Dante Orlandini is a senior politics major from Pasadena, California who was passionate about creating a new chapter of popular website for foodies, Spoon University at CUA! Since its creation, the Spoon U CUA chapter has quickly become one of the most popular Instagram accounts at CUA. This week I had the opportunity to chat with my dear friend about how this all began!
Jackie: What is Spoon University?
Dante: Spoon University is a national online publication that is centered on food. It’s basically a food resource for college age students. We post articles about the different food choices around our campus and DC, how to survive on a college food budget, restaurant reviews and recommendations in exchange for free or discounted food, and basically anything that comes to mind! We also plan events on campus revolving around food, intelligent eating, and brand awareness. We want to start planning an event focusing on body image because while we are a food organization we want people to be educated on things like body image and eating disorders. We also post recipe videos where people can learn how to make different things.
Jackie: How did Spoon U become a chapter at CUA? What made you want to be a part of the CUA chapter of Spoon U?
Dante: One of my friends was the editorial director for Spoon at Duke University and reached out to me last year about starting a chapter at Catholic. Once I started posting about it on our class page, another student, Catherine Lavallee, reached out to me saying that she was also looking to start a chapter so we partnered up and started Spoon CUA! I always loved seeing the different articles and videos that Spoon posts about food so I instantly wanted to get involved.
(Co founder of Spoon U CUA Catherine Lavallee)
Jackie: What is your role at Spoon U?
Dante: I am the Marketing Director for CUA’s chapter. I’m basically in charge of coming up with a strategy to help expand our presence and promote our brand on campus
Jackie: What are some of the goals that the cua chapter of Spoon have for the upcoming year?
Dante: We want to expand our following and presence on campus, make our chapter extremely successful, plan a ton of fun events, and leave a legacy after all the seniors graduate!
Jackie: Lastly, tell me why students should join Spoon U and How can they join?
Dante: Spoon is an awesome organization where we are able to be exposed to the endless food options in our area. You get to try new things for free, make a ton of friends, get experience in writing, marketing, photography, event planning, and videography, and most importantly have fun! If anyone wants to join, they can go to spoonuniversity.com/apply or email me at 39orlandini@cua.edu for more info!