Many Brown students spend the first few weeks of the semester debating over possible meal plan options — whether that be a standard 20 swipes per week or 460 swipes per year. The price per meal is top of mind when making these decisions, leading some students to opt out of meal plans entirely, saying it is cheaper to eat off campus.
The Herald crunched the numbers to learn how much a meal at Brown’s dining halls actually costs and how it’s impacting student decisions.
Brown currently offers five meal plan options — Flex 70, Flex 330, Flex 460, 14 Weekly and 20 Weekly. All meal plans offer a combination of traditional meal credits, flex points and guest meals, but multi-tier packages and the division of weekly and flex plans help accommodate diverse student lifestyles, according to the Brown Dining website.
Currently, students can choose between two main price points: a lower level at $3,815 per semester and a higher level at $4,052. Within each tier, weekly and flex meal plans are offered at the same price, but due to nuances in its structure, the value of a meal swipe varies even across tiers.
For juniors and seniors — many of whom live off-campus or in suites with kitchens — Flex 70 is offered as a reduced plan at $1,293.
Student dining fees are approved by the Corporation, following a recommendation by the University Resources Committee — a team of administrators, faculty, staff and students who formally propose Brown’s annual operating and capital budget, according to Vice President of Dining Programs George Barboza.
To determine the average cost per meal on each plan, The Herald calculated the total price of meal credits by subtracting the total flex points — which are valued at $1 — from the semester cost. Then, this price was divided by the meal credits available per semester, assuming that each semester is 15 weeks long and a guest meal is worth one credit.
Given these calculations, The Herald found that the average cost per swipe is $11 more for the least expensive meal plan, when compared to the most expensive plan.
One meal on the Flex 70 plan costs around $25 — a higher price point than the most expensive menu items at several popular restaurants on Thayer Street, including East Side Pockets, Chinatown on Thayer and Baja’s Taqueria. In comparison, the cost of one meal on the most expensive meal plan — 20 Weekly — is only around $13.
Students and community members can alternatively pay per meal to dine in any on-campus eatery. When dining without a meal plan, one meal at the Ivy Room, Andrews Commons or Josiah’s costs $13.15. In the two all-you-care-to-eat dining halls, one meal costs $15.95, $20.75 and $24.25 for breakfast, lunch and dinner, respectively.
Meal swipe prices have risen significantly since 2010.
In an email to The Herald, Barboza wrote that growing expenses from equipment and suppliers, “upgrades to Brown dining facilities and costs related to investing in the Brown Dining Staff” have resulted in price hikes for meal plans.
According to a 2010 Herald editorial, the cost for one meal at the Sharpe Refectory or the Verney-Woolley Dining Hall was between $6 and $8, but $13 on the less expensive plans.
In 2015, The Herald reported that “a meal on the Flex 460 plan costs $9.19, compared to $7.55 for the 20-meals-per-week plan, which has the same total price. Meals on the Flex 330 and Flex 240 plans cost $12.42 and $15.78, respectively.”
The Flex Meal Plan was first instituted in 2006 to improve flexibility for students and encourage on-campus dining. Prior to the change, meal credits were only replenished on a weekly basis. By offering a Flex Plan, Dining Services hoped to alleviate student concerns of losing meals at the end of the week while also offering more points for a la carte items, according to previous Herald reporting.
But despite this flexibility, several students told The Herald that they believe that off-campus dining is still more cost-effective than any meal plan offered.
Chloe Daniel ’27 chose to drop the meal plan as a third-year student, calculating that she could purchase 100 Chipotle bowls for the price of 70 meals on campus. “That’s such a better deal,” she said, adding that purchasing food directly from dining halls would be cheaper than participating in a meal plan.
“Dining plans pretty much only make sense if you plan to have dinner at the Ratty or V-Dub multiple times a day, everyday,” Alex Anaya ’27 wrote in an email to The Herald.
This frustration isn’t new. A 2019 Herald op-ed published by Andrew Reed ’21 argues that “every mid-sized meal plan is so outrageously priced that alternating between on- and off-campus eating is far more expensive than purchasing a full meal plan, or only eating off campus.”
Currently, all first- and second-year students are required to purchase a full-coverage meal plan. This often leads students to pay extra money to eat off campus to satisfy cravings and dietary restrictions.
In 2019, when the second-year requirement was announced, some undergraduate students opposed the requirement through a “widely-circulated letter, criticizing the changes for limiting student choice and imposing burdens on those with dietary restrictions.”
A 2019 editorial published by The Herald also argued that ensuring that every student has consistent access to food is “not as simple as requiring students to purchase a meal plan” and that the University should offer a campus pantry and end-of-semester donation drives.
Charlotte Peterson ’28, a second-year student with celiac disease, echoed concerns shared by students in 2019, saying that it’s “difficult to be on the meal plan and have a dietary restriction that is so encompassing.” In terms of pricing, Peterson said that buying groceries is “much cheaper” than staying on a meal plan.
Financial aid packages offered by the University may cover full meal plans for undergraduates. When these packages were announced in 2018, University officials said the decision was meant to address food insecurity and support high-need students so they can fully engage in their education without having to make decisions based on cost.
