Following months of negotiations, the United Auto Workers and Cornell ratified an agreement on Sept. 2, concluding a two-week long strike. The agreement invited employees back to Cornell and improved compensation and benefits for the University’s employees.
With over 1,000 striking employees, the University limited meal options across campus, closing popular eateries including Terrace Restaurant and the Big Red Barn. Additionally, due to the shortage of workers, the University invited retirees of relevant staffing to work temporarily.
Curtis Weh ’25 felt that the University let the unfair compensation reach a point where the strike had to occur.
“I think at times [being a student during the strike] could definitely be tough, but I think it’s also fair,” Weh said. “I think that the workers that are here are doing a really good job of getting us the food that we need, … so I was in full support of whatever they were doing.”
Ryan Lombardi, vice president for Student and Campus Life, told The Sun that the dining team developed contingency plans and worked hard to ensure students received nutritious meals in response to the strike. Throughout the strike, Cornell Dining did not serve hot lunches, instead offering boxed lunches at a few select locations. The lunches-to-go were sourced from York Street Market, an existing campus partner.
Lombardi also discussed the environmental impact of switching to a grab-and-go system.
“From a sustainability [perspective], [the boxes] generate more waste than using dishware or buffets or things like that,” Lombardi said. “The materials were recyclable … if students chose to recycle them, … but [they] definitely generate more waste.”
Once the strike ended, the unused boxed lunches were donated to local food bank networks. Lombardi also shared that the University worked to accommodate those with dietary restrictions and preferences, despite the limited resources available to provide the usual variety of food options.
According to an email sent to students about dining options during the strike, students had the option of meat, vegetarian, vegan, halal and gluten-free. Additionally, students could find frozen kosher meals at 104 West.
However, vegetarian student Isabela Vargas ’27 said she, often struggled to find suitable options for lunch. On one occasion, she used a meal swipe in Okenshields only to discover that they lacked a vegetarian meal for her.
Certain meal plans provide students with a limited amount of meal swipes for the entire semester. During the strike, students were limited to boxed lunches when using their meal swipes, which had a pre-portioned food amount instead of buffet meals.
In an email sent to students on Aug. 23, the University announced that only students with meal plans could get boxed lunches, requesting students without meal plans, faculty and staff to bring their own lunches from home.
In an effort to compensate for those unable to utilize on-campus eateries and provide extra food options, the University implemented food trucks for two days after the strike ended.
“When everyone came back to work the day after Labor Day, it took them a few days to kind of get back to full speed, [and] we thought it would be good to try to introduce some options that were designated … for faculty, staff [and] students who don’t have meal plans to have an option on Central Campus,” Lombardi said.
To ease the transition to fully-staffed dining services across campus and offer viable meal options to students with non-swipe meal plans, the University brought in food trucks for two days, from Sept. 3 to 4.
But Vargas said she “didn’t even know that there were food trucks” with the trucks announced the same day they started.
“When I found out about the food trucks, me and my friends went to one and they were out of half of the things on their menu, so really, what good did that do for me?” Vargas said. “Because they were out of their vegetarian entree.”
Cornell Dining granted students enrolled in a meal plan primarily based on meal swipes with a $50 City Bucks credit, four days later, on Aug. 30, the food trucks were introduced.
“The thinking was that students were really, really patient and understanding during those two weeks, and so it was an opportunity for students to have another option over that long holiday weekend,” Lombardi said. “It was really not looked at as an alternative, but really looked at as just a gesture of appreciation and a supplemental something to thank students for their patience and to just give them access to some other options.”
While Cornell Dining sought to provide more options for students to recompense for their struggle during the strike, some students felt the City Bucks was not adequate.
“[City Bucks] just seem like a workaround way for us to not be rightly compensated for our struggles,” Vargas said.
Nellie Davis ’28 criticized the University’s efforts to make amends with students.
“Buying food and making stuff can get expensive, and [first-year students] just can’t do that a lot of the time,” Davis said. “I feel like [the University] should have done more, or at least, I feel like that plus, an actual formal apology would have been a lot more impactful.”
Vargas echoed this dissatisfaction with the University.
“It frustrates us because we’re being used as pawns,” Vargas said. “And I don’t blame the workers for that if anything, I blame the University for allowing that to happen.”