Ohio University dining courts offer zero gluten-free options.
Though not all menu items have gluten ingredients, those options are labeled “non-gluten” because there is risk of cross-contamination. This distinction may seem insignificant to many, but it is vital for students with celiac disease.
“When I got here, it was a bit of a challenge,” Ally Ginder, a sophomore studying biology who has celiac, said. “I looked at a lot of different schools, and OU was probably the one with the least accommodations toward gluten free foods.”
What is celiac disease?
Celiac disease is an autoimmune disease that causes a heightened sensitivity to gluten, Lindsay Bailey, a registered dietitian at Akron Children’s Hospital, explained. Gluten is found in wheat, barley and rye, which are found most commonly in bread, pasta and many other common foods.
If consumed, gluten can cause a wide range of symptoms for someone with celiac. According to the Celiac Disease Foundation, those symptoms can include abdominal pain, fatigue, joint pain, nausea and vomiting.
Ginder said she has experienced these symptoms on multiple occasions after eating at the dining courts.
"These foods have to be avoided or they're causing damage to our systems, so that means complete avoidance of the allergen,” Bailey said.
About 1 in every 141 Americans has celiac disease, according to John Hopkins Medicine.
Dining court options
Ginder said she can count the dining court meals she feels comfortable eating on one hand.
“When you have like four meals that you just rotate, I got kind of tired of that, so I would lose like 10 pounds in like a week and a half,” Ginder said.
There are two dining courts available to students on campus: Nelson Court and The District on West Green.
When sampling a full day’s menu from each dining court, 59% of Nelson’s meal options contained gluten. Conversely, just over half of The District’s menu items were labeled as non-gluten.
However, that does not mean those options are automatically safe for students with celiac.
Cross-contamination
“The other concern is not only avoiding the food product, but also avoiding the contamination of the product,” Bailey said.
Bailey said gluten cross-contamination with gluten can happen through utensils, cooking appliances and even hands, meaning once you touch something with gluten it can spread through that contact.
Doctors diagnosed Ginder with celiac disease when she was 14 years old, but she said the struggle to cut gluten from her diet paled in comparison to transitioning to the dining courts. She said she sees cross-contamination everywhere she looks.
“I remember calling (my mom) in tears, and I was like, ‘I'm going to have to leave the school,’” Ginder said. “It was almost like, 'I'm too scared to eat anything here.'”
Kari Saunders, Culinary Services’ registered dietitian, said every Culinary Services staff member is trained to minimize cross-contamination as much as possible. The one-hour training focuses on the top 9 allergens to highlight the seriousness of different food allergies, including celiac disease.
“We can't really control the behaviors of other students in the dining areas, but we do train all of our staff,” Saunders said.
Hitting your protein
Luckily, sensitivity to cross-contamination varies on a case-by-case basis, and Ginder said it has become less of an issue for her in the past year. However, even students with celiac disease who are not affected by cross-contamination said they struggled navigating eating on campus.
Abbie Ogilbee, a senior studying nursing, is one of those students.
“It was a big transition,” Ogilbee said. “I definitely ate a lot less, and I got a lot less protein as well because there weren't that many options for me.”
Sample data revealed that the average menu item with gluten ingredients at Nelson Court has just over one gram of protein more than the average non-gluten item.
However, the District’s menu has an even larger disparity. There, the average non-gluten item has around 6 grams of protein, while the average for gluten-containing items is nearly twice that number.
Dining court alternatives
Ginder said she often ventures outside of OU Culinary Services for food, spending around $150 at Kroger every two weeks on top of her meal plan expenses.
According to OU’s website, the university requires students to participate in a meal plan for their first two academic years on campus. The most affordable meal plan for first-year students is the traditional 14, which costs $5,150 per year. The traditional 10 meal plan, which is slightly more affordable at $4,626, is only available for students in their second year and above. If their dietary needs are not being met, students with diet-restrictions can request an exemption from the meal plan requirement by emailing housing@ohio.edu.
Though Ginder feels her meal plan is a waste of money, she said there is not a better alternative.
“I don't know a lot of freshmen that would go to the grocery store and be able to meal prep their whole week,” Ginder said.
But she does know one. Hanna Sudbrink, a freshman studying applied nutrition and Ginder’s family friend, takes the bus to the grocery store every two weeks. Sudbrink said she also occasionally shops at Jefferson Marketplace, but without a flex meal plan, she has to pay out of pocket.
“I only have a traditional plan, so I can't go spend the rest (of my swipes) at Jeff Market,” Sudbrink said. “They have pretty much what you need there, but it's expensive.”
According to Culinary Services’ website, aside from the dining courts, students on a traditional meal plan can only use their weekly allotted swipes at the campus food trucks, Shively Grab N Go and Smooth Moves in Boyd Market. Students said most of those locations pose too much of a risk for cross-contamination.
ADA
The Americans with Disabilities Act is a federal law that protects individuals with disabilities from discrimination. Marcy Hintzman, a research specialist and project coordinator for the Great Lakes ADA Center, defined a disability as “a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities.”
Hintzman said celiac disease causes an impairment that is significant enough to be recognized as a disability under the law. As a public institution, OU is required to provide accommodations under Title II of the ADA, she added.
Students who feel unaccommodated in the dining courts have the right to file a complaint through the university’s ADA office, Hintzman explained, but she warns against acting too quickly.
“We always suggest to people to start at the lowest local level possible,” Hintzman said. “Most people with disabilities, they don't want to have to file a complaint, they just want access.”
