Carved from Calcite (Egyptian Alabaster) and was found in the the Sobek temple at Dahamsha during 1967 by workers digging of the Armant Canal in a shaft closed by the sandstone slab - the slab slid into place on two bronze wheels.
Sobek is seated in a human form with the crocodile head and his right hand holds the Ankh giving life to the youthful Amenhotep III. The King is wearing the Nemes headdress, with the uraeus and royal beard.
New Kingdom, late 18th Dynasty, reign of Amenhotep III, ca. 1391-1353 BC. Now in the Luxor Museum.
After spending his last day working for Aramark on Tuesday, Lucas Mello said he has never been happier.
When
the 21-year-old UF history junior was hired to work at the Reitz Union
Starbucks owned by Aramark, he said he was not paid for training or
overtime. But he said he was supposed to be. Customers weren’t allowed
to tip.
Nobody taught him to separate milk
types such as soy and dairy in different blenders like when he worked at
a corporate Starbucks in Miami Springs, he said, leaving students
purchasing drinks vulnerable to allergens and contaminants.
Aramark
is a food service giant with a stock value of $7.8 billion, according
to Forbes. It caters to school districts, correctional facilities,
workplaces and universities nationwide. UF is one of the universities it
is partnered with, and all food service locations on campus — excluding
Krishna — are owned and operated by Aramark.
But
allergens aren’t the only thing students have to worry about. Employees
have filed complaints against Aramark for wage theft and withholding
benefits from employees, said Jeremiah Tattersall, a field
representative from North Central Florida’s American Federation of Labor
and Congress of Industrial Organizations.
The
Alligator tried getting in touch with at least 15 Aramark workers for
comment, but they did not speak out for fear of being fired.
Problems with Aramark’s dining experience
Zona Ahmed felt like a fool for purchasing a meal plan.
While
browsing through the vegetarian options at the Fresh Food Company
during Preview, the biology freshman said she felt safe getting a meal
plan because she thought there were options to accommodate her dietary
restriction.
At first Ahmed, 19, said
everything was fine. But a month into her first semester, she said the
vegan options stopped showing up as often in the dining hall.
“I’ve been eating out more often, even with the dining plan,” she said. “It’s not really what it seems.”
Gator Dining’s cheapest
residential meal plan cost $1,765 for a semester that includes 10 meals
per week, which is what Ahmed has. The most expensive residential meal
plan cost $2,300 per semester for unlimited meals every week and extra
Flex Bucks.
Tattersall, who has helped
many Aramark workers file their complaints to the Florida Department of
Labor, said the food provided on campus also isn’t fresh.
The 2019 Food Service Master Plan conducted last Spring through Brailsford & Dunlavey and Petit Consulting confirmed the same. The two services exist to evaluate critical problems on college campuses and offer solutions to fix them.
The
report read that 81 percent of UF students with residential meal plans
were dissatisfied because of the low food quality, and 69 percent said
the disappointment was due to the low food variety — a problem for those
with dietary restrictions.
This is why 52 percent of the meals went unused in Fall 2018, the report read.
Student
satisfaction with Gator Dining is 62 percent, which is below the
national benchmark of 71 percent identified by the National Association
of College and University Food Services, the report read. It suggested
that UF provides healthier food options on campus.
After
analyzing this callout from the report, Aramark might not be the food
service provider anymore, said Curtis Reynolds, the vice president of UF
Business Affairs. He did not name what company may replace it.
The university renewed its 10-year contract with Aramark,
which began in July 2009, to December 2020, Reynolds said. It gives UF
about 10 percent of gross revenues and control over meal prices.
But the contract doesn’t give UF a chance to control Aramark’s food quality, according to the food service master plan report.
Reynolds said UF wants to have higher food quality and will include that in future negotiations.
When
The Alligator asked if UF plans to negotiate more control over the
programs and operations of its food service provider, Reynolds did not
give a direct answer, yelled into the phone and hung up on the reporter.
Problems with wages and labor practices
Tattersall
said the clients he has met with from Aramark said they were initially
told they would work 30 to 35 hours a week. Instead, they work overtime
and are not paid for the extra hours, according to complaints Tattersall
has processed.
The U.S. Department of Labor
mandates that employees who work more than 40 hours a week must be
given time and a half pay. Otherwise, the company is committing wage
theft.
