The Grades Are In: peta2 Rates Vegan-Friendliness of Every U.S. College

Massive First-of-Its-Kind Study of Four-Year Schools Results in A’s for University of North Texas, UC -–San Diego, Oklahoma City, and Brown

For Immediate Release:
October 8, 2013

Contact:
Shakira Croce 202-483-7382

Los Angeles — For the first time, peta2, PETA’s youth division, has ranked the vegan-friendliness of every four-year public and private nonprofit college and university with a dining program in the country. After reviewing the results of a survey sent to more than 2,000 schools nationwide, the group awarded each school a report card–style letter grade, and the results run the gamut between a perfect score for the University of California (UC) at San Diego and a failing 2 points out of 20 for Virginia’s Liberty University and Texas Tech University.

The complete rankings are available on peta2.com, where students can react to their schools’ grade with a “thumbs up” or “thumbs down” as well as contact peta2 with suggestions for raising—or lowering—that grade.

“Many schools are striving to meet students’ needs for delicious, healthy, and humane vegan food—but as peta2’s survey revealed, a lot of schools out there are still lagging behind student demand,” says peta2 Director Marta Holmberg. “We’ll help the underachievers study up on vegan dining options—and in the meantime, we’re letting prospective college students know where they can find the best vegan dining halls in the country.”

The University of North Texas—with its celebrated all-vegan dining hall, Mean Greens—earned an A, as did Brown University, with late-night vegetarian eatery The Ivy Room, and Oklahoma City University, which boasts a raw-food dining station. But UC -–San Diego’s all-vegan dining hall, Roots—combined with its campus-wide promotion of Meatless Mondays—helped the school snag an A.

Other highlights include a B for Minnesota’s Carleton College—with its vegan dining station, Wild Thymes—and a C for Massachusetts Institute of Technology, which managed to pass, thanks to its top-notch vegan chef and his vegan doughnuts. While UC -–San Diego reached the top of the class, nearby UC-Riverside did just the opposite: It earned an F, along with Texas Tech and the University of Richmond, which offer soy milk—but make few other efforts to provide students with healthy vegan food.

For more information and to see the complete results, please visit peta2.com.