cept a trayless dining policy (Trayless Dining, 11). At the end of the study, a post-survey was also given in order to determine the satisfaction of students based on the amount of food they wasted. According to the results, almost half of the students were satisfied with how much less food they threw away (Trayless, 14). At the end of the entire test study, the students determined that a total 50.355 lbs of food waste was reduced which was calculated to be approximately 0.105 lbs of food waste reduced per person. Dish washing at the end of each meal shift was also determined to be 30-45 minutes less than usual (Trayless 18). After additional calculations, they predicted that a total of 262,500 lbs of food waste per year could be reduced (Trayless 19), which will ultimately save a lot of money.
If students continue to waste food as they do now, the University of Michigan will continue to spend money on buying more food to replace it and even more on the energy required to wash the dishes and trays and remove the waste. Fortunately, a costless solution of creating a trayless dining policy and having servers serve a smaller portion of food can be the start to becoming more “green�. Until then, students should take the time to become more aware of their choices in the dining hall. Whether it is adopting the trayless method or making the effort to sample food before getting more, students can make their own difference and decrease the overall amount of food being wasted and energy being used on their terms. 90 Excellence in First-Year Writing 2011