Dining?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Massachusetts Institute of Technology
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<p>I hear frequent comments from a '12 and her friends about the dining options at MIT. They say that eating easily can become very asocial and and solitary and that far too much time and effort is taken up with scounging for free food at events or shopping/cooking for yourself or getting people to agree to go out to a restaurant or to one of the dorms that have a dinning hall (which are open 5-6 days and for dinner only).</p>

<p>Apparently there is a proposal for a central dining hall somewhere near the student center, which would accomodate all or most of the undergrad community. Does anyone know the status/liklihood of MIT doing this and if so whether it would be open for B/L/D?</p>

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<p>As far as the central dining hall proposal goes, there have been a lot of ideas floating around to try to change the dining situation at MIT. I live in East Campus, and we have full kitchens, so this is an especially hot topic on our discussion list, as the building has been due to be renovated for quite some time and residents don't want the kitchens to be eliminated. For food, the student center is pretty centrally located and at least Verde's is open pretty late. I think that the MacGreggor convenience store might be open until 4 am or so also.</p>

<p>Honestly, though, MIT dining is what you make it. I have a lot of friends that scrounge for free food each night but make it a social experience - someone yells 'I'm going to 6-120 for free food, who's coming with me?' and 5 other kids will come out of their rooms and tag along. There's always someone in our kitchen (except for at 8 am, when I make breakfast before class) so if you're having an antisocial dining experience, it's because you're making it that way. Yes, people don't eat out that much, but I find it's mostly because I can get a lot more food for $15 at Shaw's than for $15 at a restaurant. If you want to sit in your room and eat nothing but ramen, that's your decision, but there are ample opportunties to be sociable, at least in the 5 dorms with kitchens.</p>

<p>You might also want to check out this blog entry: MIT</a> Admissions | Blog Entry: "Dining"</p>

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<p>whoever your friend is, she probably does not live on the east side. around these parts the prevailing opinion is that we LOVE our kitchens, and eat on the whole more healthily, more cheaply and more socially and communally than folks who are stuck fending for themselves for breakfast and lunch and eating at the dining hall for dinner during their prescribed, for me inconvenient, hours.</p>

<p>i go food shopping at star market (right by random hall) on my bike about once a week, put my food in my backpack or hang the bags on my handlebars.. it's less than a five minute ride. groceries from whole foods are more delicious, but also outrageously priced and farther away, so i stick to star. they have a lot of discounts on fri/sat/sun so that is when i go. when the weather is nice i bike or T to haymarket (T takes about 15 or 20 minutes, bike takes less than 10) on saturday and get very ripe fruits and vegetables for extremely cheap.</p>

<p>as karen said, east campus has the advantage of full kitchens (burton conner has kitchens that are nice but a little smaller because they serve each suite, not each hall; random has huge kitchens; i can't remember how many senior haus has but i think plenty; and there's one more i'm forgetting) with stoves and sinks and fridges. i generally only cook for dinner, and eat sandwiches, salads or cereal for breakfast and lunch. it is pretty much the greatest setup ever. i wish the supermarket were right next door, of course, but it's pretty awesome as it is. a lot of people have informal mini-co-op cooking things going on, and sometimes more formal term-long cooking co-ops happen.</p>

<p>when term is really busy i would say a number of my friends get sushi or really good pizza at stata, and delicious greasy chinese at the kendall food court. on weekends a few of my friends like to have breakfast at brookline lunch, a cheap and awesome place in central square.</p>

<p>i dunno. the last way i would describe dining at mit for me is "asocial" or "solitary"... cooking and eating with friends is one of the things i like best about my social life at school. if you are under financial constraints, it is honestly a blessing to not be forced to pay for an expensive dining plan.</p>

<p>wow that turned into an essay.. i guess i feel kinda strongly about this... yeah.</p>

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<p>mollie could you fill me in on how the kitchens in MacGregor work? As in, how big are they, how many to a kitchen, how often people use them, etc.?</p>

