Restaurant takeout options are common.  Takeout appeals to those who don’t have time to sit down and eat in a restaurant.  Plus, microwaves allow students’ meals to be reheated quickly and conveniently.

Takeout is ideal for college students whose schedules often do not allow for regularly timed sit-down meals.  And, until recently, we had that option.

Currently, takeout boxes are not available in our cafeterias.  This is a problem for several reasons.  Takeout is convenient for those with busy schedules, they can spare embarrassed new students from eating by themselves  in public and they allow the use of meals instead of points.

College students have busy schedules and sometimes find convenient to get the food to go.  Also, the takeout boxes allow food to be transported to meetings or saved for after practice.

Another benefit takeout provide is the ability to eat outside the awkward and crowded cafeteria.  Sometimes   our schedules don’t match our friends’ schedules, and taking the containers of lunch back to the dorm is better than eating alone in a cafeteria full of friends eating together.

Granted, there are other choices when it comes to food.  There’s the Mountain Cat Club and the Tuck Shop, and that food can be ordered for takeout.  But those eateries require points, and most students with meal plans would rather use more plentiful meals.

The cafeteria staff shouldn’t worry about students hauling off excessive amounts of food in those humble Styrofoam boxes.  Someone could sit down in the cafeteria and eat for hours.  That amount of food could not be crammed into a takeout box.

By not offering takeout, the cafeterias are essentially losing business.        A meal is about $8.  Most students probably cannot fit $8 worth of food in the box.

Some restaurant managers want the business so badly that they offer takeout-only parking.  UPJ doesn’t need to go to that extreme, but at least the boxes should be brought back.