A fter so much improvement in such a short time, it was disappointing to see that UR Dining Services dropped the ball last week. While quality and service have steadily been improving since winter break, dining services failed to coordinate the release of specific details about next year’s dining plans with the release of dining contracts to students.
Some students on campus, for instance Freshmen Fellows, had to turn in their housing and dining contracts last Friday. It is unreasonable for dining services to expect students to sign a contract when they don’t know what the contract entails.
The change from block plans to a new, mysterious “Club” plan, should have been made with adequate time to inform all students about the details of the new plan. The plans are specifically itemized on the contract, but no information about them has been made available to students.
Even if print materials could not, for some reason, have been made ready in time, the Web site could easily have been updated to contain up-to-date information.
This is made more disappointing because it comes after so many great changes to dining on campus. Changes to Danforth, for example, may have inspired upperclassmen to change over to a block or block-style meal plan, but, having no knowledge of what this plan is will certainly discourage anyone from choosing it. Also missing is updated information about declining bonus buy-in levels.
We are quite happy with the changes that have been made to dining over this past semester, but that doesn’t change the fact that we, as students, have a very real and immediate need to know the specifics of the dining plans.
