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A guest blog by CAA/Wholesome Minnesota Summer Intern, Quincy Alberhasky
A Lifelong Passion for Compassionate Eating
I have tried to be vegetarian my entire life. When I was about five or so, I told my parents I did not want to eat meat anymore. I could not stomach hurting an animal just so that I could have dinner. But, like many ideas dreamt up by a five year old, they dissolved quickly. I tried a few more times throughout my life, success ranging from a couple days to a month.
Discovering the Impacts of Factory Farming
When I reached middle school, I began to learn about the morally corrupt factory farming industry and its adverse environmental effects. It is not a secret that modern food production systems mass produce, confine, and abuse the animals raised for slaughter [1][2]. It is perhaps even more widely known that its impacts on both the local and global environment are disastrous – polluting waters near and far, taking up massive plots of land, often displacing indigenous communities, and being one of the largest contributors to climate change [3][5][6]..
Upon researching and discovering these facts for the first time, I made the change to stop eating most meat, with the exception of seafood, a diet known as pescatarianism. This summer marks my 7th pescatarian anniversary.
Challenges of Eating Plant-Based in School
Now that I am over half a decade into my lifestyle, it has become second nature to me. However, my first year was not as smooth as the succeeding six have been. Just a 7th grader when I made the dietary switch, I found trouble while trying to eat lunch at my public school. My parents, both working, relied on school meals to feed my siblings and I. But my status as a pescatarian meant most school-provided meals did not accommodate me.
Every day entering the cafeteria, I was served pizza, pizza, and more pizza. These meals were not adequately nutritious for a young, growing mind. Luckily, I was old enough to start packing my own lunches, but this would not have been possible if I was younger or did not have the financial resources to do so.
I watched my good friend, who also switched to a more ethical diet at a similar time but could not bring her own food, eat the same school-provided lunch every day of high school. This is a reality for so many other students who can not eat animal-based products due to allergies, lactose intolerance, alpha-gal, health issues, religious reasons, or ethical reasons. As it stands, the public school food system is lacking in its ability to meet the dietary needs of all students.
Partnering With Wholesome Minnesota to Improve School Meals
Over the summer, I have had the pleasure of working with Compassionate Action for Animals’ Wholesome Minnesota (WM) as part of my position at the Plant Powered Youth Steering Committee (PPYSC). Public schools are a major target for Wholesome Minnesota. Currently, the organization is leading a campaign to push MN SF2970 and MN HF2764 through the Minnesota Congress.
These bills would require that schools supply plant-based meals to students upon request. With the guidance of my project advisor Jodi Gruhn, Wholesome Minnesota’s Director, I decided to focus my work on researching the monetary impacts of implementing plant-based meals into school foods as well as finding new partnerships to be made with local organizations.
Researching Community Support and Economic Feasibility for Plant-Based School Meals
My project focused on addressing two key conditions necessary for convincing legislators to pass a bill. The first one: do their constituents care about the things the bill seeks to accomplish? I began my research by collecting a list of Minnesota-based organizations who may have an interest in our work. Climate, animal-rights, and social organizations were at the top of the list.
Our highest priority was finding Minnesotan students who could testify that they needed the changes our bill was going to make. Without such statements, our attempted persuasions to the legislators would look weak and unfounded. Last week, I met with a few of these students to talk about plant-based foods and policy. Luckily, these students were equally as passionate as we are about implementing more equitable and ethical food options into public schools.
The second half of my project addressed a question equally crucial in the policy process: is this bill economically feasible? There isn’t a large precedent in the U.S. for schools that have implemented robust plant-based meal programs into their cafeterias. Even worse, there’s a lack of studies on the monetary implications of implementing such programs.
Generally, while researching case studies, I found that implementing plant-based meal options into schools reduced costs. However, factors affecting food costs and feasibility vary between schools, districts, and states, complicating application of prior studies to Minnesota school systems. Further, I examined online information provided by Minnesotan wholesale distributors and retailers.
Findings on the Cost of Plant-Based School Meals
Generally, large-scale caterers do not provide public information, or information at all, on pricing differences between plant-based versus animal-based meals. However, some retailers did provide pricing between specific food products. Unsurprisingly, the plant-based protein options, including legumes and beans, were more cost-effective than their meat alternatives.
Overall, there is a gap in information available that compares the cost of implementing plant-based meals into schools or other large-scale cafeteria settings. Still, what is available suggests that implementing plant-based meal options would be a net positive for school meal costs.
Looking Ahead: Building a More Compassionate Future
While my time with Wholesome Minnesota has come to an end, the campaign to pass MN SF2970 and MN HF2764 is certainly not. The public policy process notoriously takes an incredibly long time, but I am optimistic our goals will be met in due time. Since I joined Wholesome Minnesota, my experience with school foods, my plant-based friend who struggled with school meals, and the multitudes of current students who live plant-based lives have remained at the forefront of my mind.
Beside them reside the thoughts of the billions of farmed animals abused and slaughtered annually in the U.S., the communities wrecked by the global climate change that the agrifood system powers, and the industrial meat companies that have forced indigenous peoples out of their land. Schools — our cultural, intellectual incubators of the next generations are a great opportunity to advance our society toward more equitable food systems, and to introduce new students to the world of plant-based consumption. Proximity is a door to learning and exploration. Certainly, I am a case study of that fact.
Continuing the Journey Toward a Plant-Based Lifestyle
While I am no stranger to plant-based philosophy, time with Wholesome Minnesota and the PPYSC has motivated me to transition into a fully meatless diet. My hope is that with the progression of plant-based policy in schools, a parallel growth occurs in the minds of students who are exposed to different lifestyles and ways of consumption. A more ethical future necessarily includes the transformation of our global food systems, and I believe that can begin in our schools.
