<p>Do you HAVE to buy a meal plan in the dorms that require it? It just seems like a waste of money to me. You could easily buy some good groceries at Publix for way less, especially when its on sale =p.</p>
<p>Yes, dorms that require a meal plan REQUIRE the purchase of a meal plan. If you do not want to be required to buy a plan, pick dorms that do not require this. When you are tired, have exams, are hungry with nothing in your refridge, as a freshman a meal plan can come in handy. But if you have no desire to ever eat in one of the cafeterias, and want to cook, use Garnet Bucks and eat out alot, stay in a dorm without a required plan. You will not be placed in a dorm with a required meal plan UNLESS YOU REQUEST it. And if you do, yes you have to buy a plan. </p>
<p>You can take a bus to Heritage Grove and then walk across the street to Publix. But if you have no automobile, having a meal plan is going be be better than not having one. If you have a car you have the convenience of eating out, shopping for food, etc. If you do not, you probably need to pay for the convenience of a meal plan.</p>
<p>And remember, parking during the day is crazy on campus. Do not plan to go off campus for breakfast or lunch during the week. And do not plan to hit up the grocery store then either. You will not find a place to park easily when you get back. You will be driving off campus to eat and get groceries evenings and weekends. And the restaurants on campus get old after awhile if you don’t have a meal plan. And they are more expensive than a meal plan is over the entire semester. A good idea is to get the meal plan with the least number of meals, along with the Flex Bucks. Having no meal plan at all may not be as great as it seems.</p>
<p>Meal plans are not required for summer, but they are a good idea for the 6 weeks to try out a plan. There are NOT as many restaurants open on campus over summer, and many are open only M-Th. The hours of the cafeterias are not quite as long as for fall. But summer is not as crazy, you only take two classes with few night classes or labs, parking is not a problem, and getting to the cafeterias is a much easier prospect over the summer.</p>
<p>Do NOT get the smaller meal plans. </p>
<p>The two “small” mealplans are the 7 meals per week and the 125 block. There are 16 weeks in a semester X 7 = 112 meals. That meal plan costs $1619 (and you get 500 in flex bucks, so $1119 for the meals). 1119/112 = 9.99 per meal. This is the same price as buying dinner with plain old cash, and that assumes you use all your meals each week! If you pay with garnet bucks, dinner only costs $9.43 per meal and lunch is $7.43. Breakfast is even cheaper. The 125 block comes to 9.43 per meal (how convenient), so unless you use all of them for dinner, it’s a bad deal.</p>
<p>The ten meals per week is the best deal IMO (but still pretty bad). It’s 8.24 per meal if you use all your meals. 14 per week is going to be very tough to do because it means you can never eat a meal outside the mealplan place (unless you’re going there for breakfast sometimes).</p>
<p>Just keep those figures in mind when picking your meal plan. I was forced to get a meal plan, but given the choice, I wouldn’t. I’d still eat at the meal plan occasionally because they are definitely convenient, but the food is low quality and the price is not cheap. I find the fact that they force you to buy a meal plan to be very shady, but it’s like that at a lot of places.</p>
<p>Do you have to eat in the cafeteria or can you bring the food to your dorm?</p>
<p>o.O</p>
<p>I don’t think they prohibit you from eating in the dorms… Don’t they even have little mini-kitchens in the dorms?</p>
<p>@Dnerd</p>
<p>That’s what I was thinking about too. It’s stupid how they make students purchase a meal plan =/</p>
<p>Yep. That’s one of the main reasons I’ll be one of the few honors kids not rooming in Landis or Gilchrist.</p>
<p>You may eat in your room ANYTIME. There is no prohibition. You can stop by the cafeteria and get a meal to go ANYTIME. Fixing a meal in a to-go box is not a problem, nor is leaving with one.</p>
<p>FWIW, my son likes the food at Suwanee (which may be a reflection on my cooking, but I thought it quite nice when I visited a few weeks ago). In fact, he has used only about $15 of the flex bucks – all for milkshakes at the diner.</p>
<p>He lives at Reynolds and its literally less than a minute walk to the dining hall so he’ll wander down there just to get a soda or some chocolate milk. (He got the unlimited swipes just for that reason).</p>
<p>I realize that the food can get repetitive, but doesn’t all “affordable” food? Frozen pizzas, macaroni, and cans of soup get old too. I think most students will be too busy to actually do a lot of gourmet cooking and leaving campus to go out is time consuming (not to mention expensive). Having an available source of food is just one less thing to worry about. </p>
<p>The dining plans are kind of expensive, but the convenience (and social aspect) of a meal plan is a consideration as well and I think a student needs to think about how much money s/he will actually save before entirely dismissing the idea of a meal plan.</p>
<p>the meal plan is GREAT around midterms/finals</p>
<p>I would go to suwanee and walk back to my dorm with a take out box and eat a great meal in my dorm.</p>
<p>In my opinion: Suwanee has better breakfast, and lunch while Fresh food has better dinner (usually)</p>
<p>Plus fresh food has sweet tea (the best ever)</p>
<p>And there are not mini-kitchens in the dorms</p>
<p>@ Pistolen08, rice cookers actually aren’t allowed. I have one too and just read somewhere yesterday that they have to be use in the kitchen area only…so don’t get caught! lol</p>