RVC College Rep guide

Distribution: Officers and college reps of Rice Vegetarian Club

In September 1995, Rice Vegetarian Club reorganized its vegetable cutting and food preparation scheme along the lines of Rice Recycling, by introducing one or two college reps at each of the undergraduate colleges. Each college will have a turn at vegetable cutting, once every 4-8 weeks. Furthermore, each rep is responsible for RVC publicity at his or her college. In a specific college's week, the college rep(s) for that college will be expected to gather up 4 or 5 volunteer vegetable cutters. Guidelines for cutting vegetables and for getting cutters are discussed below.

College Rep duties

Pick up fliers (every 2 weeks or so) either from the RVC dinner or from the publicity representative and hang them up at high-traffic points at your college. You will receive an email notice when fliers are ready.
When it's your college's turn, arrange 4 or 5 people to cut vegetables. You don't need to get someone with a car (though that wouldn't hurt at all) in that group, as someone who's experienced has to come to supervise the cutup and most of the officers have cars
Stay in contact with the mailing list maintainer to get updates on who on the veggie club list is from your college. A refresher list should be sent to you when it's your college's turn to handle cutting, and a reminder should be mailed out to your college members, but if you don't see either, speak up at once - it makes everyone's job easier.

Getting Vegetable cutters

The president will call and email the rep to remind the rep of his or her week on that Monday. The rep should call people on Tuesday or Wednesday night, as Thursday night is often too late, and conflicts with pub night.
The president will give the college rep a reminder call on Thursday. If the college rep has people by this time, he or she should let the president know how many people have been rounded up. If the college rep is having difficulty finding people, this is the time to let the president know so that the president can look for a backup plan. This is also time to plan for transportation.
Vegetable cutters do not have to be vegetarians -- anyone interested in RVC is ok

Guidelines for Vegetable Cutters

College reps are expected to inform their cutters about the following issues:

The cutup happens at the Hare Krishna temple (although we haven't seen anybody freak out because of this, it is entirely conceivable that somebody might, so better to establish this right away)
A ride will be provided. If the vegetable cutter has a car, encourage this person to drive one of the cars
Vegetable cutting includes a free lunch afterward
Meet at 10:00 AM Saturday morning. For Jones and Brown, meet at Jones College Commons; for all other colleges, meet at Wiess College Commons.
Cutters will be back at Rice by 1 PM, after having lunch

Vegetable Cutting rules

The RVC program follows far stricter rules of cleanliness and hygiene than are usually required for food preparation. The college rep is expected to be familiar with these rules, and should convey them to the cutters. The kitchen manager (usually an officer) will also know these rules.

Wash hands thoroughly before cutting
In the wash-room, there are 2 sinks, a ceramic one and a metal one. The ceramic one is for hand-washing and washing eating utensils. The metal one is for washing vegetables and buckets. Kitchen supplies (cutting boards, knives, etc) get washed in the large sink in the kitchen.
NO TASTING WHILE CUTTING!!!!! This rule cannot be emphasized enough; although there is little temptation when peeling potatoes, please be very careful about this one when you're peeling apples, slicing strawberries, grating carrots, etc.
As a corollary of the above, we must also observe peak cleanliness in and around the kitchen and food-serving areas when at the temple. If, when you're having lunch, you're hungry for seconds, please wash your hands before using serving utensils. Further, do not eat in the kitchen or remove food from the kitchen or counter areas.
Throw away all trash in dumpster. Sweep and mop vegetable cutting area as appropriate. Throughly rinse off all cutting boards, knives, etc, before returning them.

Someone with experience will always be there, and they will show you where the bowls, knives, food processors, cutting boards, etc. come from and go back, as well as the buckets, brooms, mops, etc.

Guidelines for the President

The president is responsible for selecting the college reps. College reps do not have to be vegetarians, but they do have to be serious about RVC. Ideally, college repping should be a good training ground for future officers, so freshmen and sophomores are the best choices. If a college rep doesn't perform the needed duties, that person can and should be replaced.

The president must also make up the college rep schedule. This should be made at the beginning of the semester. The president also must contact the appropriate college rep each week -- do NOT settle for answering machines or roommates!

Ideally, there should be 2 reps at each college, but this will probably never happen at any college other than Jones! The president should also maintain a "backup-list" in case a college rep has difficulties getting cutters; the backup-list should include people who would be willing to cut vegetables on short notice.

Guidelines for Publicity Reps

Publicity reps should make fliers available to the college reps at the dinner before the week(s) advertised in the fliers, and should let all the college reps know when the fliers are ready. As much as possible, the publicity rep (or a delegate) should actually put the fliers in each rep's mailbox.

Guidelines for all officers

All officers should be ready to be kitchen managers. A kitchen manager should know how to use the blenders and other machines in the kitchen, as well as the locations of all cutting boards, knives, buckets, brooms, mops, etc.