There’s only one thing that Dining Services fears more than the norovirus: competition. When Georgetown introduced Flex Dollars, a program intended to give students choices beyond Leo’s for their meal plans, last year, they made it too small (a maximum of $100 per term) and too limited (just a number of venues on campus) to make a real difference. Over a year later, the program hasn’t gotten any better. It’s time for Georgetown to expand the Flex Dollars program so that the initiative finally lives up to its name and gives students real meal flexibility.
The biggest problem with Flex Dollars is its size. Students on the 14 meal per week plan receive just $75 per term, a mere four percent of the total cost of the plan. These students, especially the freshmen and sophomores with mandatory meal plans, are able to choose an alternative to Leo’s just a handful of times each term. In contrast, freshmen at the George Washington University are required to spend just $1,400 at GW’s dining venues, while they’re free to spend the remaining $2,000 at numerous local restaurants and stores, including two Safeways, which accept their debit cards. Students at Georgetown deserve more than $75 of flexibility each term.
The resulting competition would hopefully force Leo’s to improve the quality of its offerings, a welcome change for all the students dissatisfied with their slimy scrambled eggs and wilted salad bar. Market forces aren’t the solution for our health care system, but by ending the Leo’s monopoly, they’d do wonders for dining at Georgetown.
Georgetown also needs to work to expand the number of restaurants which accept Flex. The Corp stores, Hoya Court, and Epicurean are a good start, but the next step should be to take Flex Dollars outside the front gates. There’s no reason why Georgetown students shouldn’t be able to spend their Flex Dollars at popular restaurants like the Tombs, Wisey’s, and Booey’s.
These are all major, long-term changes, but there’s one small thing that can be changed immediately. The restriction on Flex Dollars at Vital Vittles to single-meal items like sandwiches and 20 ounce sodas, which excludes items like a loaf of bread or a gallon of milk, needs to go. Georgetown can, and should, demand that Flex Dollars be spent on food, but that’s as far as their oversight should go.
