Is it ethical to take food out of the dining halls? Is it okay to take an
apple or loaf of bread with you when you leave? Is it ethical to make a
sandwich in the dining hall at breakfast if you can't make it to lunch that
day? Is this stealing, or justifiable- are our meal plans supposed to
provide us with food whenever we're hungry? Does it matter that we pay
exorbitant prices for board?
In order to respond to your questions, we need to establish a few basic facts and assumptions:
1. As a residential college, Carleton requires that students live on campus and participate in a board plan. This is an actual contractual relationship between students and the college. Decades ago we invested in dining hall space, equipment, and staffing to provide a residential dining experience. Over the years, the College has allowed some students to either be exempted from the board plan or participate at a partial level. A few of our residential units have appropriate cooking facilities or are ideally suited for common dining (e.g. Farm House). We built the townhouses for off-board living to accommodate upper-class students who prefer more independence, including cooking on their own.
2. The College selects a vendor to provide food services. Like most colleges, we ceased providing our own food about 40 years ago. Sodexho is the present contractor.
3. Carleton’s room and board charges are the lowest of its 16 “comparison colleges”--by far. Comparisons of per meal costs, e.g. “I pay $9 for dinner when I could go to Subway for $4.95”, do not take into account the actual costs of running a food program, which include costs of equipment, labor, utilities, etc.
4. Carleton negotiates its contract with Sodexho, but sets the room and board rates independent of the rates we pay Sodexho. The College also determines what meal plans it will offer students.
5. The College sets dining hours with the food service, which in turn provides the labor and food preparation. Longer hours would require more labor, i.e. higher cost of operations. We make decisions on a cost benefit basis. The recent decision to keep the snack bar open Friday and Saturday nights is an example of value added for relatively low cost.
6. According to Joe Winegardner, Director of the Food Service: “We do allow students to take food out of the dining halls. The most common examples are a couple pieces of fruit, ice cream cones, cookies, coffee or hot tea where we stock disposable cups for such use. Students may not take loaves of bread, a number of pre-made sandwiches, or large quantities of other food items. Meal plans allow for all-you-can-eat within the dining hall, but cannot accommodate providing a ‘grocery store function.’”
The subtext of your queries seems to be: “Sodexho rips us off, so is it ethical to return the favor?” In my view, the assumption is false. Carleton students pay a fair price for meals, have reasonable choices, and over time may select on-campus housing or Northfield Option to be free of the meal plan requirements if they so desire. I might add that about five years ago we added the use of “flex dollars” in the snack bar as a way of extending time and “grab and go” options. We also provide a “bag lunch” program. The College poured enormous resources into the construction of the East Dining Hall (a substantial percentage of the $15m price tag for the building), and has plans to renovate Burton/Sevy dining hall to the tune of over $8m over the next five years.
Helping oneself to extra food, beyond what Joe states above, is stealing. Students who are off board but sneak into dining halls to help themselves are also stealing. Food and dinnerware theft are factored into the costs of operation and charged back to the College. The better, ethical alternative is to lobby for more and better services through the Dining Board, and to advocate change with an understanding that greater freedoms of choice usually come at greater cost.
Mark Govoni
Dean of Students