Student Union

Hi everyone.  I wanted to give you a brief recap of the meeting the Campus Services Committee held today with Executive Vice Chancellor Steve Hoffner and District Manager of Bon Appetit Nadeem Siddiqui.  I'll do bullet points to make life easier:

- They know the S40 is a challenge and an inconvenience to daily life for students.

- Changes are coming within the next two weeks to dining on campus.

- Customer counts will be used to restructure dining hours at all locations.

- The second half of S40 Dining will have 600 more seats and an expanded servery with more options.

- Dining Services is planning to test various new methods for making S40 Dining more efficient in the limited space (from menu changes to altering the way food is ordered -- stay tuned).

- They are against raising prices any higher.

- They are adjusting staff schedules to have more people working during heavy traffic times.

- Bear Mart has been experiencing a fair amount of theft, so surveillance cameras will be installed soon.

- Sustainable dishware will be on the 40 next year once the second phase of building is complete -- which will have the industrial dishwasher.

- Remember that using re-usable cups (Nalgenes, corn mugs, etc.) gets you a coffee discount!

- Webfood will be moving to the 40 soon -- hopefully before the end of first semester.

- Dining services is looking for input on the future of Subway on campus.

- They want students to begin diverting traffic from the DUC during lunch to the lower level of Mallinckrodt for seating -- this will become necessary come winter time when nobody wants to sit outside.

WHAT DID WE ASK FOR?

> Bringing: cranberries and quinoa to the DUC salad line, bringing back grilled chicken, bringing more hot Kosher meals to campus, and adding sour cream to the quesadilla line in Ursas.

>Consider creating a Crepe Night in Ursas for those who miss last year's crepes.

>Look into using biodegradable plastic water cups instead of regular plastic ones.

>Continue to work with us and be transparent about changes in dining hours and in how to facilitate more efficiency both on the 40 and in the DUC.

REMEMBER

*Please consider attending the forum in Mudd Multi-Purpose on Monday September 21 from 8-9:30pm about the future of the South 40.

*Please watch for an event in the near future where you will have the opportunity to hear directly from dining services and ask questions about dining on campus.

It was a great, successful, and productive meeting.  They are really interested in making dining better on campus!  Watch for more updates and I hope to see you at the events mentioned above!

Best,

Greg

The Campus Services Committee is working to create dialogue on campus about how to improve dining services related issues we are facing this semester.  We need to increase efficiency on the South 40, extend hours and decrease congestion in the DUC, and find ways to extend Village hours.  However, we need to do these things by paying attention to the budgetary limits that Bon Appetit faces in running 14 cafeterias on campus and providing us with top-notch food.

I am planning to set up an open forum with dining administrators who will listen to students' concerns and have a chance to explain what they are doing to improve campus dining.  They work hard for us, and are trying their best in this difficult transitional year as the South 40 is in limbo.  Watch for when this forum will happen and please attend.

Until then, there are three ways to express your ideas, concerns, and suggestions about dining services.  I also encourage you to read my op-ed in StudLife this week which explains some of the problems Dining Services is facing and what we can do about it: http://www.studlife.com/forum/2009/09/09/ideas-or-opinions-on-campus-dining/

(1) Send an email to dining@su.wustl.edu with your ideas and concerns.  These will be shared with administrators and my committee.  (The email address may not be fully operational until Thursday, 9/10/09)

(2) Twitter about it at WashUDining, password: dining.  Start a conversation there!

(3) Come to a Campus Services Committee meeting on Mondays from 5-6:30 in the SU Conference Room.

I'm looking forward to great, level-headed, creative discussions to spark innovative solutions to the logistical dining problems we are facing this semester.

Vice President of Programming, Nate Ferguson, meets with Mike Post (Senator), Ciara Caprara (Treasury Rep) and Leslie Hustead (Director of the DUC) to talk about a new tailgating initiative. 

Concerned with Dining Services related issues?!  Watch for an article in StudLife later this week to see how you can make your voice heard!

Every year, each student contributes 1% of tuition to a Student Activities Fee, in order to make a large collective pot of funding that spawns most of the programming on our campus. Next year, we will each contribute $378, generating an estimated total of $2,203,362.00. In the next few weeks, I will be working on a General Budget to propose exactly how that money is spent. On April 14 and 15, that budget will be approved by Treasury and Senate.