By Kara Augustine

University of Louisville students are not the first to become frustrated about a mandatory meal plan offered through Sodexo.
Other schools in North America that have implemented the new mandatory meal plans have experienced similar responses from their students.
The University of Lethbridge in Alberta, Canada, Arizona State University, and Texas Christian University, among others,  all have mandatory meal plans for freshmen.
Kennesaw State University, however, will have a meal plan similar to what U of L will have next year, where almost all students have to pay some form of a meal plan.  
Jerome Ratchford, KSU’s interim vice president of Student Success and Enrollment Services, said that the mandatory meal plan was put into place to pay for the construction and operational costs of new dining facilities, much like U of L.
The first plan presented to students was overwhelmingly unaccepted.
“The original plan was presented to students two months ago. That plan was going to be required for all students and was $400 per student,” Ratchford said. “Students were concerned because not only was it a one size fits all, they thought it did not include a lot of input from students.”
In response to the news of a mandatory meal plan, KSU student Teonykkia Starr created a Facebook group entitled, “Hell no to KSU’s Mandatory Meal Plan,” which has more than 330 members.
According to Starr, it seemed that KSU did not consider an extra $400 a semester an unreasonable amount. Because of this, the students did not want the plan to go into effect.
With the overwhelming negative reactions to the original plan, KSU’s SGA held four forums to allow students to have a voice in the process. In addition to the forums, they also created a Web site where students could present their questions and concerns.
After involving students in the process, KSU developed a tiered plan, similar to U of L’s. The amount of money on the meal plan now depends on a student’s status (commuter, full-time, resident), excluding part-time students.
“It is real important for administration to be transparent for students, meaning they have to put all of the cards on the table,” Ratchford said. “We tried to work out something that we could all live with.”
Universities with freshman mandatory meal plans have also had student concern.   Nadeem Seedat, a student at the University of Lethbridge, started another Facebook group opposing her university’s mandatory meal plan, entitled “University of Lethbridge Students against Sodexo.”
“Many of my close friends expressed distaste for the price and quality of the food they were receiving under the mandatory $1,500 to $2,000 meal plan,” Seedat said. “Opinions on the food plan by the new first years have not changed, and verbal opposition still persists this year.”
According to Seedat, Sodexo has a monopoly over all of the food and beverages on campus, but they have not made an effort to improve their facilities on campus.
“I feel it is unfair for first year students to be forced to purchase a meal plan when the service provided is substandard,” Seedat said.
Albert Rayle, a student at Texas Christian University has concerns about his school’s mandatory meal plan, and created the Facebook group, “Petition against TCU’s new meal plan,” which has more than 1,000 members.   
“Last year TCU just pumped a whole lot of money into a new dinning area and wanted to change the meal plan while they were at it,” Rayle said.
“In short, they are forcing students to eat at only one of TCU’s dining locations instead of giving us the option to choose where to eat on campus.”
Rayle believes that a mandatory meal plan should work in the student’s favor.
“Make sure that the student body knows exactly what is going to be on the plan and how it is going to affect them before it is put in effect,” Rayle advised U of L students. “The student body will see it as a plus if they get a good dining experience for less than they would be paying on their own.”
-Note: The Student Government Association will hold four meetings to discuss the meal plan waiver policy. The first will be this Thursday. For questions about times and locations, e-mail Dani Smith at [email protected].