Dining adds options, locks students in

Hingham High School '95 Hingham, Mass. Students who have signed up for Dining Services' meal contracts will be effectively locked into a one-year "lease"-like agreement, according to Dining Marketing Coordinator Adam Sherr. This new change was part of a goal to avoid raising prices overall for meal plans, Sherr said. After examining the business practices at other universities, Sherr explained, the University's Dining Services made several alterations to the meal contracts. Starting with the contracts for the fall, students will not be required to provide a $100 deposit. Another change involved requisite meal plans for students living in such college houses as Van Pelt and DuBois. Only students living in the Modern Languages Program of the Gregory College House must now purchase at least the "100 Meal Plan" and participate in the dinner-hour language tables. The students, who already had mandatory meal plans this year, requested that the program be continued. In addition, Dining Services added such flexible plans as the Weekend 50 Meal Plan, which allows students to choose from any four meals offered on Saturday or Sunday. Sherr said he was not projecting that any fewer students would sign up as a result of the drop of the college house required meal plans, but that the "dynamic college house" programs would "create a demand for dining." He added that as contracts cannot be cancelled, Dining would have to "try even harder" to achieve excellence, listening and responding to student criticism. Sherr added that meal plan cancellations were lower this year than in the past. Although Sherr did not have any figures on early sign-ups for the 1998-99 contract year, he said that he had not received any feedback about the changes in the contract. Then-College junior Samara Barend, an Undergraduate Assembly member who has worked on several dining issues, acknowledged the contract changes as an effort by Dining Services to "cut down on the number of options" for students. She added that she would like to see more "flexibility" in the contract options.

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