Melissa McEwen is sick of residence hall food – literally. After McEwen, senior in ACES, came down with food poisoning as a sophomore, she decided to look for other alternatives.

“I discovered Just Food, an RSO that promotes locally grown food,” McEwen said. “Ever since, I’ve been eating food grown locally, and I’ve been much healthier.”

Many colleges have gone a step further and begun incorporating locally grown foods into their dining services, according to Inside Higher Ed’s Web site.

Dawn Aubrey, senior assistant director of dining services, said the University has been serving locally grown food for years but only recently began making a concerted effort to increase the amount purchased.

“There is especially a need for this now with environmental concerns, and students are asking about it as well,” Aubrey said. “It’s our way of listening to them.”

Aubrey estimated that 25 percent of food served in dining halls is grown locally. She said the University purchases many dairy, pork, bakery and vegetarian products from farms within three hours of campus.

“We believe serving it is the right thing to do to support the community and to help with sustainability,” Aubrey said.

Rebecca Roach, teaching associate in food science and human nutrition, agrees but believes more can be done and that the University would benefit nutritionally, economically, socially and environmentally if more locally grown food was served.

“Research shows that food grown and harvested close to the community may have more nutrients than food put on trucks and shipped,” Roach said.

“And the community will benefit because it allows them to get in touch with the farmer and see where their food is coming from.”

Jodi Smith, marketing director for The National Association of College and University Food Services, said locally grown food also saves money.

“Less travel time can create fresher food and lower transportation costs,” Smith said. “So not only is it socially better to be supporting the local economy, but it can help operations financially as well.”

Roach believes the University does not have more local food because it is comfortable in its purchasing cycle and does not train food-service employees to handle it.

“Dining servers need to learn to utilize fresh foods rather than learning how to open up canned containers,” Roach said.

Aubrey said the University would prefer to serve more local products but because many local foods are harvested during the summer when most students aren’t on campus, it is difficult to increase the amount served.

McEwen attended the Real Food Summit, a conference focusing on the progress of locally grown college food in the Northeast, at Yale University earlier this month. She said that although there was not a wide variety of local food choices at Yale, every selection was healthy and delicious.

“One meal consisted of pizza with fresh ricotta and local butternut squash,” McEwen said, “And another time I had wild salmon with ginger-grazed local carrots.”

McEwen believes the University can begin serving locally grown food if the system is restructured to eliminate unhealthy foods and provide for a local food source.

Smith said that students should encourage the administration to bring locally grown foods to campus.

“Rather than going to the administration and telling them to do it, I would suggest students to do the legwork ahead of time,” Smith said.

Smith suggested that students find out what needs to be done to bring the food to campus and figure out a solution to any possible obstacles. Once this is accomplished, Smith said students should present the issue to the decision makers.

“It’s easier to make change when change is easy,” Smith said.