • Has a pre-consumer composting program;
  • Has a post-consumer composting program;
  • Utilizes reusable service ware for “dine in” meals;
  • Provides reusable and/or third party certified compostable containers and service ware for “to-go” meals (in conjunction with an on-site composting program);
  • Offers discounts or other incentives to customers who use reusable containers (e.g. mugs) instead of disposable or compostable containers in “to-go” food service operations; and/or
  • Other materials management initiatives to minimize waste not covered above (e.g. working with vendors and other entities to reduce waste from food packaging).                                                                        

This credit includes on-campus dining operations and catering services operated by the institution and the institution’s primary dining services contractor.


Applicability

This credit applies to all institutions that have on-campus dining services operated by the institution or the institution’s primary on-site contractor.


Scoring

Each part is scored independently.

Part 1

An institution earns 0.125 points for each initiative outlined above up to the maximum of 1 point available for Part 1.

Part 2

An institution earns 0.125 points for each initiative outlined above up to the maximum of 1 point available for Part 2.


Measurement

Timeframe

Report on current policies or programs at the time of submission.

Sampling and Data Standards

Not applicable

 

The information presented here is self-reported. While AASHE staff review portions of all STARS reports and institutions are welcome to seek additional forms of review, the data in STARS reports are not verified by AASHE. If you believe any of this information is erroneous or inconsistent with credit criteria, please review the process for inquiring about the information reported by an institution or simply email your inquiry to stars@aashe.org.