Student Accessibility Services declined an interview on the subject. However, in a written statement, Kristi Kozma, the assistant director for Student Accessibility Services, said the needs of students with dietary disabilities are met on an individual basis, which could include placing them in a residence hall with a kitchen or even providing them with a separate fridge for their room.
“If a student has diet restrictions/special dietary needs that they disclose to SAS during the ADA accommodation process, we immediately connect them to the culinary dietitian,” Kozma wrote in an email.
Special diet assistance
Saunders began her role as the registered dietitian for Culinary Services in fall 2024. In her first semester, she said she met with around 50 students, though some did not have celiac disease or any diet restrictions.
“I'll walk in through the dining hall, help them locate their options, introduce them to management or some of the team there, and just find ways to accommodate whatever their need is based on the individual,” Saunders said. “What I teach is trying to gain that independence and confidence navigating the dining halls.”
Before Saunders entered the role, Ginder, Sudbrink and Ogilbee all met with the previous dietitian when they were new to campus. In those meetings, they were presented with the following resources.
Daily online menu
One major resource Saunders recommends to students with celiac is the online menu. The Culinary Services website presents a full breakfast, lunch and dinner menu each day. The menu includes ingredients, allergen information and where you can find each item.
Ginder said she uses this every day, and it is a helpful tool when planning out her meals. However, she said that the online menu is often inaccurate.
Sudbrink agreed, saying she will often check the website for meals in advance, but when she arrives at the dining court the listed meal she was looking for is nowhere to be seen.
“It still says they have it, and you go, and it's like, ‘Oh no, but we have something completely different that you won't like,'” she said.
Saunders and Culinary Services declined to comment on the menu's potential inaccuracies.
Margaret’s Unique for You
Margaret’s Unique for You is an allergen-friendly station in The District. Saunders said the staff does not bring any gluten-containing ingredients into the station to minimize risk of cross-contamination.
“I think they are doing well at (The District), with that station, at least because they do offer almost every dietary restriction there,” Ogilbee weighed in.
Sudbrink exclusively ate at Margaret’s for her entire first semester on campus, but she said it also struggled with menu consistency.
“They are amazing with how they take their precautions, but they're not really amazing with reliability,” Sudbrink said.
Because Margaret’s is available to all students, Saunders gives out allergy-indicating stickers for students to put on their student ID, allowing them to bypass the line at the station. However, this option does not appeal to all students.
“I didn't want a sticker that says allergy on my thing that I use every day,” Ginder said. “That's probably a ‘me’ issue, but I didn't want to do that.”
The sticker was approximately 1 inch in diameter, covering a large area of a student’s ID. Since speaking to Saunders, culinary services has developed a new, smaller sticker that was released in December.
Nelson order-ahead
When Saunders meets with students, she said she gives them a phone number and a basic menu to order gluten-free meals from Nelson Court. Though the station is not front-facing, Saunders said there is dedicated equipment in the kitchen that is cleaned and does not handle gluten ingredients. Only the most experienced staff members prepare those meals, she added.
Students are also told to call one hour before picking up their meal.
“I remember the first few weeks,” Ginder said. “All your new friends get together, ‘Let's go to the dining hall!’ but you can't because you forgot to order ahead.”
Saunders said this is not a strict rule, and the kitchen will accommodate a student who forgets to call.
“We will still make them their meal,” Saunders said. “We won't be like, ‘Hey, you didn't call an hour ahead of time. We're not making you a meal. Sorry.’”
However, Ginder said that it has happened to her. She said she has tried telling the chefs that she forgot to call, and she has even tried calling ahead with less than an hour’s notice. She said she was turned away in both situations.
What’s next?
Ginder, Sudbrink and Ogilbee all said eating on campus did not improve much after meeting with the dietitian.
“There are some weeks I've used one meal swipe and that's it,” Sudbrink said. “I feel like I'm wasting a lot of money here.”
Now that she is removed from the dining courts, Ogilbee said eating has become much easier.
“I'm eating a lot healthier than I was,” Ogilbee said. “I definitely think this is a better option for people with dietary restrictions because I know what I can and can't eat.”
Still, as she closes out her first year in the position, Saunders is looking to make a difference for students with celiac and other diet-restrictive diseases. She said she meets weekly with the executive chef team to discuss new initiatives, but they take much time and consideration.
“Change doesn't happen super quick because we want to make sure that we're doing things the right way for the safety of students,” Saunders said.
Culinary Services declined an interview to discuss the new initiatives. However, in a written statement, Saunders said online ordering for Nelson Court and Margaret’s will be available by fall 2025. She said Culinary Services will also implement a new training, Allertrain, which she calls the “gold standard” in allergen training. All Margaret’s cooks as well as select staff at other locations will receive the training beginning in summer 2025, she added.
Despite the struggles, students said they do not blame Saunders for the shortcomings they face in the dining courts.
“I'm very appreciative to her. I just think her hands are tied,” Ginder said. “I think she tried to give me my best shot.”
Saunders said expanding variety for non-gluten options is at the forefront of her mind, but Culinary Services has not introduced a new policy to address the lack of variety in non-gluten options. Saunders said students feeling comfortable voicing those grievances is what facilitates change.
“I can't provide this support and services to students if they don't reach out,” Saunders said.
Any student can book a meeting with Saunders on the Culinary Services website under “Special Diets.”
“If they're not happy with some of the things we're doing, let me know,” Saunders said. “I am available pretty much anytime. I will drop any meetings to meet with a student.”
