By Jenny Johnson
News Editor
At the beginning of the school year, prices in the cafeteria rose, upsetting most, if not all, students.
The cafeteria issued a new rule, that is now in effect as of winter break that would hype up the students once again. Students are asked not to bring in their backpacks or winter coats into the lunch lines.
“I think it is impractical,” junior Adam Schalke said. “People that have gym before lunch have to go to their seat first and then leave their backpack in plain sight.”
Schalke is not the only one worried about stuff being taken from his backpack though. For the most part, this is the only reason students are mad about not being able to take backpacks in.
Supervising manager of the cafeteria, Donna Rogers, catches kids stealing food from her everyday and finally had to put an end to it.
Rogers orders and pays for everything ahead of time. In about a month, 130 Dairy Queen products, 72 Subway products and 40 Jamba Juice products were stolen, equaling over a thousand dollars, according to the tracking. When a student buys an item, the cashier presses a button to track how many are bought in a day.
The most commonly stolen item in the cafeteria prior to the changes was cream cheese for the bagels. The cafeteria lost the sales of about 100 cream cheeses per day according to the cafeteria tracking. This means they lost an average of $250 a week on just cream cheese.
“When catching people stealing cream cheese they would say, ‘Whats the big deal? It is only 50 cents,'” Rogers said. “Well, that adds up.”
Since then, they have moved the cream cheese to the back of the cafeteria by the bagels were it is harder to steal.
After having no backpacks were people can easily stash their stolen goods, Rogers says they only get about seven cream cheeses sold a day, as opposed to 100 from last year.
Rogers does not want to go around kicking people out of the line , but she does ask them not to bring their backpacks in the line, in the future.
She also realizes that people getting food during passing periods do not have a lot of time, so she allows them to quickly pass through, because they are less likely to steal in a smaller crowd.
“We are trying to avoid the massive amounts of students with big bags that they can simply put food in,” Rogers said.
Rogers knows that students are worried about their stuff getting stolen, so that is why Rogers let students keep their backpacks at the door were the security guards stands there to watch the backpacks.
Sophomore Felix Saji sticks to his daily routine were he does not need the security guards.
“I just leave [my backpack] at the table and my friends are there to watch it,” sophomore Felix Saji said.
Though the change is seems to help, some students still disagree with the whole process.
Students like Schalke think that security guards should be less focused on watching backpacks, and more focused on catching students trying to steal.
“We are out there watching, but we are not police officers,” Rogers said.
Other students like Saji and sophomore Katelynn Bieber think that the cafeteria should just get video cameras to catch people stealing like they have at stores.
Overall, the cafeteria people not trying to cause problems, but cut down the stealing in the cafeteria. This is a serious matter and student should take it serious, or pay the consequences.
“They can be arrested for [stealing] ,” Rogers said. “How will you feel when you’re in your 20s or 30s, and on your record you have something as silly as stealing from the cafeteria?”
