Much like a debit system, Saint Xavier University’s dollar per dollar meal plan system appears straightforward. When a student purchases food, the dollar amount is subtracted from the student’s meal plan. However, this system, whose rollover policy is not widely agreed upon, is not very commonly used by other universities.
There are six higher education institution that Chartwells services in the Chicagoland area: Dominican University, DePaul University, Elmhurst College, Saint Xavier University, the University of Illinois at Chicago and North Central College. Only DePaul University and Saint Xavier University use the aforementioned debit-type system. Elmhurst College uses a similar system, but instead of using dollar-for-dollar currency they use “meal points.” The remaining schools offer students the meal plans with a fixed number of meals per term.
Saint Xavier University’s debit system does not usually receive criticism except toward the end of semesters. This is because if students have a positive balance on their meal plan remaining at the end of the semester, then that balance does not rollover to the next term. This policy raises complaints from Saint Xavier University students every term although not many students find themselves in that situation.
The meal plan policies and food prices are constantly discussed and evaluated according to Saint Xavier University’s Director of Auxiliary Services, Linda Moreno. She stated that the Department of Business and Finance is charged with establishing those policies. Moreno continued by saying that she did not see the rollover policy changing any time soon.
This policy, however, is not uncommon among Chartwells-serviced schools. Out of the six schools perviously mentioned, only one, DePaul University, allows unused meal plan funds to rollover to the subsequent semester, but only within the same academic year. Moreno attributes this to DePaul University’s much larger student population. Compared to Saint Xavier University’s, DePaul University’s student population is almost six times as large.
Because of the small size of Saint Xavier University and the plethora of dining options it offers its students, it takes more business to reach “critical mass,” according to Moreno. Moreno explained that the “critical mass” is defined as the amount of sales need by dining services to cover its operating costs. She went on to explain that Saint Xavier University’s operating costs in relation to dining are high because there are many dining options available. Moreno also added that students’ funds support the dining system in place. At Saint Xavier University the dining system is relatively extensive.
There are six dining locations on-campus at Saint Xavier University. Those locations are the SXU Diner (which has six stations within it), Starbucks, Subway, Rhubarb’s, Coffee Cats and Gilhooley’s Grande Saloon.
This is indeed a large amount of options when compared to the other schools mentioned earlier. Dominican University has two on-campus dining locations, DePaul University has three, Elmhurst College has four, the University of Illinois at Chicago has twelve, and North Central College has three. If you remove the University of Illinois at Chicago and DePaul University from that list, the remaining colleges are similar to Saint Xavier University in size and commuter versus resident ratios, yet they all offer their students less dining options.
Moreno went on to say that at a large school, such as DePaul University, the funds in student meal plan accounts can be much more liquid. That means that its size allows it to pay Chartwells without much worry about how much students are spending at any given point in time, because it has so many students and, therefore its critical mass is relatively low. This allows DePaul University to give its students the flexibility of rolling over meal plan funds at the end of academic terms, according to Moreno.
Where any unused meal plan funds go is also a point of controversy among students. Most students believe that those unused funds go straight into the university’s pocket. However, Moreno clarified this misconception. These leftover funds are used to pay Chartwells, if not at that moment then at later time. This is especially true during the summer months when Chartwell’
s still runs the dining at Saint Xavier University, but there is not much student traffic so critical mass is much harder to reach at that time.
David Rodrigues
News Editor