Why are we required to stay on campus for our first year of college?

As many students at MSU know, living on campus and purchasing a meal plan is required for your first year of school. 

To meet that requirement, we’re coughing up several thousand dollars each year — in addition to tuition.

Prices can range from $6,560 for a standard double room with a Blue Meal Plan, to $8,787 for a Hyalite double as a single room with a Gold Meal Plan, as per MSU’s Room and Board website — and that’s for one semester. 

I’m guessing a good 99 percent of people know that’s a gargantuan amount of cash. My tuition is cheap compared to housing costs — only about $3,600.

For a while, I wondered why we were required to pay an unholy amount of money for a dorm   and a meal plan, when I didn’t really want either in the first place. 

Before researching this, I thought it was for profit. MSU is a business, isn’t it? And businesses have to make money in order to survive. 

Well, I was wrong. It’s not really for profit in some ways. MSU is a land-grant university — an institution of higher education that receives the benefits of the Morrill Acts of 1862 and 1890.

According to Michael Becker, MSU’s vice president of communications, the room and board fees go to MSU’s Auxiliary Services, which handles all things homely: food, housing, janitorial services and events. 

“Auxiliaries is not a profit-generating business —  it seeks to cover its costs,” he said. “The revenue generated from room and board in our dining operations and in our housing operations all goes right back into supporting those same operations on campus.”

Becker also said students must live on campus for their first year of college because it significantly increases their chances of academic success. 

“That first year that a student spends at Montana State University, or on any college campus, is crucial to their overall chances of persisting with their education, eventually earning their degrees, and graduating to pursue the career goals they want to pursue,” he said. 

Financial engineering major Isaiah Wilson said he sees why the on-campus requirement benefits students. 

“The advantage is, it’s on campus and then you also get that cohort of other students who are around your same age,” he said. “If you’re living off campus you don’t necessarily get that.”

Wilson said he also believes that, despite benefits, the requirement can be unfair.

“The idea of requiring students to stay in housing is putting, potentially, an extra financial burden on some students,” he said. 

Wilson’s beliefs ring true for me — some students are bending under the weight of the University’s fees. Biology major Max Listerud, for example, reports struggling to cover his on-campus living costs.

“I made my last payment for spring semester last year during the summer, because I couldn’t afford it during the year, which is probably similar to what’s gonna happen this year unless I manage to get a second job or something,” he said. 

Most students take out loans to afford school and accrue debt, which takes years to pay off. According to the Education Initiative, 42 percent of students who borrowed money are still repaying their loans 20 years later, and the average borrowed amount per student is $40,467. 

Comparing tuition prices to food and housing prices, one can assume much of these funds go toward paying for food and housing. 

Meal plans can be expensive, but according to Becker, they have a benefit I had never thought about before: food security. 

“We want our students to be healthy individuals and to be food secure,” he said. “And when we provide them with dining hall options, we know that their food is taken care of for them, and they don't have to worry about where their next meal is coming from.”

This reasoning has solid scientific backing — according to the American Psychology Association, food insecurity has been linked to detriments in school settings, including academic distress, grade point average and mental health challenges.

Listerud, however, said he experienced food insecurity because of the University’s housing prices and the five-day meal plan.

“I was here on the weekends eating handfuls of rice cereal, and that was all I had,” he said. “I literally ran out of money.”

MSU provides students with three meal plan options: the Gold 7-Day and Blue 5-Day for residents, and the commuter plan for off-campus students. Commuters can purchase a certain amount of meal swipes, from 25 to 100. 

Those who purchase commuter meal plans risk wasting money if they don’t use them up before the end of the semester. 

According to MSU’s commuter plan terms and conditions, commuter meal plans are non-refundable and non-transferable. Further, meal swipes do not roll over to the next semester. 

I found myself wondering: why not? 

According to Becker, since student accounts operate by semester, so do their meal swipes.

“Commuter meal plans are tied to student accounts, which allows students to purchase meal plans via financial aid or scholarships that have been applied to their accounts,” he said. “Student accounts at MSU operate on a per-semester basis, whether that’s for meal plans or room and board or tuition.”

For accounting major Gregory Jackson — an off-campus student — the per-semester basis seems counterproductive. 

“I thought that it applied for the whole year,” he said. “But since it’s only on a semester basis, it doesn’t make financial sense, and it’s way cheaper to go grocery shopping and start building life skills that way too.”

Jackson said he bought 100 meals — which cost a grand total of $900 — and didn’t use them all in time. Since the meals didn’t roll over into the next semester, Jackson ended up losing hundreds of dollars with no way of getting it back.

“If it had lasted the full year, then I probably would’ve gotten another one this year,” he said. “[MSU] didn’t make that super clear ahead of time.” 

Becker suggested that commuters purchase the 25-swipe or 50-swipe package. 

“We’re transparent with students about the need to use their purchased meal swipes before they expire, and MSU offers four different plans to allow flexibility,” he said. “Students purchasing a commuter plan can, for example, start with the smallest, the 25-swipe plan.”

The classic idiom goes that buying in bulk saves you money — and this is especially true for meal plans. MSU’s commuter terms and conditions list prices per meal for each of the four options: $12.00 per meal for the 25-meal package, $11.00 per meal for the 50-meal package, $10.00 per meal for the 75-meal package and, last but not least, $9.00 per meal for the 100-meal package. 

In short, the less meals you buy, the more you pay per meal. Jackson said he believes the smaller packages aren’t worth their while. 

“I can use up 100 meals over the course of the year, but it only lasted over the course of the fall semester,” he said. “Then in order to just get the one where I only eat, like, 25 or 50, then that starts being way too expensive.”

For commuters, eating on campus is convenient, but it is expensive to the point where buying cheap groceries and preparing food at home makes more sense financially.

Living on campus has its perks, such as increased chances of graduation, food security and a better sense of community, but the requirement can be financially burdensome to low-income freshmen, since they have to afford room and board, which is, usually, more expensive than tuition.