Residential Programs and Dining Services has been hard at work hiring students to staff campus dining locations.
Most dining locations are now fully staffed, said Micah Lamb, RPS Dining Services training coordinator. RPS Dining Services employs between 600 and 800 students across campus. This should allow all restaurants to be open on time and provide quick service. More manageable lines should be expected as well, he said.
“It’s a challenge to start classes with all of our positions filled,” Lamb said. “We’ve advertised as aggressively as we ever have.”
These advertisements could be found on table spinners, digital screens and buses, Lamb said. They provided information about the benefits of working for RPS Dining Services, like high starting pay and flexible scheduling. The increase in workers could also have been caused by students figuring out their academic workload and whether or not they need to work, he said.
While RPS Dining Services is now more fully staffed, students like freshmen Kaitlyn Paris and Desiree Fey are still seeing frequently closed restaurants and long checkout lines, especially in Wright Food Court.
“There’s this stir fry place that’s never really open when I go,” Fey said. “I wanted to try it but haven’t yet because it’s rarely open.”
Paris said she has also noticed that Gresham’s latest addition, the Den by Denny’s, is only open some mornings instead of every morning.
The hiring process for the Den by Denny’s has been slower due to a significant training component involved before students can work, Lamb said. Hours have also needed to be adjusted so the staff can refine how the concept runs.
Long lines are another issue for both Paris and Fey. They both said they realize lines are the longest during normal lunch and dinner hours.
“Once you get in line, you want to eat. You don’t want to wait,” Paris said.
Lamb said he has seen more manageable lines since the start of the school year. This may be due to a shift in when students are eating their meals, he said.
“We typically find that at the beginning of the year everyone comes to eat during the same time because they’re figuring out their routine and what works with their academic schedule,” Lamb said. “A few weeks into the semester it seems like everyone has settled into a routine where they aren’t all eating at the same time.”
RPS Dining Services does its best to manage peak hours, Lamb said. It strives to serve fresh, made-to-order food, which can often result in longer lines and wait times during high-volume hours.
While Fey said she occasionally deals with long lines and wait times to get her food, she has seen these lines move a bit faster from the beginning of the school year.
The rise in workers should allow students to get better service, Lamb said.
“We’ll be able to provide students with the high-quality services they expect,” Lamb said.
