An enduring memory of recent Tufts history, the dining hall tray is enshrined as one of those artifacts that upperclassmen remember with endearment, while sophomores and freshmen are left to only imagine as the feeling of support under their full dishes.
A year after trays were unceremoniously banished from Carmichael and Dewick-MacPhie Dining Halls, administration and students, including those who have been interested in the project since the very beginning, agree that it was ultimately successful. Since Tufts University Dining Services implemented the trayless initiative last fall, the decision — from an environmentally-friendly point of view at least — has been worth the pain. Food waste per meal, electricity and water consumption have all gone down considerably in Carmichael and Dewick, according to Director of Dining and Business Services Patti Klos, who added that students have adapted well and appreciate the shift toward greener meals despite initial concerns about inconvenience.
Though the project had been in the works for several years, efforts in the fall of 2009 on the part of students in "Environmental Action: Shifting from Saying to Doing," a class offered through the Experimental College, helped provide the impetus to put the plan into motion.
The spring 2010 preliminary 13-day trayless trial period in Carmichael yielded a 30 percent decrease in food waste, according to the Office of Sustainability's website. The success pilot program resulted in both of the dining halls adopting the trayless policy for the remainder of the school year.
The decision to eliminate trays in the dining halls was further supported by comprehensive yearlong data, Klos said, noting that Carmichael produced about 24,000 tons less composted waste during the 2011 fiscal year than in 2010, all while serving close to 20,000 more meals. Waste per meal decreased by 38 percent.
"We measure food waste by looking at the amount of compost, which consists of the kitchen waste and leftovers from students' dishes," Klos said.
At Dewick, the amount of composted waste actually went up slightly during the last fiscal year compared to the year before. At the same time, the downhill dining hall served almost 30,000 more meals, according to Klos.
In addition to reducing food waste, another major goal of the trayless project was to save electricity and water, according to Director of Facilities Technical Services and Tufts Energy Manager Betsy Isenstein. While energy data was unavailable for Carmichael due to an electric meter failure, Dewick had a three-percent reduction in electric consumption from the 2009-2010 academic year to the 2010-2011 year, Isenstein said in an email to the Daily.
Altering her calculations to account for the fact that the dining halls share water meters with the dorms and after removing data from the summer months, Isenstein concluded that water consumption in the dining halls decreased as well. Between 2009 and 2010, the decrease was seven percent in Dewick and 10 percent in Carmichael, she said.
"I'm not aware of other new water-reduction initiatives in either of these facilities during this time period, so I think it is safe to assume that a good part of the water reduction is attributable to the change to trayless dining," Isenstein said.
David Kelley, the unit manager at Carmichael, estimated that without the time needed to wash trays, the Dining Services employees' labor efforts have been significantly decreased.
While the elimination of the trays has indisputable environmental benefits, it has been equally important for the administration that students remain satisfied with their dining experience. This was easier to achieve with the incoming students that have never had the trays at their disposal, Klos said.
Even after two months at Tufts, freshman Meghan Bodo finds balancing a plate, a bowl, a drink and silverware in two hands "an art" that she has yet to perfect. She's willing to make the sacrifice, however.
"Once I learned … how much energy is saved by not using trays, I feel like my daily struggle to carry everything in one trip is definitely worth it," she said.
Adjustment to a world without trays may have been slower for upperclassmen, some of whom have just returned from a year abroad to face the absence of trays.
"There have been some complaints, mostly from upperclassmen," Klos said, "but the combined savings from Carmichael and Dewick are significant enough to warrant the change."
Kelley found that students learned to control their food portions and adapted very quickly, so overall the initiative has been received quite positively since the last school year. The dining halls themselves have undergone a fair share of adaptation by providing larger beverage cups, repositioning the silverware and hiring additional staff to clean the tables, Klos said.
Senior Alex Freedman took "Environmental Action: Shifting from Saying to Doing" and stayed involved in the trayless cause in the following semester.
The course's co-teacher at that time, Program Director of the Office of Sustainability Tina Woolston, was impressed with her students' success.
"We were lucky to have students who persevered and followed up on the issue after our class was over," Woolston said. "They realized that it takes time to study why [dining] was done that way in the past and look for alternatives to reach the same goals."
A similar approach has been used in several other environmental awareness and action campaigns that were launched on campus after the trayless initiative. Only this semester, for example, plastic bags and bottled water were removed from Hodgdon Good-to-Go, and napkins in the dining halls were switched to an unbleached recyclable brand.
"I think that [the trayless] project really shows that a group of average students can make big waves if they stay committed," Freedman said. "The administration is very receptive; all it takes is student demonstration that there is a desire and concern."
