Due to a realignment of budgeting priorities, the NAIT Student Orientation (NSO) committee will no longer be serving the popular taco in a bag to new students beginning in the spring 2026 term. Instead, the committee has announced that they will be switching to coffee in a bag for the free lunch offering.
“We want our new NAIT students to have a realistic idea of how the next two to four years of their student life will be like. They will be drinking a lot of coffee to stay awake while studying, and more coffee in various club and campus activities. So they might as well get started during the NSO,” said Polly Tecnik, a member of the committee.
But it was not an easy decision to scrap taco in a bag.
“We have been offering taco in a bag for such a long time now that it has become part of NAIT’s culture. And no one really minds if their burps still smell like tacos even 12 hours after eating it,” said Alyssa Dorito, head of the NSO Committee.
Dorito said she was “shocked and disappointed” when the revised budget was revealed to the committee.
“We could only afford to give free drinks and bags to new students. We had to make the most of the funds we have and package this into something relevant to students,” she said.
To test the reception of coffee in a bag, the NSO committee set up an experiment. Volunteers were given different amounts of coffee in a bag, which they had to consume in one sitting.
“In our findings, the group that was given an equivalent of 750 mg of caffeine was the one that displayed the best possible behaviour expected of a NAIT student,” said Dorito.
Tecnik expressed her excitement for the upcoming implementation of coffee in a bag.
“We want to show that NAIT is an environmentally friendly school that encourages sustainability, so the hot coffee will be placed in paper bags. This will encourage students to drink it right away. We will, of course, provide paper straws.”
Editor’s note: This article was originally published in our April 2026 print issue. Read it here.
Feature image via NAIT / iheartnaptime
