Jack Kirk
Features Editor

“Can I get a skillet, no ham, eggs over easy?” a student orders.

“Over easy,” another cook shouts to Jason Zimmerman, a student worker for Sodexo. Zimmerman adds two eggs to his row of skillets already cooking other orders. In mere minutes Zimmerman has finished the four orders in front of him and is already cooking more eggs.

“I usually punch in about 30 hours a week, plus my 12 hours of schooling. That’s a normal week for me,” Zimmerman said.

During the week, Zimmerman runs in and out of the kitchen filling and refilling the drink station, changing milk containers and ensuring that the juice doesn’t run out.

“It’s really hard for me to balance it. I don’t get a lot of sleep. I usually stay up to one or two studying. My work does reflect on my grades, but I usually keep above a B average. If I want to be a teacher, I need to have good grades. I struggle, but at the same time, it’s good. I love the challenge, because it keeps me on my toes, and it keeps me out of trouble,” Zimmerman said.

The entire time he’s working there are other employees running around doing their jobs, serving food, or cleaning tables. In back, there are employees preparing more food or washing dishes, student and non-student workers alike.

“[The non-student workers] show me the respect as being here, and knowing what I do. Not as a manager, but as someone who has been here a while. It works out really well. There is no butting heads or anything,” Zimmerman said.

According to Jay Carpenter, Director of Resident Dining, students mainly fill utility roles like running and serving food, washing dishes or cleaning the dining area.

“A culinary position is more of a learned, skilled position, which would require some previous cooking experience in the industry, but if the student had previous cooking experience and we could implement them in production then we would use them for that. Every position is entry level. We don’t treat our students any different than any other employee. We give them all the same training and resources to do their job, as well as opportunities for upper mobility,” Carpenter said.

Sodexo is one of the few places on campus where students can work alongside workers that have made a career of food preparation. Many of these non-student workers started working for Sodexo as students and have moved up into better jobs.

“At my previous account, our vice president of that region started as a dishwasher at that account,” Carpenter said.

Most students start with one or two shifts a week, totaling about eight hours, as they adjust to having both school and a job.

David Kenworthy is one of these employees. He graduated in 2006 and still works for Sodexo as a server at the pizza station.

“It provides them with valuable experience for their future,” he said. “If they don’t have a good work ethic, they learn it.”

jkirk@mavs.coloradomesa.edu