Wow, so many options for meal plans for freshman. It took us over an hour to choose one, lol. Question for the experienced Aggies and the Dining Dollars. From what I read, it looks like you can use those for meals, snacks and the like on campus. We went middle of the road and are hoping for the best. I also read that you can’t reduce your plan, only increase. So many decisions.
My son is a junior now. Resist the feeling that you need to buy a large meal plan or your freshman will starve. We felt the same until someone told me this exact message. Buy the cheapest plan you can and add dining dollars as you need. Keep in mind, all of the restaurants take cash too. There is only a small discount for dining dollars but a big risk that you won’t use them all. My son was giving away meals and dining dollars on his last weeks of school.
@Quirky813, Agree with @whciv01. We bought the second cheapest plan first semester freshman year. It equated to something like $11 per meal, and later learned he could buy the same meals for cash/credit card/debit card for less. Second semester, we went with the cheapest plan and paid cash for meals once that ran out. As mentioned, a lot of kids don’t eat through their meals on the higher plans – and they don’t carry over. The dining dollars are convenient, but again, you can use cash/credit/debit for snacks and Starbucks too.
Thank you both for the comments. I think we bought the 9-10 meals/week with $300 Dining Dollars but I’m going to go back in and lower it before it’s too late. I’d like to see if he eats through the 7-8 meals/week and like you said, we can always add more DD or just use cash.
Thank you
Buy the cheapest plan. Most of the places around campus will give you about $7 worth of food for a $9 or $10 meal trade, and the cafeteria is hardly worth $10 itself. You’re pretty much losing money on every meal trade you buy, the enormous meal plans come close to breaking even though. Just buy the smallest plan, burn through it, then pay cash the rest of the way, it saves money and gives you a lot more flexibility.
This is my situation and my counselor told me this but I am not entirely sure since I can’t seem to find it online. I am an upcoming freshmen with enough credits to consider myself a sophomore. She said that since I will come in with all of these credits I will not be required to purchase a meal plan. Is this true?
@BloodShotProZ, Only U1 freshman (those with 0-29 hours) who live in campus housing are required to purchase a meal plan. U2 and above (30 hours and above) are not required to do so. That said, have you already transferred/accepted DC/AP credit sufficient to equal 30 hours? More information is provided here: http://www.dineoncampus.com/tamu/show.cfm?cmd=_mealPlansFAQs#2
I agree with “buy the smallest meal plan.” First semester my S had the minimum 90 meals/300 dining dollars plan. He ran out of meals around Thanksgiving and was helping friends use up their extra meals the last couple of weeks. Second semester I figured we should increase it by 30, so we went for 120 meals with 300 dining dollars, although I think he had some dining $$ that rolled over from the fall as well. That was a painful $300+ lesson for me because he had almost 30 meals and over 100 dining dollars left when the semester ended that don’t roll over to summer or fall. Won’t do that again. Save yourselves, friends!! It’s not “go big or go home” on this one.
@lee6666 , Oh okay thank you very much! And at the moment no, I barely graduated with my associates a couple weeks ago and have yet to send in my final transcripts because I am still taking summer classes to get even more credits. Talked it over with parents, and they said I should just go ahead and get a meal plan regardless. Just trying to find out the cheapest way to go about it. I don’t want to pay for something extra that I honestly don’t need.