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<p>Ugh, why do we have to make everything an east vs west thing? West Campus actually has more dorms with kitchens than East Campus (the percentage is lower, because West Campus is considerably larger). Burton Conner and New House are <em>at least</em> as centered on their social cooking activities as East Campus, Senior House, and Random. Simmons and McCormick are slightly less so, since they also have dining halls- but their kitchens certainly don't go unused by any means. And people even do use the dorm-wide kitchens in Baker and Next (although rather infrequently).</p>

<p>Also, different strokes for different folks. Some people really like not needing to cook for themselves. And I don't see how eating in a dining hall with friends is less social than eating in a kitchen with friends.</p>

<p>I will agree that there are differences in culture between the 2 sides of campus, but "healthier" and "more social" are certainly not distinctions that need to be made.</p>

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<p>okay, okay, i stand corrected :)
truth re:different strokes for different folks.</p>

<p>i also actually had no idea that simmons had kitchens. my b.
i just meant to correct the poster's impression that cooking and eating in a non-dining hall situation was antisocial. because it's totally not. i can really only speak from my own experience and i shouldn't have generalized, i'm sorry. the threat of the kitchens being taken away some day gets me all worked up in their defense :)</p>

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<p>It's cool, I am equally guilty of getting unnecessarily worked up about East vs West stereotypes, and I don't even have a logical excuse I can point to. =)</p>

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<p>My daughter and all of her friends in Burton-Conner love their kitchens and the flexibility and freedom of eating whenever/wherever they want. And for what it's worth, they've all avoided that "freshman 15" thing. And jeez, doesn't every parent want his/her child to learn to cook? </p>

<p>Her uncle, an MIT student from the 1970s, let us read his old issues of the Tech (student newspaper), and MIT dining halls were controversial even back then. Most of the students did not use the existing dining halls, and many have been gradually shut down over the years as small little cafes have popped up on campus to take their place. I don't understand why parents and MIT administrators keep getting their knickers in a twist over this issue.</p>

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<p>kb09026, the kitchens in MacGregor are pretty small, but there is one for every suite, which is about 7 singles. In some suites the kitchen isn't really even a seperate room, its just a fridge, countertop area, stove and cupboards built into the wall along the hallway, but in other suites it's in a little "alcove" area. Each suite has one, and every entryway has one kitchen with an oven which anybody in the entry is free to use. Some people in my suite use the kitchen everyday, some never use it. So the MacG kitchens definitely aren't the biggest you'll find at MIT, but for me, that's more than made up for by the extremely convenient MacGregor convenience store, which is right in the dorm itself and is open until 2 AM (the prices aren't that great, but you'd be surprised at all the stuff you can buy in that little store).</p>

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<p>^ thanks for the reply</p>

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<p>I did not know that simmons had kitchens either. How do they work, are they by floor etc etc.</p>

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<p>I dont see any basis for making this a "parents and MIT administrators" versus "students" thing. More like some students prefering the status quo [for financial or dietary reasons] and others [those who dont want to cook] wanting something different. Does anyone know the results of student surveys on the issue?</p>

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<p>I think general opinion (at least in the dorms that do have kitchens) is that it's a parents/admins vs. students thing.</p>

<p>Residents of dorms with kitchens tend to be fiercely protective of their way of life. I loved having a kitchen, and my husband and my friends and I cooked together almost every night. We had fairly easy access to a dining hall (Next is just a few hundred yards down dorm row from MacGregor), but we only went there about once a week as freshmen, then never afterward. It was easier and happier and faster and more fun for us to make our own food and eat in the lounge.</p>

<p>Your mileage may vary significantly.</p>

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<p>Like everything else in Simmons, the arrangement of kitchens is also random. I think it's safe to say there's at least one on every floor (except the 2nd - and the 1st floor has a large country kitchen complete with ovens, two sinks, two fridges, etc.), scattered amid the randomly appearing lounges.</p>

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<p>The distinction between a "generally" held opinion and personal preference is being lost here. Havent recent surveys been done of MacGregor residents, on the strength of which they have experimented with reopening MacGregor dining on a trial basis for several nights a month? It would appear that more than a few current residents are tired of cooking/scrounging/eating maccon. One person's general opinion is another's....</p>

