In the fall of 2018, Oakland University’s Hillcrest dining hall was introduced as another buffet styled dining hall around OU’s campus to work in tandem with Vandenberg’s dining hall. Over the years however, changes have been made to the Hillcrest dining hall, differentiating the dining experiences from one another. Starting this semester, the Hillcrest dining hall has become a mobile dining service with made-to-order meals, using the Transact mobile ordering app.
Robert King, the housing director for Oakland University, explains that the changes made to the dining hall over the past few years were a result of the 2020 Covid-19 pandemic.
“We are still recovering from Covid,” King said. “Prior to Covid, I think we had one of our largest on campus populations. Since our initial tank, we went down to probably around half of those students that live with us and the parameters for managing food on campus were really baked for the parameters that were much higher in terms of students on campus.
King sheds light on why housing decided on exclusively mobile dining for Hillcrest.
“Housing and other campus partners have been trying to wrestle with what we can do to give students something that would also mimic that type of behavior of purchasing food that already exists, and one of the things we looked at was mobile ordering,” King said. “And so if you were to go around halls at the end of the day, you’ll see Uber Eats, GrubHub, and any deliveries all over after hours, and we’re like, ‘okay, so students are very familiar with the concept of mobile ordering,’ and so we thought there’s a way for us to both bring mobile ordering to campus with a very good app development platform and have something that could provide students a bit more access to food.”
With the new dining system being operational for a month so far, King understands that it’s not perfect just yet, and adjustments will be added over time.
“I would love to say that this iteration of it is the starting point for us,” King said. “It gives us a chance to start somewhere. It gives Chartwells, our campus food provider, the opportunity to hear feedback from students, make some adjustments, get the basics down pat, and then from there, add some nuances, maybe they change some menu items throughout the year, and make some adjustments based on student interest.”
Something that is continuing to help the new Hillcrest system is student feedback. King explains how the feedback is helping add additions to the new system.
“In the dining area, you’ll see there’s QR codes that give us your feedback,” King said. “You’ll see them on the walls almost next to the food stations or between stations, and a student could go there immediately and give feedback right there on the spot. As we’re reviewing, because we review weekly, we have some additional data to be able to make updates and changes as we need to.”
King is looking to transform the Hillcrest dining hall into more than a dining hall, but another lounge area such as the Oakland Center.
“When we looked at this concept, it wasn’t just food,” King said. “Hillcrest Hall is a beautiful space for us, and we have food that’s happening in that dining area, but we have board games on the wall over there for people to play and grab games as they want, hopefully keep them in the space.
“We’re also anticipating, at least maybe getting some more recreational items. So trying to work with the University Center to possibly get a pool table in the space for people to play while they’re waiting. We’re also looking to get ping pong tables, more than just sitting there, studying, grabbing food, but you could drop in and do some of the other things while you’re there. It becomes another, like third space for students to kind of just hang out, if they want to hang out.”
With the implementation of the new dining hall experience, students have had the chance to try the food and the area out for themselves. Freshman Trey Brunckhorst has a fresh take with his first OU dining hall experience.
“It’s really good,” Brunckhorst said. “I like it better than the Vandy (Vandenberg dining hall) food personally, but I also don’t like how I have to think about it 22 minutes at a time to be able to get my food.”
One aspect that gives Vandenberg a leg up on Hillcrest according to Brunckhorst is the dining hall hours.
“Vandy is nice because you can just pop in at any time, and vandy’s open longer,” Brunckhorst said. “One of my main issues with Hilly [Hillcrest dining hall] is that it’s only open on Monday through Friday, and it has really short hours, so that kind of sucks.”
With the food at Hillcrest being made-to-order, the food quality has seen some improvements, but in Molly Cooper’s opinion, the food selection could use some work.
“It definitely gets boring, and it’s definitely limited,” Cooper said. “Maybe a little more fresh food. The food here kind of resembles a mall food court, and there’s a lot of unhealthy foods. I want a little more variety, maybe some fresh food. I don’t really want to be stuck eating pizza and chicken tenders and stuff. I just want more variety and more accessibility.”
With OU housing’s efforts to turn the dining hall into a lounge area, student feedback is important in order to shape the area into a campus hotspot. A big example comes as Cooper’s biggest gripe with using the hall; the music volume.
“For one, I would not want to stand here and study while there’s music blasting,” Cooper said. “Even when I came here with my friends, it’s kind of hard to actually hear the conversation when there’s music.”
While the Hillcrest dining hall system is still in its infancy, the quick reply to student feedback is promising for the future of the dining hall. For those who want to leave their own feedback on the Hillcrest dining hall, text them at 949-763-3189.
