Editorial The Case of the Disappearing Dining Ware

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The Case of the Disappearing Dining Ware -

SGA to the Rescue?



About 5,186 dining ware items are missing from Proctor and Ross Dining Halls alone. Since the beginning of the year, the Dining Services staff has watched its supplies dwindle, whisked away by students who grab a cup of coffee - or a Mongolian grill bowl full with noodles - to take back to the dorms.

The numbers are so staggering they suggest a coordinated attempt at theft. How else to account for the loss of so many dishes, spoons, forks and cups? But abandon the conspiracy theory. This is student carelessness plain and simple.

It's a problem that spans years. We should know. The story is a perennial feature on The Middlebury Campus' pages. The only part that changes is the missing dining ware count - and the level of frustration voiced by Dining Services.

Year after year the department saps its budget to replace items that have been removed from dining halls - money that would be better spent on sponsoring more special events or enhancing menu options. There's also an environmental dimension to the problem.

As losses mount, Dining Services raises the scepter of returning to disposable products. The College's commitment to environmental consciousness, however, would be severely undermined by such a move.

The Student Government Association (SGA) made a valiant attempt to highlight the vanishing dining ware by constructing a monument of empty Proctor cup racks during the first Fall Family Weekend. The "MIA" message said it all.

The SGA should now deepen its commitment to helping Dining Services recover the lost dishware.

We suggest a door-to-door campaign by senators. They could surely collect hundreds - dare we say thousands - of dishes, cups and pieces of silverware to return to Dining Service's welcoming hands.

Even better, the door-to-door campaign would allow students to meet their senators - a novel concept for a representative body chock full of new faces, some of whom were elected as recently as last week.

Since actual senate campaigns were so quiet this year, and many positions uncontested, it's high time the senators made themselves known to their constituents. The dish recovery campaign would allow them to kill two proverbial birds with one stone.

Such a concrete achievement, measured in the number of dishes recovered, would give the SGA a needed boost and set the tone for things to come.

Student politics may not thrill with inspirational or revolutionary proposals. At least it can provide a practical service to the community.