What has changed this year at Ursinus? While this may seem like a loaded question with several answers, one thing certainly has changed. Fresh Fix, Ursinus’s health-powered station in FLB, and Cafe 2020 “the campus coffee shop,” have changed their hours of operation.
A mere change of hours could feel insignificant, but sometimes the little things make a big impact. According to Rachel Milburn, senior general manager of the Ursinus Dining Services Office, “One of the most consistent pieces of feedback we’ve heard from students is that they wanted access to Fresh Fix later in the day, especially students who wanted to grab a bowl or other Fresh Fix options after 3 p.m.”
Since the dining services office has open feedback forms year-round, like the QR codes placed within the napkin holders, they are able to compile student responses and plan future courses of action. Hence, with there being a considerable student demand for Fresh Fix to be open later, the hours were adjusted to fulfill this demand. Subsequently, Milburn declared, “it was an opportunity to take what students have been telling us and make a change that we hope will improve their dining experience.”
However, why did Cafe 2020’s hours change as well? After further inquiry, Milburn replied, “Throughout the fall 2024 semester and the 2025 academic year… Cafe 2020 typically saw only about 8–10 orders each evening after 5 p.m., with even fewer orders on weekends.” Therefore, through pattern recognition and student trends, the dining team adjusted the cafe’s hours to better fit student activity, with the aim of meeting their needs.
Cafe 2020 and Fresh Fix now close at the same time. This phenomenon is due to the fact that “Extending Fresh Fix while keeping Cafe 2020 open for the same hours would require additional staffing. By adjusting the hours at Cafe 2020, we are able to shift staffing toward the location where we know students are using the service more and asking for additional hours,” Milburn stated. The hours did not just change for students or faculty, but the workers who man these stations that provide the services we all enjoy.
This 2026-2027 school year may have started out with some minor adjustments, but a change in hours is, by definition, just a change. If there is something dining services should still change, Milburn remarked, “our entire team on campus is extremely student-focused, and we want students to know that their feedback doesn’t just go onto our corkboard in Wismer or in our email boxes unread—it can genuinely influence the decisions we make.”
