The Oakland Post

Chartwells offers up cuts

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Recently, Oakland University’s primary food service provider, Chartwells, lowered the prices for catering to student organizations by up to 70 percent.

The prices were calculated based off of a retail price survey completed by Oakland University Student Congress members and the Center for Student Activities that compared the prices and portion sizes of food to other local grocery stores and restaurants.

The change only reduced the price of the most commonly purchased items as opposed to the whole menu though, and it doesn’t apply to any on campus departments.

While we do commend Chartwells for acknowledging their overpriced goods and cutting their costs, we encourage student organizations to use their extra influx of funds because of these reductions to increase the overall quality of their programming instead of spending more on food.

In an article The Oakland Post published on March 15, it was discovered that most students only attend events because of the added bonus of free food.

Organizations shouldn’t use food as the only tool to draw students in because, as it was also discovered, most of the students who do stop by the events usually eat and then leave shortly after. It somewhat helps foster campus involvement, but organizations should seize new opportunities presented by the lowered catering prices.

According to Brandon Hanna, student activities funding board chair, student organizations spent about $130,000-$150,000 of it’s allotted $260,000 yearly budget on food last year, leaving less than half of the budget available for campus events.

Though food may be enticing, it shouldn’t be the focal point of an organization, which is partially funded by the activities fee that is taken out of each student’s tuition payments.

Since food costs are now lower, at least for hot-ticket items like pizza and chicken tenders, student organizations should remember the main task at hand; student involvement.

Organizations should enhance student life and provide events that enrich in a way that’s more than nutritional.

Again, we bring about the common complaint that is what we’ve dubbed “the commuter conflict” — the phenomena of a campus of about 20,000 students rarely contributing to the campus community, save for attending classes.

The school is starting to shed that image, but students must contribute to the effort.

The editorial board recently sat down with OU President Gary Russi’s cabinet to discuss a myriad of topics, including on campus involvement.

Mentions of a new dorm building because of the increased demand in student housing have brought to our attention a vested interest in living on campus.

People are becoming interested in staying on campus for reasons other than the availability of copious amounts of free food.

We’ve observed lines that extend past our office for the Student Program Board’s trip to Boston, OUSC’s Postsecret event and for last year’s Meadow Brook Ball, which sold out in record time.

All of these large-scale events are put on by campus organizations and a whole cadre of similar events could be created if money were less frequently spent on food.