NEW YORK — Truman Potts normally eats a burger and french fries for lunch. If not that, then he orders a pasta dish and grabs a pastry. Usually that adds up to around $12, which for Potts is a little absurd.
“It’s like, why don’t I go out and get an actually good meal for a similar price?” Potts said.
Food prices at the University Center’s cafeteria are too high, students say. For some, it means going hungry; others say it may explain why some students resort to stealing.
Nearly every food item is priced over $7 in the University Center cafe, and some students living in dorms are finding the prices too high for what the New School’s mandatory meal plan supplies them.
“I always run out of money before the term ends,” said Lauren Hall, a second semester freshman at Lang. “Because everything’s super expensive, I have to budget.”
With nearly three weeks left of the spring semester, Hall is down to $40 from her original $770 meal plan through living at the Stuyvesant dorms.
She said she spends $20 to $30 dollars a week on food outside of school and in her hometown of Ventura, California, food is much cheaper.
“It’s the New School. It’s New York. It’s a very high-end school, we’re already paying so much, I’m not surprised the food is expensive,” Hall said.