With meal plan, the choice is not yours
In response to Jasmine Hill’s submission “Extra
meals hard to swallow,” (Aug. 23) I would like to thank the
Daily Bruin for introducing this issue to the UCLA community. I
feel UCLA Dining Services puts regular UCLA students at a low
priority relative to conference groups and sports camps. Summer
visitors do help relieve some of the costs for students during the
regular year, but the administration should not neglect the
interests of current summer school students, especially those of us
who are paying exacerbated costs. I am paying $3,792 for 12 weeks
of summer housing and meals.
Additionally, not only must we swallow 21 meals a week, but the
meals are to be eaten only at one dining hall, and this hall is
often packed with diners and offers little variety. While students
who work for the residence halls, such as those working for front
desks and Access Control, have the option of eating at the dining
hall of their choice, residents do not. Like the student employees,
I am also a full-time UCLA student who works for the school. We are
no different from the employees of UCLA Housing. We deserve the
same treatment and privileges. We are further restricted in where
we can eat because another limitation of the plan is that the lunch
coupon option that is available over the year is not available over
the summer.
I have tried to speak with both Housing and Dining Services, but
have not received a satisfactory answer from either party.
On-campus housing officials need to reevaluate their priorities.
The UCLA summer sessions motto is “The Choice is
Yours.” With the current meal plan, we have few choices.
Yvonne Ha Second-year, art history
Swift Boat questions still unanswered
Ezra Klein’s submission “Kerry’s war heroism
bears partisan fire” (Aug. 30) demonstrates his lack of
understanding about military technicalities. Klein writes that the
Swift Boat Veterans claim that at least one of Sen. John
Kerry’s wounds was self-inflicted is
“despicable.” The “Swifties” suggest Kerry
launched a grenade against a river bank that was too close and that
shrapnel flew back toward the boat, hitting Kerry. While this may
qualify as an “accident” to a college boy, an
investigating officer would have to classify this wound as
“self-inflicted.”
It’s unlikely Klein has ever read any combat after-action
reports, or accident reports that go along with military action.
Such a claim is hardly “despicable”; it’s just
the way the military looks at things in their official
documentation. As to the issue of Kerry’s Cambodian
Christmas, Kerry made many references to the incursion ““ some
with such emphasis that the events were “seared” in his
memory. Now that the vets are challenging his claims, the
“searing” has become a
“misrememberment.”
Wayne Martin Palo Alto