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Plant-Based Food in Public Schools is the Future

An update on PFT’s push for plant-based meals in San Diego schools

The mission of the Plant Forward Team (PFT) is to help the San Diego community reduce emissions and other environmental impacts associated with animal agriculture by educating about and promoting a plant-based diet, as well as advocating for policies that promote the reduction of animal-based products.

Introduction

Food is important not only for the taste and joy it brings but also for its cultural, nutritional, and climate impacts (1). Food-related emissions are a major driver of climate change (2,3,4,5). Last year, the EAT-Lancet Commission on healthy, sustainable and just food systems revised its global dietary guidelines, recommending more plant-based foods and less saturated fat to achieve climate-change mitigation goals and improve health, as diets high in red meat and saturated fat are linked to worse health outcomes (6,7). This does not include the serious ethical concerns related to animal agriculture (8,9). Thus, being mindful of the food on our plates, especially in institutional settings, can positively impact our climate, health, and the lives of farmed animals.

While many can choose what they eat, millions of children rely on school meals as their main source of daily nutrition and food assistance. The Department of Agriculture reports serving 9.3 billion meals in fiscal year 2024 across its Child Nutrition Programs in the US (10). In San Diego, the 2019 State of the Food System report highlighted the link between nutritious foods and food insecurity, noting nearly 25% of food assistance came from school meals and other child nutrition programs. More recently, the San Diego Hunger Coalition 2026 report found that 13% of food assistance comes from school and youth meals.*

* The percentages may not be directly comparable between reports due to assessment methodologies.

In the 2022-2023 school year, California advanced its efforts to ensure adequate nutrition by enacting the Universal Meals Program (UMP). UMP requires public schools, county offices of education, and K-12 charter schools to provide free breakfast and lunch to students daily.

Despite efforts to increase availability, a challenge remains. If you are vegetarian, vegan, have dietary restrictions, or cannot eat the food served for religious reasons, simply having food available is not enough. What food is available matters too, and can influence students’ dietary habits (11). In these cases, parents or students become responsible for meeting these needs, even though plant-based foods are more accessible to a broader audience, cheaper, and more environmentally friendly.

Shifting these meals toward more sustainable, plant-forward options in the US presents a substantial opportunity to mitigate climate change (12, 13), and school food systems across the country can do more to meet nutrition and sustainability goals (12, 13). For these reasons, the Plant Forward Team has spent the last several months reaching out to our community to gather signatures urging San Diego schools to adopt plant-based meals. Through the petition, our goal is to show school districts that there is strong demand/support for increasing plant-based meals and beverages in San Diego Schools. To date, we’re close to our initial goal of 1000 signatures, but there is more work to do. Still, the data we’ve collected offers meaningful insights.

“As a student in the San Diego Unified School District, I would love to see more plant based food options in the cafeteria and efforts to educate about the impact of the food we eat. I myself have been involved in climate action for years but i t was not until recently that I learned that what I eat is probably my biggest impact on the environment. This is a topic that students are not exposed to enough so it is amazing to give kids more plant based options to build sustainable and healthy habits from a young age.”

  • Student quote from petition urging SD schools to adopt plant-based food

Analysis

To better understand who is engaging with our petition and why, we analyzed the responses collected so far. We asked signatories to identify their role in the school community. The chart below shows how those roles are distributed among our respondents. Most signatures have come from community members, followed by K-12 students, parents, and so on.

In our petition, we asked people to designate which category an individual falls into within the community. Of course, we all wear many hats, and, as such, if more than one category was chosen, individuals were ranked according to: student (1), teacher (2), parent (3), community member (4). Most signatures came from community members, followed by K-12 students, parents, and so on.

We believe the greatest impact comes from the voices of the students themselves. Below are the comments shared with us during the signature collection. Hover over each to see what students, teachers, and community members are thinking.


San Diego County has 476,844 enrolled students (2024 – 2025) across 42 public school districts, as shown on our map below. Enrollment ranges from the second-highest in all of CA at San Diego Unified (113,787) to some of the smallest at Julian Union High (112), according to the 2024 – 2025 annual report to the community produced by the SD County Office of Education. Currently, most student signatures come from students within San Diego Unified, followed by Sweetwater Union.

