Bon Appétit has been using disposable dishes because students keep taking the regular dishes, usually after eating outside. The Outhouse and Campus Greens did a raid to find the missing dishes which was “moderately successful” according to Joanna Jungerman, an Outhouse resident who was involved in the raid.

Although this is a recurring problem, “This is the worst year I have seen in a long time,” said Susan Todhunter, the resident dining manager at Prentiss.

“Over 200 dishes have already been stolen this year,” said Todhunter. “I don’t want to be the policeman. I want students to have the ability to go to their room or study while they eat or whatever: if they would just bring [the dishes] back.”

If the problem continues at this rate, Bon Appétit won’t be able to keep re-stocking the sets of dishes, and students would no longer be permitted to take the dishes out of the dining halls.

The dining managers are looking for feedback to try and solve this problem. Todhunter had the idea to put out collection bins in the residence halls to collect some of the dishes, but the RAs felt that it might encourage students to keep taking dishes without bringing them back and make the problem worse.

“We’re trying to come up with answers that would make us happy and make the students happy. Like I said, I don’t want to be the cop. I don’t want to be the person who stands at the door and makes everybody mad,” said Todhunter.

Last year at a focus group, RAs said that they thought many dishes ended up in the garbage because students don’t want to return the dirty dishes. “I went to take some recycling out, and I saw two of our dishes in the garbage: in perfectly fine condition,” said Todhunter.

The dining managers are happy to discuss this issue with students. The primary goal is to let students be flexible and eat outside, or wherever, but keep the dishes to save money and save the effort of ordering new ones.