AAC Livestream: Creating Plant-Forward Universities with Upgrade Dining

Learn how Upgrade Dining equips institutions with the data, insights, and student engagement tools needed to confidently grow plant-forward offerings while balancing cost, quality, and sustainability targets. Upgrade Dining is a nonprofit advisory and consulting service that implements plant-based strategies across the university food service sector. As CEO of Upgrade Dining, Navin oversees strategic operations, growth and partnerships, while Jessica, as Chief Strategy Officer, creates internal processes and workflows. Through Upgrade Dining, they have built a network of over 90 student consultants across more than 50 campuses nationwide, launched consulting partnerships with major universities covering over 100,000 students, and spoken at leading industry events on plant-based strategies. Their presentation will focus on how they've applied various tactics to commit universities to implementing plant-based strategies and how these learnings can apply more broadly across institutional spaces. Navin graduated from Harvard last year with a self-designed BA in Sustainable Food and Health Systems while Jessica graduated from Cornell with a BA/BS in Biology and Society. Both led plant-based clubs at their universities and founded the Upgrade Dining program while they were students.