There comes a time in every NYU student’s residency when he or she realizes that for the last year or so she has been screwed by The Man in the form of a Downstein casserole. For many of you this moment has yet to come. Allow me.

In this instance, our “Man” is NYU Dining Services. Sure, this institution has probably provided you with some great joy in your time here, i.e. Palladium Brunch and the chocolate fountain, Ricky the Grill Man or Personal Pan Pizzas in Kimmel. But underneath this seemingly joyous culinary experience lies a common theme of which we are all too familiar here: big-ass rip-offs.

Sure, one of the greatest things about having a meal plan is the convenience — you can easily swipe a soup-to-go in Kimmel and be on your merry way between classes. It also provides a scapegoat from the all-too grown up routine of actually having to cook for yourself. However, this train of thought can ultimately lead down a financially destructive path. For instance, have you ever taken the time to calculate the actual price per meal of each meal plan? A chart*:

If you’re living in Hayden with no kitchen and the smell of grilled cheese 3 floors down, I understand the need for an expensive meal plan. You can coddle your parents’ money on a 225 flex for this year while you get yourself together, and the price per meal really isn’t that bad.

It’s the students in the small-kitchen-transition for which the system does not favor. $11 bucks per meal on 75 flex? Chipotle is right around the corner, and I don’t care what anyone says about Kimmel Quesadillas — an old fashioned barbacoa burrito bowl for $8 bucks would kick the ass of that flimsy excuse for Tex-Mex any day. But regardless of your taste in made-up Mexican food, it’s clear that no one should spend this much money for one meal in a university cafeteria.

When asked about the disparity between high cost per meal plans verses low cost per meal plans, Owen Moore, Director of Dining Services, offered an explanation that certainly made sense: “The price of meal plan varies to provide our student with different price points based on their needs. The plans are priced to cover all NYU Dining’s fixed costs (G&A, equipment, facility, utility) and then each plan is adjusted based on variable cost (in this case food, paper supplies.) The larger plans then begin to show a greater value per meal.”

So, the more meals you get, the better the deal. I don’t have a better plan for the system. But think about the way you use your meal plan. For instance, how many students who use the plans with more meals actually use their entire meal plan?

Moore said that last semester they saw an increase from 82% usage of all meal plans to 88%, which, sure, is a big majority. But don’t forget that at the end of the semester, it’s all gone. There’s no rollover. You lose out completely. Students often don’t realize the amount of money they are actually wasting if, say, a 14/week user misses a meal every other week. If on average you have 1-2 meals left over on a 14/week plan, you could loose approximately $197 per semester with a plan that doesn’t even keep you entirely fed.

When I asked a freshman with a situation similar to the one laid out above if it bothered her when she wasted a meal plan, she responded, “Not really. Honestly, usually I think I already used it and then I’m like ‘Oh, really? Whatever,’ because it’s already Saturday night.” Bye, bye $200.

And this isn’t even an extreme case. One student I spoke with said he had 75 meals left over after last semester on the 175 flex — a situation which I have actually found quite common among my peers, despite Moore’s statistic. The blame for this, of course, on poor planning by students. That’s about $735 bucks down the drain that you didn’t ever see coming. How could you? This is a dangerous way to think about money.

It seems that with the options provided, students lured by the convenience of meal plans are forced to choose between getting a better deal per meal and taking the chance that they may waste tons of money or spend the rip-off $11 bucks a meal, which you may not wind up using in its entirety either.

The point is, you have other, cheaper options. I live off Trader Joe’s for $20 bucks a week — that’s $320 a semester in the same time span — and allow myself to go out to dinner every now and then or eat at Chipotle if I’m in a rush. National Editor Surekha Ratnatunga and her roommate do even better than me; “We spend about $25 [on groceries] and that lasts us around 10 days.”

Your meal plans are not voids of pretend cash. They are full of real money that has already been spent. If you must have one, use it. All of it. If you don’t need one, cancel it.

*Based on a 16-week calendar.
Photography by Amalyah Oren.