USG confers on late meal, course guide

USG members discussed the future of meal plans and the launch of the new Student Course Guide (SCG) at last night's weekly meeting.

Dining Services recently released plans to revise meal times for next year. Dinner in the dining halls will be extended to 8 p.m. and late dinner will last from 10 p.m. to 11:30 p.m.

Some USG members, however, criticized the late dinner time change, arguing that the 8 p.m. to 10 p.m. window is the most useful one for students.

"The issue is that dinner is until eight [o'clock] and late meal until 10 [o'clock]," USG President Alex Lenahan '07 said. "Dinner and late meal need to meet."

Besides the change in meal times, Dining Services plans to increase late meal credits to $5.95 for lunch and $6.95 for dinner. But USG Vice President Rob Biederman '08 and other USG members pointed out that since the double swipe was eliminated, the net effect will be negative.

"The new plan is littered with economic disincentives," senator Josh Weinstein '09 said. "Late meal hours need to be kept."

Course guide

At the meeting, the USG also discussed the newly revamped SCG, which was released March 1.

The new guide will incorporate several changes. Students will no longer receive money for adding reviews.

"It was a bigger hassle than was worth it," Lenahan said at the meeting.

To replace the payments, the USG discussed implementing other incentives to get students to evaluate their professors.

"My vision is to offer incentives during high traffic times at the end of semesters," USG Academics Chair Caitlin Sullivan '07 said.

Lenahan suggested that there be a week at the end of the semester when students who write reviews would be entered into a contest for prizes such as iPods and a Bent Spoon gift certificate.

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One point of contention over the new SCG was whether to include a question that asked students to grade their professors on how harsh or generous they are in their grading.

"We pulled that question," Sullivan said. "For misinterpretation reasons and for purposes of consistency between departments and to protect professors, we decided it was best to not have a question that dealt with scaling a professor's grading. It is now included in a prompt for narrative feedback," she said.

Sullivan also hopes to transfer entries from the registrar's course guide over to the SCG.

"At least we would have that information, so we're not starting completely from scratch," she said.

Sullivan hopes to get approval this week.

Students will be held accountable for their reviews, Sullivan said. Reviews can be tracked by user IDs, and each student is limited to reviewing six courses for each semester. A current junior, for example, could review upto 30 courses, six for each of her five semesters at the University.

So far, students have submitted more than 50 entries, Sullivan said.