Among the schools most represented in our petition responses are Pacific Beach Middle School (PBMS) in the SD Unified School District and Eastlake High School. The likely explanation for the preponderance of signatures from PBMS is our passionate youth volunteers at SD350 and the challenges of reaching students across San Diego County.

The interactive map below shows the geographic distribution of petition signatures by zip code. The size of the circles on the map represents higher concentrations of signatures. Click on them to see the distribution. You can toggle school districts on and off using the map controls in the top right. Additional metadata for each school is available in the district metadata browser at the top left.

Steps PFT other orgs and schools are taking

A Shared Vision for Systemic Change

Part of PFT’s long-term vision is to see plant-based by default become the standard not only in schools but also in local government and beyond. More than our team shares this vision, and fortunately, many great efforts have improved our food systems, including those at the city and county levels in San Diego.

Local School District Progress: Carlsbad Unified

This past June in Carlsbad Unified School District, after nearly two years of effort spearheaded by Kathy Rallings, a PFT member and lead of the North County Team, an update to an administrative regulation (AR5030) to improve student wellness was made with a particular focus on food and nutrition.

Federal Advocacy: The Plant Powered School Meals Pilot Act

More specifically, as a member of the Plant Powered School Meals Coalition, PFT has met with legislative aides from the offices of Representatives Scott Peters (District 50) and Sara Jacobs (District 51), urging them to support the Plant Powered School Meals Pilot Act (H.R.5867 / S.3669). If passed, the act would provide $10 million in grants to help school districts expand plant-based meal options and improve access to non-dairy milk alternatives for students with medical or dietary needs. Check out the easy-to-read factsheet.

Additionally, the Whole Milk for Healthy Kids Act passed earlier this year. This federal legislation allows districts to offer soy milk on the lunch line for the first time ever and removes many barriers to access for students wanting a non-dairy alternative. Learn more here.

San Diego Food System Alliance and Food Vision 2030

The San Diego Food Systems Alliance began in 2012, focusing on justice, equity, sustainability, people, and the environment. In 2021, they released Food Vision 2030, looking to 1) Cultivate Justice, 2) Fight Climate Change, and 3) Build Resilience. Their efforts are helping improve food security in San Diego and increase food availability for schools across the region. This October, SDFA will hold its 6th annual gathering with the theme of nourishment, an event open to all interested in learning about our food systems.

Initiatives in higher education in SD:

While our efforts have focused on K-12 schools, there are numerous opportunities to improve food on college campuses. Efforts from organizations such as the Alt Protein Project led by the Good Food Institute and initiatives like the UC San Diego Center for Community Health at the University of California San Diego and the Center for Food Systems Transformation at the University of San Diego are taking strides as well. Additional resources can be found at the Plant-Based Treaty and Better Food Foundation, the latter of which will be hosting a public lecture titled Michael Grunwald: We Are Eating the Earth, with the Center for Food Systems Transformation on October 14th.

What Still Stands in the Way

We believe the biggest challenges to increasing plant-based meals in schools are educational, financial, and political. A recent review of US school lunch guidelines found that California is one of three jurisdictions- out of all 50 states and the District of Columbia- to promote plant-based meals in schools at a statewide level through explicit legislation, albeit with no mandated frequency of such offerings (14).

Healthier, more equitable, and sustainable food options exist; some food service providers and schools want to make this shift, but changing what we eat is a hurdle, especially when hundreds of thousands of students eat once or twice a day in a San Diego school cafeteria, and millions nationally. Education and messaging are key to student acceptance of plant-forward options, and low acceptance can be a challenge in itself. State and federal funding gaps (15), along with certain federal policies, can further complicate the picture and make it difficult for schools to transition to healthier plant-based foods.

