Soon, a community dedicated to food hacks and lifestyle advice may find its way to campus — given enough people apply.
Management freshman Alyssa Parker has been working diligently to bring Spoon University to LSU.
Spoon University is a food resource website featuring on-campus dining, local eats and easy recipes. It is aimed specifically toward college students to help navigate their dining hall decisions and provide a variety of recipes and tips on how to adjust to the college lifestyle.
“For our chapter at LSU, we’re trying to focus on healthy eating and ways to have better options and provide easy recipes that you can cook in your dorm or in your apartment,” Parker said. “Or if you want to have that cheat or try yummy recipes, we’re also trying to do some stories on local restaurants.”
Northwestern University alumni Mackenzie Barth and Sarah Adler started the organization in 2012, when they were both undergraduates. The duo recognized the lack of educational resources for dining on and off campus and created the publication for people to gather and talk about food.
It began as a print publication called Spoon Magazine, which Northwestern still prints four times a year.
The staff grew to more than 100 people, and students from other universities began contacting them and asking how to start their own campus branches. Shortly after, Barth and Adler created the current website and gave it the name “Spoon University” because of its vast expansion.
“We really want to grow and hopefully be on 150-250 campuses by the end of the year,” said Andrea Jacobs, director of growth for Spoon University.
The national website features articles and stories covering topics like cooking, drinking, eating out, learning how to cook and lifestyle tips. There also is a tab to look at a specific university’s Spoon University page.
Currently, Spoon University has reached more than 50 campuses nationwide. The organization has nearly 20,000 likes on Facebook and a large following on Instagram.
“We want to be a resource for colleges to express themselves in a way that’s relevant to them, and right now, that conversation is around food,” Jacobs said.
While Parker is excited to bring the organization to campus, student opinions vary from optimistic to skeptical.
“I would definitely use it, but that’s probably because I’m not from here,” said international trade and finance freshman Sydney Gillespie. “I use Yelp and Urban Spoon all the time, so it would be cool to have one just for our
campus.” 
Architecture freshman Kaitlin Schuette believes the campus chapter should focus on reaching out to students who are unaware of how to make healthy
decisions.
“Would I use it? Probably not because I feel like I have a pretty decent understanding of what I need to eat right,” Schuette said. “But I feel like something like that could be useful if it was targeted to students who haven’t had a chance to be exposed to what they need to be eating right.”
Twenty people must be gathered to establish the chapter.
To bring this organization to campus, the first step was obtaining 300 likes and signatures on the website’s petition for LSU. To accomplish this, Parker took to social media asking friends and family to help promote the cause. Now that the first step is complete, Parker is working with Jacobs to recruit the minimum 20 members needed for the chapter team.
“It looks good on your résumé, and it’s a of fun if you love food. It’s not only about food, either — it would give a nice sense of community to LSU,” Parker said.
To apply for a position on the chapter team, visit lsu.spoonuniversity.com. The deadline to apply is March 13.
You can reach Ashlyn Rollins on Twitter @ash_r96.

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Courtesy of Spoon University