As post-secondary students, most of us are met with the omnipresent reality of inflation on a daily basis. Whether we are at the grocery store, or searching for off-campus housing for next year, it’s hard to be ignorant of constantly increasing prices and the dread that they cause.

On this note, residence dining plans are set to increase for 2024–2025.

The cost of a traditional-style dining plan, the option for those in dorm-style residences, is proposed to be raised by 6.6% between academic years, increasing from $5,300 to $5,650. 

This plan’s overhead fee will see a 10% increase, as the $1000 fee collected for 2023–2024 reportedly didn’t cover the necessary costs, which needed to be “recovered from other income sources, vending commissions, [and] product rebates.” During the October 31, 2023 Foodservice Committee meeting, it was revealed that the total costs expected to be covered by this overhead fee added up to $1,073.88, accounting for university administrative costs ($350.86), orientation week costs ($264.00), utilities and maintenance ($354.37), and principal to university ($104.65). This difference in actual costs and fees charged resulted in “a net negative impact of about $155k”.

These costs are predicted to increase by 4.3% for next year, totalling at $1,119.92—which is still above the proposed 2024–2025 overhead fee.

As for the declining balance portion of the dining plan fee, its proposed increase is from $4,300 to $4,550, a difference of 5.8%. According to the Foodservice Advisory Committee on November 30, 2023, this growth “will not keep up with the rate of inflation for the food service sector ([6.1% at the time]) resulting in a loss in real buying power.” The near 6% increase is attributed to the need to cover inflation in food and labour costs, as well as “other expenses” in order to “maintain the same purchasing power.”

The suite-style plan for students living in annexes is set to increase by 8.5%, growing from 2023–2024’s rate of $3,500 to a proposed $3,800. This larger increase, in comparison to that of the traditional-style, is said to be to maintain HST exemption and “[save] residents 13%”. However, the usable declining balance portion of this specific plan is only increasing by 7.1%, while the overhead fee is increasing by 14.3%. 

Even with these proposed increases, Trent University’s dining fees “remain the lowest in the country” according to the Colleges and Student Services Committee’s 2023-2024 Annual Budget Report.

Before this proposed increase in dining plan fees can take effect, many menu items have seen a price increase between Fall and Winter terms—by an average of about 3%.

At the Foodservice Advisory Committee meeting on January 22, 2024, the committee attributed this price adjustment to being “tied back to the rate of inflation for food and the retail price increase [of about 5%] that was implemented last fall”. While prices were being set in the Summer of 2023, they had expected the 9% inflation rate to “soften to closer to 6%”, but would eventually realize that the “price increase over the summer was not sufficient to cover the very high inflationary pressure.”

Alongside this rise in menu item pricing, the Champlain Dining Hall has implemented a $6.49 Value Menu of rotating regular portion meals at a lower cost during lunch every weekday. 

To put Trent’s meal plan through a practical perspective, the basic dining plan is, according to Trent, designed to work for students who “eat 2 times a day,” “plan to leave campus most weekends,” “tend to eat small meals,” are “relatively inactive,” and “do not eat many snacks,” or “drink much coffee or tea.”

By calculating the daily budget provided by this meal plan for most students living in residence who will stay on campus over the weekend (assuming that they are off-campus for reading weeks and do not purchase any meals on the Saturday they leave, or upon returning on Sunday), their $4,300 declining balance is divided by 208 days of on-campus meals—leaving them with an average of $20.67 to spend per day. 

Though this budget may make sense with the basic dining plan description, students living in residence are, realistically, unable to sustain themselves throughout the day with the sustenance that this budget pays for. 

Amidst the chaos of ever-increasing meal plan fees and prices of menu items, Trent’s ten-year agreement with Chartwells will come to an end in April of 2024, leaving next year’s foodservice provider up for speculation.

Considering the proposed 5.8% increase in declining balance provided by the traditional-style dining plan, this year’s daily budget of $20.67 has increased by a proportionate  5.85% to an allotted average of $21.88 to spend on meals each day.

Though these rates match up, they don’t exactly account for the likelihood of another increase of at least 3% on the pricing of menu items, and the very probable possibility of these meals not providing the sustenance that university students need in order to succeed, both generally and academically speaking.