YuLin Zhen, Photography Editor

On Sunday, the YCC passed a policy proposal that seeks to evade dining hall exclusivity via a “buddy system.”

The proposal’s sponsor Tiffani Baik ’26 noticed student frustration about dining halls, such as Berkeley, Silliman and Pauli Murray colleges, reserving some hours exclusively for students in their respective residential colleges. According to the proposal, these limited hours impose a burden on students who no longer have access to to-go boxes and are often studying, working or attending classes far from dining halls, like on Science Hill.

For some students, these restrictions have created a culture of campus exclusion, according to Baik.

The proposed solution is a “buddy system” where, on weeknights from 5:00 to 6:00 p.m., a Yale student affiliated with a residential college with exclusive hours can bring a plus one and avoid the restrictions.

“The Yale residential college system is designed to create individual bubbles of community while allowing its students to ‘[enjoy] the cultural and scholarly resources of a large university,’” Baik wrote in the proposal. “All Yale students should have the ability to eat with their friends, regardless of their residential college affiliation.”

The proposal includes data obtained from students from Benjamin Franklin College, which shows that 27.7 percent of surveyed students “want to get rid” of restricted dining hours entirely, and 36.9 percent are in favor of the new proposal.

William Barbee ’26, a senator from Silliman, co-sponsored this proposal. He said that when it was brought to his attention at a dining policy committee meeting, he immediately thought it was an “excellent” idea to foster community.

“I think just going up to people and saying ‘Hey, I know you, let’s have a conversation’ and going in as your plus one for dinner is a good way to be able to develop other relationships,” Barbee said.

Diego Paz ’27, a senator from Murray, also co-sponsored the proposal after noticing student displeasure with his college’s dining hall hours this year.

“Often, you want to invite your friends over to eat, and oftentimes, you either have to schedule later meals or you just couldn’t eat with your friends,” Paz said.

He believes that this proposal will alleviate current issues with the restriction and that, eventually, the five-to-six restriction will be discontinued or at least altered. 

Yale University has 14 dining halls in its residential colleges.