 "Photo: The Phoenix/Chandler West")
University officials are looking into how to make Rambler Bucks useable at local restaurants in Rogers Park and Edgewater as soon as Fall 2010.
The idea is to give students more dining options off campus; however, the plan will not include convenience stores and other non-restaurant locations. Loyola has not identified any specific locations. The plan would only apply to Rambler Bucks, not meal plans or flex dollars.
Changes to the card system would only allow students to purchase food, not tobacco, alcohol or birth control products said Robert Kelly, Ph.D., vice president for Student Development.
“We need to keep in mind we are a Jesuit university,” Kelly said.
“There are a number of questions that need to be figured out,” said Caitlin DeRango, the chairperson of the Residence Life and Dining Committee for the Unified Student Government Association. She specifically pointed to how Loyola would prevent students from buying alcohol at restaurants where the card is accepted.
She thinks that it would be reasonable to have a few locations accepting Rambler Bucks by the fall semester.
Before the plan can move forward, “we still need to have the initial internal discussion,” Kelly said.
That discussion has to include many departments on campus, including Aramark, ResLife and Information Technology Services, before the plan can be pitched to local restaurants. It could be enacted by fall, according to Kelly.
In order for restaurants to accept Rambler Bucks, they will have to install a new system to handle campus cards. The new C-Board system, installed in January at dining locations on campus, has made it possible to consider spending Rambler Bucks off campus, Kelly and DeRango said. The new system would allow outside businesses to access campus card information.
Other schools that have a system like the one Loyola wants to create are Loyola University Maryland, Villanova University and Boston College.
“It would be convenient,” said Chris Corlew, a senior creative writing major. “I already use Rambler Bucks.”
Kelly believes that this plan will benefit restaurants that start accepting Rambler Bucks because it may increase the number of student patrons.
Many other schools have systems that allow students to use their campus cards off campus, Kelly said. He hopes that Loyola will be able to use the other schools’ plans as a guide on how to move forward.
“We are playing a little bit of catch up,” Kelly said, “but we’re not inventing the wheel.”
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