For years students have requested updated dining services. We want lower costs, more options and better food. VCU has not stepped up to the plate and third parties have taken the initiative. One company, Elevate, has gone above and beyond by offering 14 restaurants in their VCU plan. They also offer services at the University of Virginia, UNC-Chapel Hill, Florida State University, University of Michigan, St. Clair and Cornell. The best thing is they keep adding new college plans every year!
This company began with two UVA graduates, Seth Kramer and Josh Cohen, who realized that the price for meal plans was only getting higher as students got more disgruntled with their options. This is when they knew what needed to be done and started this business venture.
Elevate is a low-cost alternative to traditional dining plans. With the standard VCU plan, students pay upwards of $2000 for 200 swipes and $150 dining dollars. All of the options available through VCU are not cost-effective and essentially flush your money down the drain as the swipes you purchase are erased at the end of the semester, regardless if you use them or not. These swipes are also only accepted at certain times of the day and let’s be honest, VCU does not provide the most appetizing options. The price for these lacking plans has increased by $44 in the last year alone and is projected to only increase.
With Elevate’s plan, students pay $739 for their most popular plan of 75 meals. These meals are available until you graduate meaning if you buy 75 meals during your freshman year and wind up not using them, you can still redeem them until you graduate. They have many delicious options including the student favorites, Rosita’s Taco Shop, Asado, Deep Run Roadhouse and tons more listed below. They even have swipes at NuVegan in case you were sick of VCUs only vegan option: Shafer’s salad bar.
With these new plans, students have been saving more than two hundred dollars per year on food. The swipes you receive are worth approx. eight dollars, meaning that if you buy a ten-dollar meal, you save two dollars! For more information on the dining plans offered by Elevate, you can visit their website.
Bon Appetit!