We conducted a food waste audit at my school; this is what I learned
- Date: 25 March 2025
- Author: Rogue Bailey
My name is Rogue, and I’m thrilled to have this opportunity to introduce myself and my passions in this essay. I’m currently a senior attending Bioscience High School. Some of my hobbies include hiking, gardening (though I’m not that good at it), and learning!
Throughout my high school career, I’ve dedicated myself to learning as much as I can about sustainability and ways that I can make a difference in my community. Sustainability relates to everything we know and rely on. In the past years I’ve learned about recycling, native and invasive species, and water conservation. One of the most influential times in my education was my sophomore year when I worked with water conservation. A group of students and I worked with ASU and prepared tons of research about native species, natural watersheds, and more, all with the goal of adding a water-conserving garden to our school. The garden wasn’t just for conserving water, its purpose was to serve native wildlife in the city area.
This year, I knew I wanted to continue serving my community in any way I could. When I noticed the massive amounts of food that were being thrown away every day during lunchtime, I had to act. My gardening club had compost bins from different companies that would allow us to learn about composting and find a solution to using uneaten food. This sparked my interest in learning about food waste. When I saw our trash bins filled to the brim with good usable food, I thought about the families struggling to make ends meet and afford high-quality, healthy food.
I was already working with my club sponsor and teacher Ms. Loya, trying to figure out how we could use the Mill food recycler bins given to us for a research project that would relate to the food being wasted at our school or ways we could use compost in the future. We figured that the best way to start a project relating to the food waste at our school would be a food waste audit. This way we could gather data about exactly how much food is being wasted and what foods the students are not eating during lunchtime. When students were finished eating, they would be forced to go to one of three audit stations where volunteers would take the trash and leftover food, separate it into categorized buckets, and the buckets would be weighed after lunchtime. The data we collected separated the uneaten food into four categories: 1. Fruits and Veggies, 2. Milk, 3, Meat and Bread, and 4. Bread alone. We took this route because we realized that a lot of the main course options would be things like sandwiches, pizza, etc. and sometimes students would only eat the meat off the sandwiches while throwing the rest away.
The first audit was completed in October of 2024. After reviewing the data, it became very clear that fruits and veggies were being avoided the most during lunchtime. Out of almost 100 lbs of uneaten food, fruits and vegetables accounted for 45% of it at 43.85 lbs. After learning this information, finding a solution became our next priority. Since the next food waste audit wouldn’t be for months, I knew that there was more that could be done to help spread awareness about the waste happening in our school. That’s when Miss Loya showed me a picture taken by our freshman art teacher, Mr. King. He and a few students who helped during the audit collected all of the leftover food and arranged it neatly on a table, which turned out to be a strangely unique and thoughtful art piece.
This made me think that maybe if students could visually see what they are wasting, it would encourage them to reduce the amount of food they waste. With the permission of Mr. King, I used this idea and the data from October to create a visual piece using the food from school lunch. By the time of our next audit, I had a poster at every audit station so that students could visually see what they waste. Reviewing the data from this audit showed that the amount of food wasted went down by about 30%, going from 96 lbs to 70 lbs. Whether it was the actual audits or the visual representation that helped, we did see a significant decrease in the amount of food wasted.
Knowing that there are people who don’t have access to fresh vegetables while the vegetables in my school are being thrown away is what inspires me to continue with my project. I think that with the right solution, the food that students throw away can be put to use in a way that will aid the food deserts of Arizona. While I’m still at Bioscience, I hope to create an impact that will last beyond my time here. I hope that students and families alike will have the knowledge and resources to eliminate food waste, and have access to good quality, healthy food. In the future, even after I’ve graduated, I plan to continue on this journey of bringing food equality and quality to all of Arizona. Through research, collaboration and taking action, change can be made for those who need it the most.
This school year, Arizona State University's Sustainability Teachers Academy, Incite, Mill, and World Wildlife Fund's Food Waste Warriors program have partnered together to launch the Food Waste Futures Fellowship program with an inaugural cohort of 10 preK-12 educators from five schools across the Phoenix metropolitan area. The fellowship aims to create a lasting impact on the way schools engage with food waste. Teachers are responsible for creating educational lesson plans that complement the practicality of the Mill Food Recycler, shaping the way students learn and think about food waste. Ms. Brianne Loya and Mr. Matthew King, both mentioned in the article, have been selected to take part in this year's Food Waste Futures Fellowship cohort.