While my co-ed days are now long gone, I still vividly recall the dreaded trip to the dining hall for “food,” or at least the stuff that they called food. My memories are still haunted by one of these “edible” gems in particular; the Monte Cristo sandwich, a nasty concoction that consisted of French toast wrapped around some mystery lunchmeat. I still don’t get it, and I still wonder who thought that this was a good idea. I will never forget how elated I was when they put in a frozen yogurt machine and added a salad bar to the dining hall even though the produce for it was far from local or sustainable.

I got to thinking about my dining hall days because as a farm writer I am on plenty of listservs and other email lists, and I get all kinds of interesting emails and links about food and farming trends at colleges and universities and lately these seem to be increasing.

For example, a recent LA Times story outlines how farmers’ markets have spread on campuses throughout the U.S. because “a growing number of colleges are finding that campus farmers markets are a great fit, tapping into students’ interest in sustaining the planet.”

The story goes on to say that USC started a monthly “Trojan Fresh Market” in February 2008 and in order to make it profitable for farmers, they adjusted the usual farmers’ market model. The university buys the products from local farms and they set up the stands and offer payment options that make it easier for students to purchase the fresh produce.

Other colleges with farmers’ markets include UC Davis, UC Santa Cruz (my alma mater), UC San Diego, Stanford, Harvard, Brown, Portland State, the University of Minnesota, the University of Maine and the University of Arizona.

But having farmers’ markets on campus isn’t the only way that students are leading the way to bring local, sustainable food onto their campuses. One of the most ambitious ways is through the Real Food Challenge. This is a campaign led mostly by students to “increase the procurement of real food on college and university campuses. By leveraging their purchasing power we can catalyze the transformation of the larger food system.”

The group outlines that because colleges and universities spend over $4 billion each year on food, that they make up a significant portion of the national food system and that young people have a unique chance to directly influence this system through this campaign because they have the power, they are the ones eating cafeteria food every day and their voices and choices matter.

What exactly is Real Food? According to the group its, “food that is ethically produced, with fair treatment of workers, equitable relationships with farmers (locally and abroad), and humanely treated animals. It’s food that is environmentally sustainable, grown without chemical pesticides, large-scale mono cropping, or huge carbon footprints. Real Food is food that is healthy, tastes good, builds community, and has the potential to inspire broad-scale social change.”

They also point out that students are making a real impact on food issues on campuses since 300 institutions already have college farms, fair trade initiatives, or farm-to-cafeteria programs, and the number is growing every day.

The group also has several partners helping them including Health Care Without Harm, Oxfam, California Student Sustainability Coalition, Community Food Security Coalition–Farm to College Project, and Student/Farmworker Alliance.