Vegetarian resource group awards two $5,00 college scholarships

Selecting the winners of VRG's scholarship contest is tough. Hopefully, in the future, donors will enable us to give additional awards. The students in small cattle-raising towns certainly deserve accolades, and there are young people who've lost a parent to whom you want to reach out and hug and give an award for their courage.

How do you 'rate' the entrant who was raised as a vegetarian versus the individual who became one on his or her own? For those from a vegetarian family, it's easy to take your diet for granted and be involved in working on other issues. One of the winners this year attends a school where only 30 percent of the students go on to college. How much more credit does an applicant earn for making changes under those circumstances? Thank you to all the entrants who deserve prizes for their work, and thank you to the donors who allow us to give scholarships and promote vegetarian activism.

THIS YEAR'S WINNERS

SEEMA RUPANI stopped eating meat at the age of five. During a car trip with her family, she asked her mother, "Why are there so many cows out there?"

Her mom answered, "They are all going to be killed and made into meat."

From that day forward, Seema made the decision to stop eating meat.

In her junior year of high school, Seema started the first animal/environmental protection group on her school's campus. Their major goal was to get vegan and vegetarian items added to the cafeteria menus. Over two to three weeks, she organized the gathering of more than 1,000 signatures, 25 percent of the school's 4,000 students, who agreed that the food service should offer more vegetarian options.

After an hour presentation from Seema, the head food service director agreed that she would provide the food if the students would promote it. Seema put together a commercial with humorous skits relating to vegetarian food, which was played on their school's daily television bulletin. Seema's club was given its own cart and sold veggie riblet burgers, soft tacos, fruit salads, garden salads, potato wedges, baked chips, rice cakes, yogurts, tomato basil pasta soup, and miso and tofu soup. Then, the local newspaper did a story on them, and even more students became interested. Roughly five vegan options were then placed on the standard menu.

Another event at the school is a science health festival attended by 5,000 people. Seema contacted the food service person in charge and was informed that there could be vegetarian food if she would take charge of selling the items. She turned the usual menu of hot dogs and hamburgers into a mostly vegetarian menu. She worked with the food services to create a selection of fruit salads, garden salads, garden burgers, soft tacos, taco pockets, veggie corn dogs, veggie chicken nuggets, chocolate soymilks, fruit juices, and more. The food service insisted that there must be one non-vegetarian item, chicken, so that people coming to the festival would be able to choose.

Seema reported, "It was funny to hear that even meat-eaters thought the chicken looked so greasy that they chose the vegetarian food over it because it looked so much more appealing, and nearly all the items on the menu sold out."

Seema was also scheduled to go on a 'road show' with her club officers and the food service director to travel to all the elementary and middle schools in her district and do presentations on the "new school revolution."

Seema said that she has learned that instead of sitting around arguing with people and getting frustrated, she has to focus on making positive, constructive changes. With her club's successes, eating vegan and vegetarian food has become "cool and new on campus instead of something weird."

Melissa from In Defense of Animals said Seema is "an angel for animals.... I have never before met someone as young as Seema, so dedicated, and a role model for so many."

One of Seema's teachers stated, "As for Seema, there is no need to invent any hyperbolic bromides. She is a force of nature. There would be no vegetarian/vegan food at this school at all if not for her. After meeting a mountain of bureaucratic inertia, she just kept climbing. She basically just wore them down enough so that they feel obligated to provide a healthy alternative, but she does it with verve and persistence, not bluster and hectoring. I think she'll be promoting vegetarianism until she draws her last breath.

"Seema Rupani is committed. Period. Her drive and focus will be of immense help in fighting to change people's awareness of what comprises a healthy diet as well as the way we treat animals. Seema has had an uphill struggle with the school's leaders, but that's the kind of thing she thrives on. Eventually, she outworks them, and they give in. But there's more to her than just being dogged.... I know it's her pure, queen-sized heart that guided her and formed her convictions."

Congratulations to Seema and to her family and to James Logan High School in Union City, California, for producing such an excellent person.