The Inside Scoop

Well, hold on to your trays! The meal plan changes are coming! When next semester comes around, things are going to change up at Sodexho (SAGA, please nobody write in to the Colonnade because I called the cafeteria SAGA).
So in this issue of the Colonnade you will find a story about the proposed meal plan changes coming for Fall 2002 and Spring 2003. These changes were supposed to be discussed at a town hall meeting this past Thursday, but I don’t know how many people went to it. One, because I am writing this in a Wednesday. Two, because they had the town hall meeting before we even had a chance to run the story.
So next year, they are planning on changing (condensing) the meal plan options. Now, this at first sounds like a good idea, except for the fact that students living off campus (Non-residents) are going to get a big fat shaft when they find out their only meal plan option is for 25 meals for the whole semester. That is ridiculous! I live off-campus and right now have a “non-resident” meal plan that is a 50-block plan which allows me, if I wish, to upgrade my meal plan by a certain date to a 75-block plan. I am probably going to, and that should probably be enough for me. But if I am forced next semester into paying for a meal plan that is going to nothing more than wet my appetite, then it’s not worth my money. What is the point in buying a plan that you can only eat with for dinner, Monday through Friday, for less than a third of the semester!? Why even pretend like it’s going to last that long? Some off-campus students depend on meal plans, and 25 meals out of 15 weeks is, in short, Ridiculous!
Moving on, Sodexho (SAGA, sorry again), is also going to change the operation hours to “continuous serving hours.” That means that you can show up at 4 p.m. and get food. Hey, that sounds like a great idea until, you find out that since you can eat when ever you need, they will no longer offer the “carry-out” program. Also, you won’t be able to use meal plan equivalency since they are always going to be open. That means they are going to give you on all but one meal plan a whole $150 flex dollars. The flex dollars will even carry over to the next semester if you don’t use them. Wow, that’s great, except if you live “off-campus,” and happened to get stuck with the measly 25 block plan, you didn’t get any flex dollars. So you have to pay cash, or go eat by yourself in Sodexho (SAGA, not really sorry anymore). Also, if you want to take your food back to your room. Besides, you don’t want to waste your flex-dollars down at Chick-Fil-A. And nobody, I mean nobody is at SAGA. Well then, you get to eat all by your lonesome self, unless you want to pay fifty cents for a take-out box! That once again is so stupid! If you were to go to any, any, self-respecting restaurant there always is some option of ordering something “to-go” or getting a “carry-out.” So why can’t we take it back to our room?
Well, now that I am a little upset, I just would like to know how many “off-campus” students were on the Dining Service Board of Directors when they helped come up with these meal plan options and new rules. Honestly guys, no offense, but things are better off now then the way you are proposing to change them. If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Oh, and sorry again about the “SAGA” thing.

Aaron Hill

Posted by Colonnade Archives on Feb 8 2002. Filed under Opinion. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry