Frequently Asked Questions(FAQ)

Who is required to purchase a meal plan?

Students that live in a residence hall (including those in St. Basil Court) are required to purchase a meal plan. Only students that live in Teresa Court or La Salle apartments or St Miguel Townhouses are not required to purchase a meal plan.

How does the Meal Plan work?

All meal plans are comprised of three components:

1.) Meals
The “meal” component entitles you to an “all-you-care-to-eat” meal in either Blue & Gold Dining or Treetops Cafe. As you enter the dining hall you will be asked to swipe your ID card. This will reduce your available meal balance by one meal (unless you are on an Unlimited Access Plan, then you have no have limitations). Once inside, you can treat yourself to all of the food available at each of the various serving areas. Food cannot be removed from the dining hall.

Unlimited Access Meal Plans do not restrict the student to a set number of meals per week. With an Unlimited Access Meal Plan students can enter the dining hall as often as they like.

The 14 or 17 Meal Plan offers 14 or 17 meals per week. If you do not use all of your meals within any given week they do not carry over to the next week. At the beginning of a new week you will receive a fresh balance of either 14 or 17 meals depending on your plan.

2.) Special Food Account
Your Special Food Account (aka SFA or Plus money) provides you with a fixed amount of funds in an account that can be used to purchase food on an ala carte basis. If you decide you want to eat a meal in the Food Court or Café Metro (our restaurant), the SFA is accepted as a means of tender. For example, if you requested a Philly cheese steak,, fries and a soda in our Food Court each of these menu choices has a specific selling price. The cashier would ring up each item, you would present your ID card and the amount of the ala carte items chosen would be deducted from your SFA balance. The Special Food Account is intended to allow you to eat in venues other than the Blue & Gold or Treetops Café.

If you have an unused Special Food Account balance at the conclusion of the Fall semester, it will carry over to the Spring semester. Provided you enroll in the same meal plan during the Spring semester. However any unused SFA at the end of the Spring semester is forfeited.

3.) Guest Meals
Each meal plan provides the student with a certain number of guests meals. These guest meals are intended to permit you to treat a friend or family member to a meal in Blue & Gold or Treetops Cafe. All of the meal plans we offer carry a minimum of 3 guest meals per semester. The 7 Day Unlimited Access meal plans have 10 guest meals. Unused guest meals do not carry over from one semester to the next. Should you use all of your guest meals, you still can treat a friend to a meal by using your Special Food Account to purchase a meal.

If I do not live in a Residence Hall, is there a meal plan available to me?

If you live in the St Miguel townhouses, Teresa Court or La Salle apartments, or if you commute or live in a nearby off-campus house you can purchase any of the meal plans we offer.

We have specifically designed certain meal plans to meet the needs of those students that may only desire to eat in the dining halls on an occasional basis. In addition to any of the required meal plans we offer we also have optional meal plans.

Can I change my meal plan?

You can request to change your meal plan before the start of any semester at no charge. Once the semester begins, students may request a change in their meal plan provided that the request is submitted within the first two weeks of that semester. Meal Plan change requests will not be honored after the first two weeks of each semester. When making a meal plan change you will be issued the pro-rated difference between plans in the form of a credit to your account or a refund check mailed to your home address. The first meal plan change requested by first semester freshmen is free. Requests by upper class students or second semester students will be processed with a $25 administrative fee.