<p>Starting our own thread so as not to hijack the '08's thread. But of course we love inputs from the upperclassmen parents.</p>
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<p>If they go over the DBA and have left over from the $200(Topside), it will automatically take money from the $200 first before going negative. But if you spend more than $200 Topside money, it will not take money from your dining DBA to pay for your Topside purchases.</p>
<p>And yes, the $200 Topside allocated amount cannot be rolled over. Dining DBA can be rolled over. Not that we are expecting any remaining amount from the way our boys eat!!! We will all probably receive a bill at the end of the term for the amount that they went over on their dining DBA.</p>
<p>Foggy, just about everything I know I've learned from you! I had to read this three times before I understood what it said. </p>
<p>At my older son's school, we paid one global amount (and everyone paid the same amount) for tuition, room and board, and they could eat as much as they wanted. The way Dartmouth does it is too confusing, too many choices, worries about $$$$. Goodness -- we're paying $46,000; why can't they just feed our kids??</p>
<p>i don't know if this has been brought up yet, but though the Topside account doesn't roll over, that's no excuse for losing the money. You can use the Topside account at any other DDS location by simply asking the cashiers to take it off Topside. Thus, one can use all $200, while at the same time delaying the use of regular DBA, since that does roll over until Spring term.</p>
<p>foggy - thanks for starting this thread. Apologies to '08 for my first hijacking. It was post-traumatic-empty house syndrome...Thanks for explaining the topside.<br>
<a href="http://thedartmouth.com/2006/11/21/opinion/duplicitous/%5B/url%5D">http://thedartmouth.com/2006/11/21/opinion/duplicitous/</a>
I now see the Dartmouthcom opinion section has raised many of the concerns that I now have about the expense of dining- salads were mentioed as they charged by weight. I was told some girls spend $50/day because they eat salads...and so much of the food is organic...I would like to prices posted on the menus' website. Healtier foods, based on the articles, cost more. Kids have also requested they post calories per entree and other health info re: servings.</p>
<p>Healthful food is too expensive here, so I've generally stuck to the cheaper fried/grilled offerings. There's actually quite a bit of free food available at activities - I have been getting free dinners from the Dartmouth Review, Aegis (the yearbook), the First-Year Forum, and Christian Impact - meaning that during the week, the only night I don't have a free dinner is Thursday. Having said that, the food served at these meals is by no means nutritionally ideal; typically it's just pizza, though Christian Impact does make a point of preparing the food itself instead of buying takeout.</p>
<p>I think there are ways to make money stretch here, but the main problem really is making healthful choices affordable. I have never had a salad because it's just too expensive, and soups only on rare occasions. The cheapest meal I can find is about USD7 from FoCo, and if you take nutrition into consideration, it can easily run into twice that amount.</p>
<p>I am hopeful that DDS will review its program and look at dining services ta other schools such as Carleton, Yale, and Northwestern - which also offer 4.5k-5K/per year dining options that include unlimited portions once in the dining service area and post nutritional info. Understanding that Dartmouth might charge another $500 premium per year would be accepatable so quality wouldn't suffer - but the option should be available as it is at other schools - because currently - it appears healthy eating is cost prohibitive and counterintutive to the values of DDS. When I went online and saw pictures of The Topiside - filled with junk food like - it made me wince. Pricing on healthy food should be such that it encourages such habits - and a premium charged for fatty low nutitional value foods.</p>
<p>Even with another $500 premium per year it will be worth it if the kids get to eat enough healthy food. As it is now, I would not be surprised if it does cost us more than the extra $500 per year. In fact I think it will definitely be more than $500 extra per year since our kids, boys in particular, will go over the Green Plan by at least $200 per term.</p>
<p>I would be happy if it was only $200 per semster - I am afraid it is more. We are in a receipt gathering mode this week - and then are going to analyze it and discuss w/ DDS because at the current rate - it is simply too much money for the kind of food (wraps) that he is eating.</p>
<p>My son's biggest complaint is the food-he is anxious that he will go over his limit very quickly-and he isn't a big football player or anything. I think Dartmouth could stand to look at the dining services at Bowdoin and Bates-both excellent.</p>
<p>It's the wages, guys. Having all those venues open for extended hours per the number of students paying into the system dirves up the expense, because they have to hire people at "exorbitant" wages. Also there has been an increase in availability of more desireable campus jobs, so the number of students (cheap labor) working for DDS has gone down - more people being hired at the "exorbitant" rate.
