about us

The GU Eating Society (GUES) is an organization dedicated to learning about culture through cuisine. Our mission is simple: give our members authentic experiences and great food, all while having fun.

Read all about our club’s history below to see how far we’ve come! At the bottom of this page, you can also find answers to some frequently asked questions (like how exactly one pronounces GUES).

our history

GUES was founded in August 2016 by Alex Heintze & Brittany Arnett, who were sophomores at the time. They originally met at a *very small* Sig-Ep pregame in their freshman spring, when Brittany was flexing her freshman girl skills and Alex was “rushing” Sig-Ep (please look past this momentary lapse in judgement). At the party, they bonded over their love for food and eagerness to try every restaurant in D.C., whipping out their phones and sharing each other’s restaurant lists – to find that one restaurant, Mandu, was at the top of each of their lists. They made the impromptu plan to exchange numbers and go to Mandu together, which they did the following week. From then on, they became best friends.

As the Spring semester went on, they both were rejected from all the clubs they applied to – yes, GUAFSCU, Blue & Gray, & The Corp were all included. Disheartened and wanting a club that met their love for trying new foods and meeting new people, they decided to start their own club – and came up with the GU Eating Society. (Yes, we understand that’s an eerily similar name to Princeton’s infamous Eating Societies, but not their original intention!) They began brainstorming the club’s aesthetic, mission statement, goals, and well, everything else from then on – with the intention to start recruiting for members in the upcoming Fall.

In their very first semester, they received 200 applications, conducted 100 interviews, and ultimately took 56 new members – they thought they were going to get 20, max.

It started a wonderful journey, and since, GUES has been to dozens of restaurants, had partnerships with dozens of cultural clubs, brought chefs to campus, fundraised thousands of dollars for local charities, and even gotten involved in the D.C. Food Scene, José Andres’ ThinkFoodGroup included. With a brief stint of Alex abroad and Brittany running the club solo, they were hand-in-hand, unstoppable. Until they became seniors and had to pass on the baton!

GUES now has more than 150 members, more than 10 board members leading the club, and an entire lineup of hallmark weekly events.

our board

GUES is led by a 15-person student board composed of departments including Outreach, which organizes restaurant partnerships and all restaurant events, Membership, which manages recruitment, formal, and other major events, and many more.

meet the board

faq

  • Like the word “guess” !

  • Well yes… and no! We all love to eat, and we do it together, whether that be at restaurant events (where we get to sample menus and talk to chefs and owners), dinner parties hosted by members, potlucks, you name it.

    Put simply, we plan events for our members that revolve around cultural foods, eating, socializing, and community service. Hover over the Events tab to explore all the different types of events we offer.

  • GUES offers full, no questions asked subsidies for its events in order to ensure accessibility to any and all of our members, and we need to limit our membership to ensure we can support that policy.

  • GUES values open-mindedness, passion, and a love for community, so make sure to show us how these values are important to you!

  • Applications are open at the start of every semester; they have now closed for Spring 2024. The application consists of a few short-answer questions, and will be linked on the “Join” tab of our website and in the bio of our Instagram.