For instance, earlier this year, the highly controversial 2025 – 2030 Dietary Guidelines For Americans (DGA) was released by the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), the same federal body that oversees nutrition standards for school meals and funds the National School Lunch Program. The new model now prioritizes meat, poultry, fish, eggs, dairy products, and fats such as butter or beef tallow when cooking (16). This is despite the accumulating evidence that they are neither ideal nor necessary for a healthy diet (6,7,17,18). These guidelines also contradict the advice in The Scientific Report of the 2025 Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee, which highly recommends plant-based foods. These new DGAs are expected to shape upcoming meal patterns for the National School Lunch Program and School Breakfast Program. Efforts to prevent this include a lawsuit from the Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine.

The Plant Forward Team has signed on to two letters addressed to Congress and the USDA, drafted by Friends of the Earth after their report analyzed the health risks of status quo school lunches across the US and outlined a better path forward (19). Both letters request investment in school districts to support more scratch cooking, update nutrition standards, and reform USDA commodity procurement to phase out processed meats and expand plant proteins.

Despite a complicated landscape rife with mixed messaging and detrimental policies, many schools welcome the opportunity to do their part to improve school nutrition. However, improvements can come with upfront costs, such as training food-service staff, working with new food-sourcing partners, and updating kitchen infrastructure. Fortunately, financial resources exist for these improvements, and several organizations, including ours, are working to provide more support.

Earlier this summer, Governor Newsom and the CA legislature approved a new state budget that included major wins for expanding non-dairy milk and plant-based meals in schools. The budget allocated $500 million of funding for the Kitchen Infrastructure and Training (KIT) Program. KIT funding can be used to expand scratch cooking, procure healthier foods and beverages (including plant-based!), train cafeteria staff, and upgrade kitchens. This new funding helps address many of the barriers school districts face when they want to serve more plant-based meals in the cafeteria. Schools across the state will be able to apply for KIT funding for the 2027/28 school year soon, and we will reach out to schools to let them know when they can start. We are grateful to Governor Newsom and the CA legislature for passing this budget, and to the many groups who advocated for this funding. We hope that you share in our goal of seeing KIT funding go toward increasing plant-based foods in San Diego schools.

Steps You Can Take

  1. If you live in San Diego, please sign our petition if you haven’t already. Then share it with someone you know, especially students who are interested.
  2. Sign up to volunteer with our team or one of the many orgs listed above
  3. Contact your legislators to support legislation, such as H.R.5867 / S.3669.
  4. Sign on to actions that Tell USDA: Give Our Kids Better School Food from Friends of the Earth
  5. Attend events and free public lectures to learn more about our food systems such as:
  6. Read the literature presented here, especially the report issued by Friends of the Earth, to learn more about the complexities of procuring and distributing healthy school meals.
  7. If you are a student, teacher, parent, or community member, provide public comment at school board meetings urging the board to adopt more plant-based meals.
  8. If you are a parent or student, ask your school district to serve plant-based milk at lunch.

As we collect more signatures, we will update the information presented here.