I don't want ot get into a discussion of living wage, but I wasn't kidding when I said my DH and I were considering retiring and going to Dart to work in food service. Some people make $30/hour I believe.</p>
<p>Hm...but at FoCo, students take the salads themselves. They even place them on the weighing scales themselves at the checkout. Same goes for soups in Collis. Meanwhile, when I order a double cheeseburger deal (the greatest bang for buck food I've found so far), it takes a good five to ten minutes for the chefs at the grill to prepare it. So why is a salad more expensive than a hamburger?</p>
<p>There doesn't seem to be a real correlation.</p>
<p>In my four years at Dartmouth, I never once came close (i.e., within $150) to going over my limit on the minimal plan, and I did it while eating healthy and maintaining weight. It's all about balance: do the double cheeseburger deal on some occasions, do salads others, etc.</p>
<p>Furthermore, I would take a $3000 dining plan over a forced $5000 plan every day of the week and twice on Sundays.</p>
<p>Wisconguy- How are your costs running this year? Isn't the plan in effect now different from when you started? Can you give us an idea of what you spend on a typical day for breakfast, lunch, and dinner? And what you order? Do you think menu prices should be posted online? Thanks!</p>
<p>My son's purchases are mostly omlettes in the am ($8.46)and wraps for lunch ($9.27 each) and dinner- after I told him of my near death experience seeing he was spending $40/ day. We supplement him w/ clif bars/ grapenuts/ and he also stocks his fridge w/ yogurts and milk. He will run out of money at his current rate well before the trimester ends.</p>
<p>Wow! Those prices are well above prices for the same items in a decent cafe around here. Do a lot of the kids end up cooking in the dorms? I guess the Hanover restaurants don't have any trouble competing with campus food.</p>
<p>Oh, gosh, no. EBA's actually has a buffet for less than USD8. If they accepted DASH, DDS would be out of business.</p>
<p>I'd cook in my dorm if it wasn't such a hassle and there wasn't so much work.As it stands, we just look for as many activities as possible to finagle free food from.</p>
<p>I'm a freshman at Dartmouth... and the food definitely is too expensive, especially considering I try to eat relatively healthy. I also eat a good amount because of a high metabolism, but I have tried to cut back on my eating [also due to inactivity dropping my metabolism]. On days that I go running or play tennis though, my metabolism shoots up insanely.</p>
<p>That said, my DBA is already down to around $660 and I've only been here since September 18th. Combining what I have in my Topside, I'm around $840. That is supposed to last me nine weeks, or 63 days or so. I don't see that happening.</p>
<p>i'm on the small plan and have been since freshman fall ... i usually don't get breakfast (cereal or bagel in my room if i have to), usually a sandwich lunch, entree dinner ... that's usually about $15-$20 a day, with drinks. If studying late I'll sometimes spring for another sandwich for eating in the library around midnight; sometimes i'll go for a medium salad instead of lunch or in addition to dinner.</p>
<p>i've never had a problem with the amount of DBA ... tell your kids to work 10 hours/wk for DDS and get a 20% rebate credited to their accounts. </p>
<p>Also, phase2, no omelet is $8.46, no wrap is $9.27; omelets top out around $5, wraps around $7, if you get a bunch of add-ins, but usually they're about $6. Let's not get hyperbolic on this thread.</p>
<p>Breakfast includes an OJ and a muffin, lunch an dinner include milk and yogurt.
At a minimum -prices should be posted by DDS on the website- because it isn't a flat fee meal plan - but a bill will arrive for overages. There should be economies of scale in pricing. Below are prices of local restaurants in business to make a profit on dining. </p>
<p>so at murphy's you can spend $20 on a healthy salad and burger, plus drinks plus tip...</p>
<p>at zin's, an entree plus salad is about $20, and at the DWR, a juice, omelet, and english muffin runs you over $15...</p>
<p>all these prices are above what they are at DDS. Nobody's saying that these prices are reasonable either, and certainly the quality of food at Zin's and Murphy's are better than anywhere at DDS, though breakfast at the DWR is nothing to write home about, it's about on par with Collis or the Hop.</p>
<p>while it might be helpful to parents to have prices up, in reality, nobody really cares how much anything is when they decide to go buy it - basically students use the online menus to decide where to go for a meal - they know the entrees are going to be $7-10, the grill special at FoCo 6.50, the deli special at 5.50-6.50, and entrees at pavilion will be 8 - 11.00.</p>
<p>Everything else for the most part is fixed-price everyday .. basically if you think the prices are too high you're going to have to convince the college that paying its employees a living wage is a bad idea.</p>