Student athletes can now get disposable containers from Marketplace to take food off campus.
After conversations between members of the 24 Student Athlete Group, coaches and Washington and Lee Dining Services, Dining Services implemented a new system for student athletes to bring food to away games.
In the new system, coaches email Dining Services to request the number of boxes they need. Then student athletes go to d-hall, pick up the boxes and get their food.
In 2024, Dining Services implemented the ReusePass system, which required all students—athletes included—to use reusable containers and return them after three days. According to Ethan De Fonseka, ’27, vice president of the 24 Student Athlete Group, athletes’ main concern about the reusable containers was that it was unhygienic to carry food to and from away games among their sports luggage and clothing.
De Fonseka also said it was too easy to lose the containers.
“We were so worried about losing [a container] because if you lose it, then the school’s gonna fine you,” he said.
According to the university athletics website, the 24 Student Athlete Group is a coalition of student athletes whose “goal is to develop and strengthen a sense of responsibility and wellness…as well as taking a holistic approach when thinking about the lives of student-athletes on campus.”
Members of the club must be a student on a varsity athletic team and “must demonstrate an interest in building a student-athlete community based upon the principles set forth in the mission statement,” the website says.
Members of the 24 group reached out to co-faculty heads Tiffany Pins and Maddie Coleman about their concerns regarding the takeaway containers. Pins serves as the head women’s soccer coach and Coleman is the women’s lacrosse coach.
Pins said she knew the reusable takeaway containers were affecting athletes, but she hadn’t realized how big an issue they were.
“Even as coaches, we had not put it together the impact for away games—having to take that container and bring it home with you and hold onto it for the entire evening or potentially the entire weekend,” she said.
Alvin Wheeler, director of Dining Services, said the Dining Services team “just wanted to understand the need and actually make sure we were solving the problem instead of making more of a problem,” Wheeler said.
Wheeler says Dining Services considered the environmental implications of having such a program. But they decided the change was worth it.
“While yes, this doesn’t tie into our efforts of sustainability, it does tie into just the student experience and making sense in that particular instance,” he said.
