Traditionally, sitting down in the dining hall and enjoying a meal with other students was one of the best ways to meet people and find community on campus. About a year and a half ago, however, University of Delaware Executive Director of University Student Centers Tony Doody and his team noticed students were no longer speaking with each other as they had been in the past.
“Right from the first weekend when students come, you could see students would be sitting alone, either in the student center, the student union, food courts, or here in the dining hall, and not engaging,” he says. “[…] Their connection was to their device and not to human beings.”
Determined to help students engage with their peers more on campus, Doody turned to the Aramark Collegiate Hospitality team at the school to see if something could be done.
They ended up creating CR Unplugged, a weekly event held on Sunday evenings at the school’s Caesar Rodney Dining Hall where students trade in their phones for an upscale meal and conversations with their peers.
The premise of the event is simple. When students enter, they place their phone in a bag that is locked until they leave. Each table features conversation ice breakers to get students talking. There are also activities each week that are centered around a different theme, like giant board games.
If there is ever a lull in conversation, staff spring into action. One of the employees, for example, enjoys doing card magic tricks and will perform in front of groups of students.
“He’ll walk around and do magic tricks, just to engage people and get conversations started,” says Food Service Director Manny Maldonado.
Students lock their phones away during CR Unplugged.
The menu rotates weekly and includes a salad, entrée, and dessert. The dishes are elevated options not typically served at the dining hall, like NY Strip Steak, Smoked Halibut, or Chicken Parmesan, which Maldonado says has been the most popular with students so far.
A vegetarian option is also always available for students who don’t eat meat or seafood.
Unlike normal service at the dining hall, staff plate and serve the meal to students at their table. Students only get up to get their beverage.
Alongside students enjoying the more elevated options, staff also enjoy the chance to prepare something different from the usual dining hall fare.
“These guys usually batch cook, so they get to do more plated [food]. It’s elevated, the plates look a lot nicer, and they enjoy it,” says Maldonado.
Since the launch of CR Unplugged at the start of the semester, Maldonado has noticed that it has slowly but surely gained a following, and many students now show up repeatedly each week.
“It’s kind of built its own little community,” he says. “It’s really nice.”
Aramark Collegiate Hospitality Resident District Manager Eric Bringman agrees and has also seen students connect more with each other since CR Unplugged began.
“We’ve seen a stronger connection with students to students because they’re not tethered to the device, and it’s creating an opportunity for these folks to have that interaction without the noise of the phone and the distraction of the phone grabbing them,” he says.
Staff enjoy getting to prepare upscale dishes as part of CR Unplugged.
This is only the beginning for CR Unplugged. Looking into next semester, Maldonado wants to dive deeper into the weekly themes and rework them so that they all connect to one another.
“I want to kind of tweak [the themes] so that each time there is something we can build on. So this week we’re going to do this. If you return next week, it’s going to be part of this going on into the event.”
The success of the event has also caught the eye of student government, who are now working with dining services to host their own event.
“The event has gained so much popularity that they wanted to have their own cell phone-free dining, which we’ll be supporting in a couple of weeks,” says Bringman.
In addition, Bringman, Maldonado, and Doody are considering expanding the event to additional dining locations in the future.
There is a clear need for CR Unplugged and other phone-free events on campus, says Doody, and he’s excited to see how he and the dining team can continue to grow the event in the future.
“Students are looking for opportunities to put their phones away and actually have conversations with each other,” he says.
Dining and Cooking