Students push to bring dining services in-house

Students at the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis are asking the university to switch to a self-operated dining program once its current contract with Aramark expires, Minnesota Daily reports.

The push is being led by the school’s student association, which discussed the proposal at its first forum of the semester, held last week.

At the forum, the student association’s dining subcommittee presented its recommendations to improve dining services, which included longer dining hall hours, access to higher-quality produce, incorporating more sustainable food sources and the construction of an on-campus grocery store.

“The construction of a grocery store will alleviate the lack of affordable and fresh grocery store options on and near campus and open up a new channel of potentially lucrative revenue,” the dining subcommittee said in a report. 

While the university administration has final say on the future of the school’s dining program, it will take the student association’s recommendations into account.

The University of Minnesota is the only publicly owned school in the Big Ten that’s not self-operated, according to Minnesota Daily.

Read the full story via mndaily.com.