Content warning: discussion of disordered eating, diet culture, fatphobia, and food insecurity
Victoria College is adapting to COVID-19 safety measures with another new dining system.
Students now receive three to four meal tickets when they swipe their TCard, each redeemable for an entrée, a side, or a beverage with a cookie or fruit. Breakfast, lunch, and brunch allow for one ticket in each category, while dinner is given an additional side. Students can purchase more sides separately at the cashier’s desk. Breakfast and brunch offer a choice of entrées from two combos, while lunch and dinner have three.
Residence students are required to purchase a meal plan, totalling at $5,388 or $5,946 for first years. Upper year students have the option of Meal Plan C, which costs $4,688. These amounts translate directly into Meal Dollars and Vic Dollars: breakfast costs $8.50, lunch/brunch costs $12.50, and dinner costs $15. This system is intended to be a temporary replacement to the traditional buffet system.
On developing the system, Dean Kelley Castle wrote to The Strand: “We’ve tried to respond to what we hear in the Dean’s Advisory Committee (DAC), the broader UofT student ancillary services groups, and feedback Food Services received last year.” Students are invited to join the DAC; the elected Victoria University Students’ Administrative Council (VUSAC) was not consulted.
Experts on disordered eating were not specifically consulted, despite potential risk factors. For instance, eating disorders have a dimension of social comparison that could make having to pay extra for sides—or even using up all your meal tickets—untenable if those around you are not. The current system also directly points to strategies for restriction. While these risks also exist under buffet-style systems, its inherent perspectivism is the art to the sheer quantifiability of ticketing’s science.
This is particularly concerning, as universities can serve as a hotbed for eating disorders. “I think some of the major drivers of that are just the general transition from… being home with family members to living on your own, lots of freedom, exposure to different social situations, exposure to substances, exposure to activities, et cetera,” said Dr. Kyle Ganson of the Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work in an interview with The Strand. “On top of that, there’s obviously a lot of pressures associated with going to university. So social pressures, you know, trying to fit in, trying to find a group of friends, trying to find extracurricular activities, academic pressures, athletic pressures, et cetera.” Food insecurity—an issue faced by approximately 40% of Canadian students—is also associated with higher levels of some eating disorder pathologies.
Fatphobic narratives such as the “Freshman 15” or the more recent “Quarantine 15” can also contribute to this issue. “18-year-olds … are supposed to be gaining weight, their bodies are growing and developing … but that’s often shamed,” stated Aryel Maharaj of the National Eating Disorder Information Centre (NEDIC) in an interview with The Strand.
The potential for heightened disordered eating on campus is not new or unique. For instance, buffet-style meal plans make binge eating relatively easy. “There’s no one-size-fits-all plan because everyone’s relationship with food is so different,” said Kaitlyn Axelrod, the Program and Outreach Coordinator at Sheena’s Place, in an interview with The Strand. Addressing these issues takes concerted efforts outside the dining hall.
Dr. Ganson suggested public awareness campaigns on what disordered eating actually is, why it occurs, and how to seek help. Axelrod concurred, highlighting myths surrounding who can develop eating disorders, which can cause affected students or the people around them not to recognize the symptoms. She also emphasized fatphobia and diet culture, which dictate “good or desirable or healthy bodies as being thin … that people should be striving to lose weight or go to the gym in order to have a certain body. Universities should be doing more to challenge those messages.” Dr. Ganson also suggested that helping students adapt to their transition to university life would reduce the incidence and risk of disordered eating. He added that: “as far as treating it … just having accessible and knowledgeable clinicians on staff and locations where students can go to get help as a first step is obviously key.”
A search of Victoria College affiliated social media finds no recent mention of eating disorders or disordered eating; the @viccollegelife Instagram did promote weekly “Workout Wednesdays” for the back half of the 2020–21 schoolyear, along with “Fit-tober.” According to Dean Castle, residence dons undergo basic training on responding to eating disorders. Transition adjustment programming is also offered. On Victoria College’s website, there is one mention of disordered eating, grouped together with other mental health concerns on the “Resources and Services” page. This is largely where the similarities in issue management end.
“We do direct sessions with students in and out of residence through academic advising in the Registrar’s Office, through transition programming, commuter and residence don programming, and international student services (orientation, mentors, etc.),” wrote Dean Castle. The Victoria College website lists several initiatives under “Student Wellness”: Wellness Wednesdays hosted by commuter dons that each explore “a different dimension of well being (sic),” weekly Mindfulness Meditations, and two personal counsellors (one specifically for BIPOC students) available for referral. They also host the Minding Our Minds conference annually to discuss mental health on campus, and the topic is brought up in conferences on other topics such as race and sexuality. The Office of the Dean of Students and the Office of the Registrar and Academic Advising have staff trained in responding to students and referring them to services in and out of the University, while all staff are trained in “Identify, Assist, and Refer.” “Ask, Listen, Talk” was developed for students to help themselves or their friends, framed on their website as a covenant for dialogue and understanding on mental health and/or sexual violence among community members.
While Victoria College’s approach to mental health is more extensive than that for disordered eating, it is not perfect. “VUSAC’s position is that there are many gaps at Vic and UofT regarding student mental health and wellness,” President Jerico Raguindin wrote to The Strand. Dean Castle somewhat echoed these sentiments: “there’s always more to be done in these areas and we meet regularly with students. We have [DAC] that normally meets 2-3 times per year. Last year during COVID we met 26 times (along with Vic Black, to discuss the ongoing and urgent needs of our BIPOC students).”
Dean Castle stated that Food Services was willing to make adjustments based on student responses and that the issues raised here would be discussed during evaluations over Thanksgiving. Of course, words and action are not synonymous; for instance, outside of the Minding Our Minds conference, only one affiliated event focusing on mental health has been advertised on Victoria College’s social media in at least the past year. Meanwhile, students have complained about not being heard while serving on the DAC and/or feeling that the meetings were unproductive. Whether disordered eating continues to stray from mental health’s precedent remains to be seen.
If you find yourself struggling with disordered eating while living on campus, eating in the dining hall can be part of the remedy. “We hear from a lot of people that when they’re at the worst point of their eating disorder, they isolate themselves from others,” Axelrod added. “Creating space where people can come together to build community and connect with each other can be really, really powerful.”
If you or someone you know might be experiencing an eating disorder, you can call NEDIC’s toll-free helpline 1-866-NEDIC-20 or chat on nedic.ca, or register for free, group-based support at Sheena’s Place.