Wage
theft coincides with hour manipulation, in which managers document
fewer hours than the employee actually worked that week, Tattersall
said.
Good Jobs First is a national policy resource center that collected data of Aramark’s offense types. It reported
that Aramark had 24 records of wage and hour violations with a total
penalty of more than $9 million and 40 records of labor relations
violations with a total penalty of $967,042 since 2000.
The
workers who do not receive benefits struggle to maintain families or
even their own lives, Tattersall said. About a dozen Aramark workers he
spoke to depend on a food pantry to eat.
Reynolds said UF has no more than 1,350 employees under Aramark.
Tattersall
said that since UF is going to go into negotiations with new food
service companies, there is an opportunity for change.
“Aramark’s
allowed to do whatever they want,” he said. “Now we have the
opportunity to say: We’re going to be a top-five institution, we need a
top-five dining experience, which means that workers need a living
wage.”
Rally at President Fuchs’ office
Last
Friday, workers and students decided they were fed up. Nearly 50 people
showed up outside President Kent Fuchs’ office — and although many
different groups were involved, everyone had one thing in common.
No one was a fan of Aramark.
The rally brought together Aramark
employees, members of Graduate Students United, the Young Democratic
Socialists of America, United Faculty of Florida, the Alachua County
Labor Coalition and North Central Florida’s American Federation of Labor
and Congress of Industrial Organizations.
Ashley
Nguyen, the coordinator for the Alachua County Labor Coalition, said
she emailed Fuchs twice to set up a meeting to discuss the possibility
of a living wage and once more to invite him to the rally.
“It
would not be appropriate for me to meet with the Alachua County Labor
Coalition,” Fuchs wrote in an email reply. He did not respond to The
Alligator’s emails, and UF spokesperson Steve Orlando said he had no
comment.
Charles Karcher, a 19-year-old UF
international studies and English sophomore, said he believes that it
is unfair that Aramark workers get such low wages.
“It’s
important for us as students who aren’t threatened by Aramark as a
company to stand up and try to improve the conditions of the people that
are working for Aramark on our campus,” Karcher, the co-chair of the
Young Democratic Socialists of America, said.
However,
the rally last Friday was meant to support the living wage campaign and
to advocate for Aramark workers on campus receiving fair pay depending
on the calculation from the MIT calculator for Alachua County, Nguyen
said.
The MIT calculator
determines a living wage based on factors like how many adults are in
the household, who is working and whether or not they have children.
“For
the living wage as a campaign as a whole, you shouldn’t operate without
paying your employees a wage that will help them survive without
struggling,” Nguyen, a 22-year-old UF international studies and
political science senior, said.
Negotiating
for a living wage is possible. Aramark at the University of Virginia,
as reported by The Cavalier Daily, originally paid its employees an
hourly wage of $10.65 — but the university negotiated for Aramark’s
employees to earn a living hourly wage of $15 this year.
What’s next?
The food service master plan recommends for UF to have local vendors for fresher food.
Reynolds said that UF will begin advertising in late June for food service vendors and should start negotiations by this Fall.
UF
should close out the existing operator agreement by next Spring and
have a new contract with a new food service provider starting next
Summer, the food service master plan report read.
Marcus
Milani, a 19-year-old UF political science and biology sophomore, said
that while he works with the Young Democratic Socialists of America, he
will continue to hand out flyers to students, promote the cause on
Turlington Plaza and reach out to other organizations to partner in
advocating for the living wage campaign.
“The
university is aspiring to be a top-five public institution,” Milani
said. “I don’t think that’s possible without having contracts with
companies who run fair and ethical practices — which is not Aramark.”
I would point out that all of the nazis and white supremacists that end up on the news and featured in magazine spreads as if they were fucking tech innovators or something, are all in their 20s and 30s.
Stephen fucking Miller is in his 30s. He may have 50 more years in government, deliberately deporting immigrants AND US citizens to their deaths, unless stopped. Dylan Roof was in his 20s. The Covington Catholic assholes in DC were HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS.
Racism does not grow old and die off. It indoctrinates the next generations. You cannot wait it out. Drench those embers and grind them into the ground, at every opportunity.
This blog is mostly so I can vent my feelings and share my interests. Other than that, I am nothing special.
If you don't like Left Wing political thought and philosophy, all things related to horror, the supernatural, the grotesque, guns or the strange, then get the fuck out. I just warned you.
