Illustration by Mike Padilla

The word "mandatory" is understandably repugnant to free-thinking college students, so it is of little surprise that the Residence Hall Association's mandatory meal plan proposal is being met with stalwart resistance. But while it is true that any new fee should be regarded with a healthy degree of skepticism, the proposal's failures often have nothing to do with the fact that it is mandatory.

Under the most recent proposition, a mandatory meal plan fee of $1,900 to $2,300 would be added to the tuition of students who opt to live in the residence halls. Dan Adams, director of the student unions, has touted the plan as a means of obtaining much-needed revenue, ostensibly to aid in upgrading current facilities as well as building new ones.

Adams explains the need for a mandatory meal plan as a matter of simple economics. While the student unions are 97 percent self-sufficient, they don't raise enough money to pay for important upgrades.

Damion LeeNatali Columnist

"We continually try to carry the products that students want," Adams explained. "A lot of times, other departments don't have the money (to lend us), but the need is still there."

Although Adams is certainly well-intentioned, the principle behind the proposal - that those in the residence halls should be somehow responsible for subsidizing the student unions' considerable building costs - is flawed. In essence, it seems unfair to lean on students as a source of guaranteed revenue unless it remedies issues of the most pressing nature.

Given the choice between increased class availability and improved restaurants, most students would probably prefer the former. For a variety of reasons, universities are increasingly reliant on student dollars to supplement their own. But while tuition increases are to be expected, and in some cases applauded, mandatory fees introduced specifically to fund upgrade or building ventures seem ancillary at best when compared to other, more worthy efforts that seek to better the UA's principal aim - academics.

Of course, Adams is quick to point out that freshmen would be spending an average of $1,900 a year on food anyway, but such an argument fails to account for a crucial student choice - how much of that money should be spent at off-campus venues. Granted, the most recent proposal talks have addressed an optional $300 addendum to the original meal plan fee that could be used within a specific geographic region. But to say that students will only be afforded an off-campus choice if they fork out an extra $300 is hardly a matter of choice at all.

Not surprisingly, much has been made about the fact that the UA is the only school in the Pacific 10 Conference that does not have some sort of required meal plan, but to say that the UA should mirror those schools ignores a number of distinct trends.

Some schools with tightly knit campuses have such high percentages of freshmen living on campus (e.g. Stanford University with 99 percent or the University of Southern California with 93 percent) that a mandatory meal plan does not seem especially unreasonable. Other schools with low percentages of freshmen living on campus (e.g. Arizona State University with 74 percent) have instituted a required meal plan to raise funds aimed at boosting freshmen retention rates.

But the UA is not confronting the campus dynamics of its Pac-10 counterparts. At approximately 80 percent, the UA's number of freshmen living on campus is about average for the Pac-10, but perhaps more significantly, our campus is not nearly as self-contained as Stanford or USC. Tucson boasts a wide array of dining options, ranging from indigenous Mexican fare to Persian, Greek and Ethiopian venues. Given the diversity of options, it seems appropriate to suggest that students should be able to take advantage of all that Tucson has to offer.

Adams has admirably attempted to include students in the decision-making process, one that he notes is "as student-friendly as it can possibly be," and his efforts should not go unnoticed. Respectful dialogue is laudable in any situation, and it is especially pertinent when generations of future Wildcats will continue to feel its effects.

But for now, at least, UA administrators would be well-suited to address the most prominent student concerns, most of which tend to relate to the UA's academic shortcomings and not to the grandeur of our dining facilities.

Simply put, we'd prefer classes to cuisine any day.

Damion LeeNatali is a political science and history sophomore. He can be reached at letters@wildcat.arizona.edu.