Serving Up Excellence in a Different World

Marletha Booker, Training Director

There’s nothing more rewarding than accomplishing what others say can't be done. Going into the new year, there was uncertainty as to whether collegiate dining professionals could safely serve food in the midst of a global pandemic. It required lots of planning, but here we are conquering the inconceivable. There was uncertainty as to whether dining halls could remain clean enough to keep students safe. We're disproving that. They also said controlling and maintaining social distancing in college eateries was improbable. We're demonstrating it is indeed plausible. As we navigate this semester together, let's promise each other one thing. Let's promise to refute the limitations others set and not allow them to impact whether we strive for excellence in achieving our goals. Deal? Ok, great! Now let's continue to safely move forward.

How are we able to successfully accomplish what many said was impossible in a very different dining environment?

We have an amazing team of managers and team members committed to serving up excellence with an emphasis on public safety. We have implemented and managed the following standards to keep you safe:

• We mandated that all associates wear mask inside our facilities. Our managers ensure every student, staff member, vendor, and guest wears face protection.

• We encouraged resident advisors to pick up meals for quarantined students. Our managers devised a system to allow quarantined students to pre-select their meals for delivery.

• We issued COVID-19 specific trainings to our leadership teams. All managers and our team members successfully passed these trainings.

• In addition to doing those things, we're also offering hand sanitizer stations for guests, requiring health screenings for all associates, and cleaning and disinfecting surfaces every thirty minutes.