Huden Dining Hall. The name may ring a bell to some, but if not, this is the only dining hall on the VTSU Castleton campus.  

For $2,297 a semester, you can purchase your very own meal plan! The gold plan includes unlimited meal swipes in the dining hall for the semester, $120 dollars toward the campus Fireside Cafe, long strands of hair in the tofu, and maggot-looking bugs in the lettuce. 

If you’re lucky, you may be able to find a few dozen ants crawling around the pans of food at the hot food bar. 

Huden Dining Hall is one example at VTSU Castleton where students don’t get what you pay for. 

The dining hall is seemingly becoming worse, evidenced by complaints becoming more and more frequent in the Yik Yak social media platform. 

Yik Yak, an anonymous posting app, is constantly flooded with complaints, photos and videos from Huden. Dining hall workers are seen rubbing their teeth with their gloves and scratching their heads to then go serve up a sandwich. 

Staff members are seen picking up food from the hot food line with their gloved hands and popping it into their mouth. 

Little larvae were seen found crawling on the broccoli at the salad bar. 

And if you’re vegetarian or vegan, you’re guaranteed to develop some sort of vitamin deficiency due to the lack of proper and nutritious meals.

Some of the vegan and vegetarian meals include, but aren’t limited to, vegan hot dogs, dried out and charred black bean patties with no option for buns or condiments, hot quinoa congealed with warmed pineapple, and “root vegetable mac and cheese,” which entails mac and cheese mixed with carrots, radishes, cauliflower, and potatoes. 

Some days in the vegetarian section there is not even a protein option. 

The staff at Huden aren’t entirely to blame. It is impossible to know what their bosses are telling them to do and what standards those in charge are holding the workers to. It is easy to become lackadaisical when you aren’t being held to certain standards. Though the staff could be more sanitary, they are incredibly friendly and are always leaving students smiling. 

Some staff blast music, some will hit you with a joke, or even take the time to learn your name. 

But due to the amount of money VTSU students pay for the dining hall, they deserve better. 

There needs to be higher standards for the quality and overall cleanliness at Huden. There needs to be vegetarian and vegan meals, not just random ingredients. 

It’s well known that college dining halls aren’t going to have the same quality that a 5-star restaurant might, but for $2,297 a semester and $4,594 a year, the standards at Huden must be higher. 

And even if the food doesn’t improve, sanitary guidelines and proper cleaning must improve. No one wants to find a live bug in their root vegetable mac and cheese or have someone scratch their face and then serve you a sandwich.