11.9 percent of residents of Tompkins County, or 12,200 people, were food insecure in 2022, according to Feeding America. Charlotte Ariyan ’26 said she believes Cornell can be part of the solution.
As a first-year student living on North Campus, Ariyan was surprised by how much food Cornell’s dining halls produced and figured that a lot of it was wasted. Two years later, Ariyan is the community outreach chair for Cornell’s chapter of the Food Recovery Network, a national organization with chapters around the county working to recover food waste and combat food insecurity.
Ariyan explained how dining hall kitchens have leftover ready-to-eat meals, which Cornell FRN donates to the Friendship Donation Network — a donation center that “rescues fresh, nutritious foods that would otherwise be thrown away.” Donations are then distributed to hunger relief programs throughout Tompkins and nearby counties.
Ariyan said she has seen firsthand the impact of FRN on FDN, with Cornell being one of the only donors to provide full, pre-made meals to the center.
“A lot of people from addiction recovery centers, homeless shelters or just other people in need can come to this center and get food,” Ariyan said.
Anaïs Ozer ’26, director of volunteers at Cornell FRN, explained that FRN has two types of volunteers — recovery volunteers and recovery drivers. Recovery volunteers go in groups to the dining halls to recover unserved food and package it before meeting the recovery drivers at a designated meeting spot. The recovery drivers then take the packaged food to FDN and weigh and refrigerate the recovered food.
Cornell FRN currently recovers food from four dining halls on campus — Morrison Dining, North Star Dining Room, Jansen’s Dining Room and Becker House Dining Room.
FRN runs recoveries twice per week from Morrison Dining and once per week for each of the other three. Ozer explained that FRN hopes to expand operations to include more dining halls but lacks enough volunteers.
“It was a really big deal when we got to recover from Morrison and especially getting a place to store all the [food] containers and bags in [the dining hall],” Ozer said. “The biggest thing we struggle with in food recovery is making sure we have enough people to drive and to volunteer, and if we had more volunteers, especially with cars, we would be able to do a lot more.”
Madeleine Rodoski ’27, a recovery officer for FRN, said that contributing to FRN’s efforts requires only a small time commitment in order to make a difference.
“I wish more people would get involved and know how easy it is,” Rodoski said. “It is such a small time commitment — you just sign up for one or two [recoveries] per semester to help move [food]. We usually meet around 7:30 p.m. or 7:40 p.m., and we’re done by 8 p.m. I wish people would get involved and learn more about [FRN and sustainability] in that way.”
Ariyan said that she feels FRN’s work goes overlooked, with most students not considering how much food waste Cornell produces.
“Almost no one knows about us, and a lot of people don’t even realize how much food is going to waste,” Ariyan said.
Rodoski echoed this sentiment, contextualizing Cornell FRN’s efforts as only part of countering food waste.
“I wish [people] knew how much [food waste] they produce,” Rodoski said. “I see people in the dining hall throwing out food or just not eating it all the time. Even though we are recovering a bunch of food, I wish they could see the amount. I wish people were more aware of food waste — it’s one part of sustainability that can [often be] overlooked.”