Dear AU Community,   

We are writing with an annual overview of the comprehensive health and safety measures in place for our campus dining program. As part of the AU Kitchen’s commitment to health and safety, we communicate an annual summary of all our health and safety measures each fall, so our community is aware of our practices, where to find additional information, and how to resolve any related issues.

We have a comprehensive program for food safety in place. Throughout our venues and in our meal preparation process, we follow procedures and practices that are designed to minimize and reduce the risk of foodborne illnesses. We require all staff to take regular training on food safety and on food preparation standards. To ensure we adhere to required compliances and best practices, our dining venues undergo regular inspections.

On our AU Kitchen website, we provide an overview of the inspection system for our dining venues. We also post copies of health and safety inspections from all sources on our dining website. We maintain physical copies of the most recent reports and post signage reflecting our latest inspection score on the first floor of Mary Graydon Center and the entrance to TDR. Our website maintains copies of all reports from the past two years to date. For all reports that contain findings or improvement recommendations, we post a management summary that provides more detailed information about the findings and our corrective actions.

We serve more than 45,000 meals per week in our dining venues. Mistakes can and do happen. We are most successful in resolving mistakes and ensuring our community enjoys their experience dining with us when we work together to address matters right away.

We encourage everyone to send feedback to us in several ways: 1) Ask for a manager in any of our venues so that we can address matters on the spot, 2) send us an email at mealplans@american.edu or 3) use our text2chat feature by texting the number on display in the dining hall.  

We look forward to hosting you in one of eateries on campus soon!

Onward we go, together!

Bronté Burleigh-Jones
Chief Financial Officer, Vice President, and Treasurer

Mike Scher
Assistant Vice President, Campus Auxiliary Services, Airlie

Ann Marie Powell 
Sr. Director, Dining and Auxiliary Services