Possible food donations?
Uncategorized November 16th. 2009, 8:05amIs there any way to implement a program where it can be an option for each person to donate leftover meals, or the monetary equivalence of leftover meals each week? Is there a way to do this through Chartwells or something? I know the Hillel House did something similar for a week, is there any way of extending this to be all year round? Some people are on the Mather only meal plan, and get tired of gluten-free edible delights. I have talked to several people and they seem quite interested. Thanks!
November 16th, 2009 at 2:21 pm
This was mentioned to me by a friend of mine, and I’ve talked to Lorenzo about it, since he would be in the best position to work on something like this.
November 16th, 2009 at 9:04 pm
yeah, i talked to someone about this, and chartwells seemed disfavorable to this idea because in fact, it would mean that Chartwells would lose a lot of money. However, it might be possible to do this, maybe once a month at most, if we were able to convince Chartwells. So, not sure about the idea actually.
renz.
November 17th, 2009 at 1:18 am
Sounds like a great idea, Ethiopia.
Yes Lorenzo I agree that chartwells may not stand to directly benefit from such a program, but if ethiopia and others amongst the student body feel that this is an important issue we should press ahead with it.
There is always the appealing argument that these are our meals, already paid for, and we should be able to spend them as we please, which could plausibly include donations. This sort of argument was, in part, used last year to help win such changes as the guest meal swipes and the abolition of the three meal/day limit.
According to Will it seems like Ethiopia’s wishes are expressive of those of a number of students.
Still, like you, Lorenzo, I’m not sure. We gottah pick our battles. Maybe this should be one of them.
November 17th, 2009 at 1:35 am
Echoing what Adam said, if these meals are already paid for how does Chartwells lose any money?
How would it be any different from people not using the meals at all and having ten meals left over at the end of the week?
November 17th, 2009 at 2:14 am
Good point, Ethiopia.
A year ago, there was a marked difference between donating meals and having leftover meals. Back then with the three meal per day limit, unused meals at the end of the week simply vanished. It is clear that under this system, donating extra meals meant that cash was directly diverted from chartwells to the charity organizations.
Despite this, they did allow meal donations on a number of occasions. Toby is a nice guy.
At this point, I’m not sure what the rate of meal usage is. If everyone uses all their meals buying stuff from the Cave or Outtakes on Thursday nights (ie 100% or very high usage), then the proposed plan may pose somewhat less of a hurt to Chartwells. After all, both using a meal and donating it mean that Chartwells gives something up in some sense (tho admittedly the $5.75 candy from the cave cost less to chartwells than donating the actual $5.75 to the charity of your choice).
So if we want, we could mention this tradeoff in a hypothetical chat with Toby. But really, you can bet Chartwells knows it already. It’s a business and they’ve thought this all through already. They must turn a profit somehow.
Chartwells issues are tricky. Ultimately Chartwells finances are bound in certain weird ways to the College, so that any significant changes often require the college being on board.
A lot to think about!
Oh and I’m sure I make no sense at this hour (why then am I writing essays now??)
November 22nd, 2009 at 4:14 pm
Well,
as to meal utilization,
I definitely know that it was above 95% two weeks ago and it marginally hit 84% last week, where as Chartwells anticipates meal utilization below 84%.
Therefore, it may in fact be difficult due to those facts.
But, next semester, it may very well be a campaign to pursue as there is not much time left this semester.