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<p><a href="http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/massachusetts-institute-technology/492982-cpw-mit-college-life.html#post1060193993%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/massachusetts-institute-technology/492982-cpw-mit-college-life.html#post1060193993&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>@mia305-- you have expressed this attitude before.. see mollie, jessie, calalum and laura's responses. no one is trying to express a unanimous view, or to suggest that EVERY STUDENT holds the same opinion.</p>

<p>nonetheless, the personal <em>perspective</em> i expressed in my post certainly attempts to convey more than just my own preferences-- i shared them because they <em>do</em> represent how a certain, moderately-sized segment of mit's population approaches eating at mit.</p>

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<p>Carmel: You missed the point. Some of these reply posts portray personal preferences as the "majority" or "general" or "prevailing" or "settled" position. I have no problem with the "opinion" expressed in your last post, which doesnt do that, or any opinion for that matter. You are entitled to your opinion. But so are the others. And, it seems to me that some of those who prefer the status quo, tho vocal, are too quick to claim a consensus in their favor and are a bit intolerant of those who dont want to cook for themselves or scrounge for food and want change. I undertand that there are surveys and proposals to change the dining "options", and was looking for information on these.</p>

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<p>
[quote]
I dont see any basis for making this a "parents and MIT administrators" versus "students" thing.

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</p>

<p>I do, because it is.</p>

<p>There are exceptions, but really, it is. I was in student advocacy for three years; I have a pretty good idea of the views around campus. Every couple years, admins try to shove a more traditional college dining experience down everyone's throats, and every time, the student body as a group resents it. I'm not claiming everyone holds this opinion. There are also students who think that hacks should be cracked down on, students who supported Freshmen on Campus, and students who wish that dorms would just be assigned for them the way they are at most places.</p>

<p>
[quote]
And, it seems to me that some of those who prefer the status quo, tho vocal, are too quick to claim a consensus in their favor and are a bit intolerant of those who dont want to cook for themselves or scrounge for food and want change.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>You don't have to. I'm terrible at cooking, and I rarely scrounged, and I lived in a dorm without a dining hall, and yet I didn't have a problem. Anyone is allowed to buy into the dining plan, and eat at any of the dorm dining halls, regardless of where they live. Anyone can buy food from the places in the Student Center (which have improved a lot since, say, I showed up as a frosh). Most of the FSILGs have their own dining systems, and I know of at least one that lets you buy into its dining plan without having to join. And you don't have to be able to cook to, you know, fix yourself a sandwich or a bowl of cereal. It is really frickin' easy to find sufficient food. And social spaces. There are a lot of social spaces on campus, in and out of living groups.</p>

<p>
[quote]
Does anyone know the status/liklihood of MIT doing this...

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</p>

<p>Hopefully, zilch. Hopefully this idea and all similar ones to force people to conform to traditional models of college dining at MIT will die on the vine.</p>

<p>ETA: Oh, and if you think this was harsh, you should have seen what I originally typed. :p</p>

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<p>I'm sorry that you disagree with the status quo, but the fact of the matter is that the general consensus is that MIT students don't want to have mandatory dining, and therefore we are strongly against these programs. We have given you information on what some proposals have been, but they are hopefully unlikely to be passed. I'm sorry that you disagree with the opinion of the majority of MIT students. I guess democracy doesn't really work in your situation.</p>

<p>I can't cook, my boyfriend can't cok, many of my friends can't cook, but we'd have to be complete idiots to starve to death. If you're genuinely concerned about not being able to feed yourself, you have many other options, like ordering food, or the Student Center, or various restaurants near campus. And, like Jessie said, ramen is pretty much idiot-proof. There's a reason it's a college staple.</p>

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<p>seriously, MOST people do not eat ramen regularly or even near regularly. it has calories but not much else, everyone knows that, and it is a BAD THING to imply that students live on it b/c they can't cook.... i am sure you did not mean it that way, but that is the kind of comment that invites conclusions like "without mandatory dining students are malnourished."</p>