By Kelly Corbett
This semester we said hello to a newly renovated T-Dubs, but also to some stricter rules on our favorite two and a half hours of the day — Meal Equivalency.
The new regulation is putting a limit on how much a student can eat for lunch. A student can either get one meal at Eickhoff Hall during Meal Equiv or $7.25 worth of food elsewhere, no longer both. But the real question is, is it fair?
The hours between 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. daily was probably the most anticipated time of the day, where students with a meal plan could treat their taste buds to food other than the typical selections of Eickhoff Hall, yet still swipe into the Atrium if their stomachs growled.
However, with the College now enforcing their rule allowing either the use of Meal Equiv or a swipe into Eick, some feel the meal plans purchased at the start of the semester are false.
According to the College’s website, students with meal Plan A or Plan B enjoy unlimited swipes into Eickhoff, and those with meal Plan C enjoy unlimited swipes after 11 a.m. However, with this new rule, “unlimited” is not really the ideal word to use when students are restricted access from Eickhoff during the Meal Equiv period. The website does make note of the new Meal Equiv rule when selecting a meal plan, though it is mentioned toward the bottom of the page. However, prospective students reading up on the College may miss that minor detail and be mislead.
With the prices on food at other dining locations on-campus being so expensive, $7.25 is not enough money for a student to get a proper lunch. Access to Eick ensured full stomachs and that students did not necessarily have to use their Carte Blanche points to buy an extra bag of chips, or a bottle of water.
Now, of course one could argue that, if a student is afraid of going over Meal Equiv and wants to save their points, they could just eat at Eickhoff during the designated time slot. This is true. However, after eating breakfast, lunch and dinner in the same place daily, a student is entitled to other options without worry.
If the College truly began losing money as students took advantage of the “free” items, then a plan should have been set up to enable one or two snacks from other dining locations when a swipe into Eick is used, not complete and total restriction.
No matter what the solution may be, one thing is certain — the strict use of Meal Equiv or entrance to Eickhoff Hall is an unfair change hurting the student body.
