the university cafeteria
Cafeterias and restaurants are important on college campuses. The university’s largest cafeteria designed for use by staff, students and visitors is generally the most visited component of a university. It is also a place where students and faculty can take their visitors for a short coffee break or lunchtime visit. A well-designed central cafeteria, located perhaps in the student center, adds to the functional efficiency of the university. Here, lunchtime can be combined with a visit to the bank, post office, and bookstore along with a friendly exchange of words with colleagues, fellow students, visitors, staff, and faculty who may be visiting the same building at the same time. weather. weather. Universities where these centers are not common would do well to plan for it on their campuses.
As mentioned, the ideal location for a university’s central cafeteria is the student center. The student union building containing the cafeteria, along with the administration building, can easily be designed as the two largest buildings on a university campus due to their central and essential functions. Both buildings must be accessed from the academic departments, as well as by outsiders and vehicles. Therefore, its location on the university together with the parking areas and the university boulevard should be incorporated into the master plan. The best location for a student center on campus is one close to the administration building but towards the student housing area. It should also be near University Boulevard and Visitor Parking. The building must be surrounded by lawns and gardens containing benches to sit on.
The university cafeteria should be spacious not only because of the large number of visitors, but also because the space between the tables should ideally be much larger than the space between the tables in a normal restaurant. Students often use these charts to read or complete an assignment along with a snack, lunch, or dinner. The acoustic design of a university cafeteria must be such as to minimize the noise level. The use of non-reflective wall coverings and the provision of sections of the cafeteria that can be opened to the surroundings during peak hours addresses this need. Music may never be allowed inside a college cafeteria for the same reason. Other soundproof sections of the student center can be designed to allow for music.
It is worth mentioning that a university cafeteria needs to serve nutritious food at subsidized prices. Its main customers are students, who are not earning members of society. Two different models prevail for running such cafeterias. In the first, the university awards a contract to a private provider. In the second, the university has its own food service department and runs the cafeteria by hiring the necessary staff. Both models have inherent limitations. When services are outsourced to a private provider, you gain a captive and secured clientele without having to face open market competition. This can and often does lead to a deterioration in the quality of food and service. Although the contracts are for limited time periods, university food contractors tend to stick around for a number of reasons.
On the other hand, when a university runs the cafeteria alone, we end up with a problem similar to that faced by state-owned companies. A staff with secure employment but unconcerned with profit can lead to an expensive establishment that provides poor service. A novel solution to the problem is to provide a set of small kitchens, five or six, instead of one large one. These kitchens are then rented out to separate caterers or restaurants that serve different types of food. The maintenance and cleaning of the facilities as well as the billing are in charge of the personnel contracted by the university. A common billing clerk collects the appropriate amounts for food from different counters. The practice is to provide a plastic tray and cutlery at the entrance to the food counter enclosure. After purchasing the desired food items at the venue, a customer proceeds to checkout in much the same way as checkout in a supermarket. Billing of food items is made at the exit of this enclosure. Billing done on a computer easily segregates and divides revenue among different providers. A separate counter for hot and cold drinks (requiring the least effort to prepare) is kept under the direct control of the university department. Proceeds help support the cafeteria.
A clause in the contract with the caterers ensures that the caterer with the lowest cumulative sales (ie, the least popular) will not renew its contract in the following year. Therefore, bad providers last a year, while a good one can stay forever in college. This system introduces competition among catering service providers and provides constant improvement. The best of caterers can be sure of long contracts, while the poor ones would change quickly. The fact that the university provides space, silverware, utilities, and some staff to run the cafeteria automatically introduces a subsidy measure that can translate into lower costs. In this competitive system, the university does not need to control costs since an expensive catering service will generally not be popular with students. Some basic rules must be specified in this food court, such as the number of items each vendor can prepare.
A campus without a good cafeteria is sterile.