Overall Rating	Gold
Overall Score	69.22
Liaison	Leslie Raucher
Submission Date	Dec. 11, 2023

STARS v2.2

Barnard College
OP-8: Sustainable Dining

Status	Score	Responsible Party
	2.00 / 2.00	Jazmine Garcia Sustainability Coordinator Campus Sustainability and Climate Action

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Part 1. Sustainable dining initiatives

Local community engagement

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor host a farmers market, community supported agriculture (CSA) or fishery program, or urban agriculture project, or support such a program in the local community?:

Yes

A brief description of the farmers market, CSA or urban agriculture project:

Barnard Dining introduced an annual farmer's market event called Joyful where students can purchase 5 individual produce items for the equivalency of one meal swipe. The produce provided was from Chartwells local farm accounts. This initiative provided an opportunity to teach students about healthy and sustainable local produce.

Sustainability-themed outlet

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor host a sustainability-themed food outlet on-site, either independently or in partnership with a contractor or retailer?:

Yes

A brief description of the sustainability-themed food outlet:

Barnard's main dining hall includes "Pure Eats", a vegan home-style station that provides a variety of plant based food options. It is also alergen-freindly station.

Inclusive and local sourcing

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor support disadvantaged businesses, social enterprises, and/or local small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) through its food and beverage purchasing?:

Yes

A brief description of the support for disadvantaged businesses, social enterprises, and/or local SMEs:

We work with local restaurants and food vendors within the Compass-approved family such as our Sushi provider at Diana Center Café and our exclusive purchasing policy with our two local coffee vendors at Liz’s Place. We assist local and disadvantaged food-related business with product tastings and tablings at our units, and providing support in becoming part of the Compass-approved network.

Estimated percentage of total food and beverage expenditures on products from disadvantaged businesses, social enterprises, and/or local SMEs:

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Low-impact dining

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor host low impact dining events or promote plant-forward options?:

Yes

A brief description of the low impact dining events and/or plant-forward options:

We have a dedicated station, "Pure Eats," that offers meatless options (vegan/vegetarian) allowing educated customers to make lower-impact and plant-forward dining choices. Our catering unit offers vegan and vegetarian options and always includes a meatless protein option. Our Kosher dine-in program always includes a meatless protein option at each meal.

Vegan dining program

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor have a vegan dining program that makes diverse, complete-protein vegan options available to every member of the campus community at every meal?:

Yes

A brief description of the vegan dining program:

Vegan and vegetarian protein options are available at every meal, including in the Kosher servery. In addition, we offer a station, "Pure Eats," that is both a vegan and allergen-free. The meatless and vegan dishes available daily are free of the nine most common allergens. Though this station is not open during breakfast, it is open during lunch and dinner daily.

Labelling and signage

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor inform customers about low impact food choices and sustainability practices through labelling and signage in dining halls?:

Yes

A brief description of the sustainability labelling and signage in dining halls:

Food is labeled using vegetarian, vegan, gluten-free and balanced diet icons in all locations and catering. We focus on serving local produce and other local products to the Barnard community and feature our local produce partners in our locations, including wall signage in the main dining facility listing locally sourced providers and our sustainability sourcing scorecard. We know local doesn’t mean only vegetables and fruit. Other locally sourced ingredients includes cheese and milk, beverages, and meats.

Part 2. Food waste minimization and recovery

Food recovery program

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor participate in a competition or commitment program and/or use a food waste prevention system to track and improve its food management practices?:

Yes

A brief description of the food recovery competition or commitment program or food waste prevention system:

Barnard Dining uses Waste Not, a back of house waste tracking system to track production waste, overproduction waste and wasted out of date inventory. Areas of improvement within the waste stream are identified and these goals are improved upon after discussion and collaboration with culinary and operation teams at each dining location.

We have modified menus and portions to reduce post consumer food waste.

Trayless dining and portion modifications

Has the institution or its primary dining services contractor 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?:

Yes

A brief description of the trayless dining or modified menu/portion program:

We utilize reusable trays in our all-you-care-to-eat facilities and do not utilize trays in our retail facilities. Additionally, in alignment with official dietary guidelines, our locations serve portion-controlled meals offer smaller plate sizes in our AYCTE facility.

Food donation

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor donate food that would otherwise go to waste to feed people?:

Yes

A brief description of the food donation program:

We utilize the Columbia chapter of the Food Recovery Network, which pairs dining providers with local shelters, churches, and community centers.

Food materials diversion

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor divert food materials from the landfill, incinerator or sewer for animal feed or industrial uses?:

Yes

A brief description of the food materials diversion program:

In all dining locations on campus, we have back of house composting to collect food scraps from the kitchen. The campus has several food scraps collection bins in all academic buildings, 26 offices, and 3 dorms. This post-consumer food waste is taken to a municipal bio-digester in Brooklyn, where it converted into fuel.

Composting

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor have a pre-consumer composting program?:

Yes

A brief description of the pre-consumer composting program:

Waste Not 2.0 - Built by Chefs for Chefs, the Waste Not 2.0 is our web-based, waste-tracking program designed to implement chef behavioral change with real-time tracking and dashboard reporting. We utilize the Waste Not program to collect any expired, over production, and kitchen scraps from back of house to add to the campus composting collection bins.

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor have a post-consumer composting program?:

Yes

A brief description of the post-consumer composting program:

Introduced this Fall 2022, Barnard now offers food scraps collection in our dine-in location on campus. Signage was added to the collection areas to help guide students. This initiative was boosted by having sustainability students stationed at the collection sites to guide students on how to properly compost. Students were stationed during the first week of fall semester on a daily basis to inform new students and returning students of the update. An additional educational campaign was introduced which consisted of notifying all students, staff, and faculty through social media, various newsletters, email blasts, and posters around campus.

Dine-in service ware

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor utilize reusable service ware for “dine in” meals?:

Yes

A brief description of the reusable service ware program:

Reusable plates, bowls and silverware are available at the dine-in location.

Take-away materials

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor provide reusable and/or third party certified compostable containers and service ware for “to-go” meals (in conjunction with an on-site composting program)?:

Yes

A brief description of the compostable containers and service ware:

Compostable containers, serviceware and straws are available at our retail facilities.

Does the institution or its primary dining services contractor offer discounts or other incentives to customers who use reusable containers instead of disposable or compostable containers in “to-go” food service operations?:

A brief description of the reusable container discount or incentives program:

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Optional Fields

A brief description of other sustainability-related initiatives not covered above:

As of November 1, 2021, Barnard Dining is no longer providing single-use plastic beverage straws that are not compostable.

Website URL where information about the sustainable dining programs is available:

https://www.dineoncampus.com/barnard/sustainability

Additional documentation to support the submission:

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Data source(s) and notes about the submission:

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