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Environmental and sustainability science major combats food waste on campus

Lipscomb University established a campus chapter of Save Our Supper, a national student organization, in fall 2015, and senior environmental and sustainability science major Courtney Christl ramped up the chapter’s activities and awareness campaigns this past school year.

Janel Shoun-Smith | 615.966.7078 | 

Two students scoop out pumpkin seeds.

Lipscomb University established a campus chapter of Save Our Supper, a national student organization, in fall 2015, and senior environmental and sustainability science major Courtney Christl ramped up the chapter’s activities and awareness campaigns this past school year.

Initially, the chapter’s mission was to glean unused food from the Bison Cafe and take it to Nashville food banks or hunger relief agencies for distribution. Since the founding of Lipscomb’s chapter, Save Our Supper has gleaned 2,800 pounds of unused food from Sodexo, which operates Lipscomb Dining Services.

This past year Christl, from Noblesville, Indiana, planned several campus events to increase student awareness of and participation in food recovery and preventing food waste.

During the year, Save Our Supper showed the documentary Just Eat It, about a dumpster-diving couple calling attention to the quality of the food we throw away every day, and hosted the first Food Tank Summit. Save Our Supper partnered with the Nashville Food Project and with the Society of St. Andrews to glean unused pumpkins from fields and use the pulp to make muffins for the workers in Lipscomb’s facilities department. The remaining pulp went to the Nashville Food Project, where Honors College alumna Grace Biggs (’10) serves as impact manager.

News - Muffins out of food waste

Christl also organized the Food Solutions Challenge and the Regional Summit for all campus chapters of Save Our Supper.

“I’m proud that our e?orts reaching a lot more students and raising student awareness of the harms of food waste. If you are in the food recovery network, you are there either for the environmental impact or as a way to reduce hunger,” says Christl.

The environmental and sustainability science program is housed in the Institute for Sustainable Practice in the College of Leadership & Public Service