Since the beginning of the semester, students have been adjusting to a variety of alterations to University Dining operations. Although several of these changes have drawn positive reviews, the exact nature of the dining modifications also have caught some students by surprise and prompted them to raise concerns.
There necessarily will be bumps in the road as Dining negotiates the process of administering its revised meal plan options this year and adapts to an entirely new arrangement at Newcomb Dining Hall once renovations are complete in summer 2012. To minimize disruption and keep students informed about their meal plan options, however, Dining must be open about the changes that are occurring and seek to address promptly any concerns that arise.
One way that Dining has succeeded in this regard has been by responding to student feedback provided through the online forum Speak Up UVA. For example, a diner who posted about the limitations of this year's new Meal Exchange program, which only is offered at dinner hours, received a response indicating Dining is unable to expand the program because of a dearth of additional retail space. Although this does not alleviate the student's complaint, it offers a measure of transparency that will enable students to better judge what to expect from the Meal Exchange program in the future.
More practically, Dining rectified a policy inconsistency in the newly established Newcomb To-Go Room that was highlighted in a Speak Up UVA comment and a recent Cavalier Daily editorial. It did so by conveying to employees that the To-Go Room, despite no longer being self-serve, remains an all-you-care-to-eat dining option. Thus, students no longer should have to worry about arbitrarily being limited to one entree and two sides per To-Go Room visit.
Other complaints, however, remain to be addressed. For one, Dining needs to follow through on its promise to link the Amphitheater food trucks to electric lines rather than generators so they do not produce as much noise. More pressing is the lack of prominently visible nutritional information at some dining stations and the To-Go Room. Although it has yet to act, Dining at least has recognized the severity of this issue. "There should be ID cards out there for most items," University Dining Marketing Manager Nicole Jackson said. "It's a work in progress, but I don't expect that it will take much longer." In the interim, students should continue to demand this important improvement from Dining since it is a relatively simple measure that will enhance both convenience and wellness for diners.
Dining also must do a better job of advertising changes to the operational structure of its services. Its goal should be to avoid a repeat of the spring meal plan sign-up period, when it prominently advertised certain upgrades but overlooked other revisions such as the creation of the dedicated To-Go Room. Unfortunately, Dining has not acknowledged that its spring communications effort was incomplete. "I wouldn't really agree with that analysis," University Dining Director Brent Beringer said when asked about the failure to advertise the To-Go Room alongside other changes. "We don't feel we promoted any part of the program any more than the others."
The literature that is available from Dining's spring meal plan sign-up does not mention the To-Go Room, however. A flier with the headline, "Exciting NEW Changes for EMPSU 2011-2012" only details the initiation of the Meal Exchange program, the opening of the Shea House cafeteria to meal plan holders, the scheduled opening of an Einstein Bros. Bagels location in Rice Hall and the arrival of food trucks on Grounds. Moreover, Dining's 2011-2012 Meal Plan Brochure does not list the To-Go Room among other on-Grounds dining locations. To ensure students would be aware of the To-Go Room's impact on their dining experiences, Dining should have spelled out in detail its rationale and expectations for the new arrangement.
Dining can learn from these experiences, though, and make students more aware of future modifications. In particular, it should educate students about the redesigned set-up of Newcomb Dining Hall prior to its scheduled opening next fall and should update students about plans to potentially implement to-go rooms at Runk and Observatory Hill dining halls. Also, Dining should continue to use outlets such as Speak Up UVA to explain to students the constraints that it faces as it attempts to keep its dining offerings in line with a growing student body. Students, for their part, must not become discouraged when Dining makes mistakes or runs into obstacles. Only by keeping administrators supplied with feedback will they promote the establishment of an end product that justifies the inconveniences that occur along the way.
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