Washington and Lee University
Food at W&L is quite good, if we do say so ourselves. This year nearly 30% of food served on campus will come from local producers, including the University’s own garden (tended by W&L students, with guidance from Professor Bill Hamilton of the Biology department).
Students take advantage of two main on-campus dining options, both located in the John W. Elrod University Commons:
The Marketplace, W&L's main dining hall, is an all-you-care-to-eat dining facility featuring an array of freshly prepared American and International cuisine. Fair Trade coffee, made-from-scratch soups, desserts, and vegetarian specialties, a salad bar, a sandwich bar, a pizza bar are just a few of the options. Special and theme meals throughout the school year are popular on campus, too, especially Local Harvest day – it features only locally grown & produced food.
Cafe '77, the campus “stop-in,” offers a variety of freshly prepared sandwiches, salads and hot food items, as well as an extensive variety of candy, snack food and bottled beverages.
Meal Plans
First year students at W&L are required to purchase the University's Full Board Plan, which includes daily meals at the Marketplace, $100 in food debit and three guest meals per term (for when an out-of-town visitor tags along). Upperclassmen may choose from a variety of meal plans to fit their individual lifestyles.
Housing for undergraduates at Washington and Lee is organized in three distinct categories: First Year Housing, Upperclass Housing, and Fraternity/Sorority Housing. All first and second year students are required to live in campus housing. Many juniors and seniors also elect to live on campus, and some live close to campus in apartments or homes in the Lexington community.
Like so many other aspects of life on campus, residence hall life at W&L observes our tradition of student self-governance. Students on each hall formulate statements of social responsibility pertaining to quiet hours and visitation policies, and upper class students serving as resident advisors plan educational and social programming for their halls and help first year students navigate their early days at W&L.
Rooms with facilities for physically disabled students are available in both singles and doubles, and substance-free halls geared toward students who refrain from drinking alcohol are also an option.
Roommates
Approximately 40 percent of residence hall rooms for first year students are singles; the remainder are double rooms. Housing assignments are completed in June and July, and students receive the name and contact information of their roommates by August 1. Roommate assignments for first year students are based on a questionnaire asking about topics ranging from study habits and music preferences to extracurricular interests and how much sleep you need. Students from the same hometown or same high school are not typically assigned as roommates.
