Statement on our Absence

Throughout our 18 year history, Real Food Challenge has had major wins in the fight against corporate food.  We have also faced significant challenges, both internal and external, to our work.  We want to share the story of our journey and what has led us to this moment of re-emergence.

Real Food Challenge (RFC) was founded in 2007 by student organizers and allies with a bold vision: to transform university food procurement and build student power for food justice. RFC developed a grassroots organizing model that empowered students to hold their campuses accountable for shifting billions of dollars in food purchasing toward local, fair, and sustainable producers. Students mobilized across the country - using community building and the Real Food Calculator as a tool to audit dining contracts, leading campaigns to secure Real Food Campus Commitments for the national “20% by 2020” campaign. RFC’s annual summits across the US brought together students and movement allies for intensive organizing and cross-campus strategy building. These efforts connected RFC to a larger network of food system movements while channeling the voices and impact of students. 

A key driver of RFC’s success was the Fellowship Program, which recruited recent graduates for a year-long intensive organizing experience. Fellows received rigorous training in campaign strategy, base-building, and university procurement, then were deployed to campuses across the country to recruit and mentor student organizers. This model built a deep and growing network of campus leaders, expanding RFC’s reach and impact. By 2018 several hundred campuses had RFC chapters with 83 universities—including the entire California State University system—had signed onto Real Food Campus Commitments, with some pledging up to 40% Real Food. 

As student interests expanded beyond procurement and campus-focused campaigns, a group of RFC organizers launched Uprooted & Rising (UNR), a new initiative centered on food sovereignty and direct action, tackling corporate consolidation and industrial food systems through campaigns like Block Corporate Salmon and Stop Land Grabs. RFC and UNR officially split under the shared umbrella of Real Food Generation (RFG), but tensions over priorities, strategy, and governance emerged. Energy and resources increasingly flowed toward UNR, while RFC’s once-robust national organizing structure shrank to a single policy-focused staff position. Around this time, our founding Executive Director, Anim Steel, who had led the organization for over a decade, announced his departure, prompting a leadership transition that further disrupted RFC’s momentum.

By 2022, these underlying challenges — gaps in implementation, leadership transitions, and internal organizational tensions — coupled with the destabilizing effects of a global pandemic, led us to a breaking point.  Longtime staff departures, a stalled strategic planning process, and unclear governance structures left RFC at a crossroads. While students remained passionate about food justice, the infrastructure to support and sustain their power had weakened. Concerned for the long-term health of the organization, RFC’s advisory board intervened in January 2023 with the aim of supporting employees in navigating what had become deep rifts of trust and accountability in the organization. Shortly thereafter, community members in one of the primary locations in which UNR had been organizing surfaced very damaging claims about some of UNRs core organizing staff.  Investigation of those claims led to the firing of nearly half of RFG’s staff in Spring of 2023.  This was followed by the resignation of several more staff members shortly thereafter.  A statement from the Advisory Board detailing the actions they took during this time can be found here.

After a summer of emergent reflection, the organization returned to its original unified brand and mission under Real Food Challenge.  We hired two new program directors in the fall of 2023 who have been diligently revamping the Real Food Calculator, ensuring our Real Food Standards are informed by the most current and comprehensive research and gradually rolling out our presence on college campuses. We are working to reposition students as drivers of our work, building relationships and inviting their voices into this new iteration of RFC. Our relaunch in the spring of 2025 aims to reinvigorate our national presence by seeding campaigns on campuses which have yet to make Real Food pledges and by building accountability and integrity with those who already have made the commitment. 

It is clear that the RFC mission is as viable as ever.  With our updated calculator and standards, we are ready to nurture the depth and breadth of student organizing for which we are known and are excited to bring the fight against extractive agriculture and corporate food service management practices that harm people and the planet. 

We look forward to sharing more about our absence and plans for the future in our upcoming Webinar on May 6, 2025. Register here!