Hold the Plastic: How to Get This Toxic Material Out of Student Meals
The health and economic case for reusable stainless steel dining and to-go ware
Join us on March 12 at 4 PM ET for a free educational webinar for the latest information on the alarming health impacts of using plastic dining ware and to-go containers and learn about the compelling health and economic case for making the switch to reusable stainless steel items.
Our expert speakers are Allison Grove, CEO and founder of USEFULL, pediatrician Dr. Manasa Mantravadi, CEO and founder of Ahimsa, and Judith Enck, president of Beyond Plastics and former US EPA Regional Administrator and our moderator is Beyond Plastics’ science director, Trisha Vaidyanathan, Ph.D. Register now to save your spot.
About Our Speakers
Dr. Manasa Mantravadi, Founder and CEO, Ahimsa
Dr. Manasa Mantravadi is a board-certified pediatrician, Pediatric Culinary Medicine Specialist, and nationally recognized expert, speaker and writer in child health, food systems, and environmental health. She is the Founder and CEO of Ahimsa, a pediatrician-designed stainless steel foodware company focused on reducing harmful chemical exposures while supporting lifelong healthy eating habits. She leads school-based preventive health initiatives including through the Clinton Global Initiative and is the co-author of The Conscious Cafeteria Report, a data-driven analysis examining the health, cost, and environmental impacts of plastic foodware in school meals.
Alison Rogers Cove, Founder and CEO, USEFULL
In 2018, Alison created USEFULL, the stainless steel reuse solution to solve a personal dilemma; like many others, she loves takeout food and drinks, but felt guilty about the trail of waste her habit was creating. In the research that led Alison to found the USEFULL reuse program, one key takeaway emerged—you can’t solve a plastic problem with more plastic. To galvanize reuse in the healthiest, most sustainable way possible, Alison is committed to eliminating plastic and single-use packaging from the takeout stream at college dining operations, protecting students from microplastics, and driving lasting behavior change around reuse.
Judith Enck, Founder and President, Beyond Plastics
In 2019, Judith founded Beyond Plastics to end plastic pollution everywhere. Judith was appointed by President Obama to serve as regional administrator in the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency in 2009 and served as deputy secretary for the environment in the New York Governor’s Office. She is a professor at Bennington College and co-author of the new book “The Problem With Plastic” (The New Press, December 2025), available wherever you purchase your books.
Trisha Vaidyanathan, PhD, Science Director, Beyond Plastics (Moderator)
Dr. Vaidyanathan is a scientist and researcher dedicated to using science to drive policy change. She has a decade of academic research experience, and holds a BA from UC Berkeley and a PhD in neuroscience from UC San Francisco. Her passion for environmental health grew from her postdoctoral research at Duke University, where she studied how prenatal exposure to air pollution affects brain development, work that illustrated to her the urgent need to translate science into action.