References

  1. Ritchie, H., Rosado, P., & Roser, M. (2022). Environmental impacts of food production. Our World in Data. https://ourworldindata.org/environmental-impacts-of-food
  2. Li, Y., He, P., Shan, Y., Li, Y., Hang, Y., Shao, S., Ruzzenenti, F., & Hubacek, K. (2024). Reducing climate change impacts from the global food system through diet shifts. Nature Climate Change, 14. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-024-02084-1
  3. Crippa, M., Solazzo, E., Guizzardi, D., Monforti-Ferrario, F., Tubiello, F. N., & Leip, A. (2021). Food systems are responsible for a third of global anthropogenic GHG emissions. Nature Food, 2(3), 198–209. https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-021-00225-9
  4. Ritchie, H. (2019). Food production is responsible for one-quarter of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. Our World in Data. https://archive.ourworldindata.org/20251125-173858/food-ghg-emissions.html
  5. Crowley, A. (2025, March 26). Animal agriculture’s impact on climate change. SanDiego350. https://sandiego350.org/2025/03/26/animal-agricultures-impact-on-climate-change/
  6. Rockström, J., Thilsted, S. H., Willett, W. C., Gordon, L. J., Herrero, M., Hicks, C. C., Mason-D’Croz, D., Rao, N., Springmann, M., Wright, E. C., Agustina, R., Bajaj, S., Bunge, A. C., Carducci, B., Conti, C., Covic, N., Fanzo, J., Forouhi, N. G., Gibson, M. F., … DeClerck, F. (2025). The EAT–Lancet Commission on healthy, sustainable, and just food systems. The Lancet, 406(10512), 1625–1700. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0140-6736(25)01201-2
  7. World Health Organization. (2023). Red and processed meat in the context of health and the environment. https://www.who.int/publications/i/item/9789240074828
  8. Barnhill, A., Bernstein, J., Faden, R., McLaren, R., Rieder, T. N., & Fanzo, J. (2022). Moral reasons for individuals in high-income countries to limit beef consumption. Food Ethics, 7(2). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41055-022-00100-8
  9. Animal welfare. (n.d.). In Choose Food Ethically: Benchmarking Food Systems. Johns Hopkins Berman Institute of Bioethics. Retrieved August 29, 2026, from https://bioethics.jhu.edu/research-and-outreach/projects/global-food-ethics-policy-program/past-projects/choose-food-ethically-benchmarking-food-systems/core-ethical-commitments/animal-welfare/
  10. USDA Economic Research Service. (2025). Child nutrition programs. USDA Economic Research Service. https://ers.usda.gov/topics/food-nutrition-assistance/child-nutrition-programs
  11. Micha, R., Karageorgou, D., Bakogianni, I., Trichia, E., Whitsel, L. P., Story, M., Peñalvo, J. L., & Mozaffarian, D. (2018). Effectiveness of school food environment policies on children’s dietary behaviors: A systematic review and meta-analysis. PLOS ONE, 13(3), e0194555. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0194555
  12. Stern, A. L., Blackstone, N. T., Economos, C. D., & Griffin, T. S. (2022). Less animal protein and more whole grain in US school lunches could greatly reduce environmental impacts. Communications Earth & Environment, 3(1), 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1038/s43247-022-00452-3
  13. Love, D. C., Conrad, Z., Altema-Johnson, D., Ramsing, R., Bassarab, K., Thorne-Lyman, A. L., Williams, D. A. L., Moore, E. R. H., Nussbaumer, E. M., & Anderson, P. T. (2026). Food substitution and waste reduction can reduce the environmental impacts and food costs of school meal programs in the United States: An 2011-2018 NHANES analysis. Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, 126(3), 156118. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jand.2025.04.006
  14. Modak, V., Karthikeyan, A., Sorajja, N., Mangalesh, S., Shah, P., Kaushik, S., Gashi, E., & Faillace, R. (2026). State-level promotion of plant-based school meals in the United States: A national policy review. Nutrients, 18(15), 2556. https://doi.org/10.3390/nu18152556
  15. USDA Economic Research Service. (2025). School food authorities work with state and federal agencies to implement the National School Lunch Program. Amber Waves. https://ers.usda.gov/amber-waves/2025/june/school-food-authorities-work-with-state-and-federal-agencies-to-implement-the-national-school-lunch-program
  16. Nguyen, M. (2026, February 19). The new food pyramid is a climate mess. SanDiego350. https://sandiego350.org/2026/02/18/the-new-food-pyramid-is-a-climate-mess/
  17. Hendley, J. (2026, January 26). What you need to know about the new dietary guidelines. Harvard Health. https://www.health.harvard.edu/diet-and-nutrition/what-you-need-to-know-about-the-new-dietary-guidelines
  18. Thomas, T. (2026, February 17). Tip sheet: From plate to pyramid, understanding the new dietary guidelines. College of Public Health, George Mason University. https://publichealth.gmu.edu/news/2026-02/tip-sheet-plate-pyramid-understanding-new-dietary-guidelines
  19. Friends of the Earth & Chef Ann Foundation. (2026). Beyond the nugget: The hidden health risks of industrially produced animal proteins—and the path toward better school lunches. https://foe.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/09/BeyondNugget_Report_Body_final.pdf