On Monday, Sodexho Food Service will serve a Thanksgiving dinner to students and faculty.

The dinner is scheduled for 4:30 to 7 p.m. in Mayes Dining Hall in the Student Life Center. The cost is $5 and is covered by the student meal plan.

“It’s going to be a good meal,” said Munawar Ahmed, director of food services. “It’s going to be fun for the community and the family and friends.”

Ahmed said the food services would like to send the students going home for the holiday with a “nice” meal.

“My goal is to send the students a thank you and a good farewell,” he said. “They are going home taking something positive.”

Ahmed said he has heard positive feedback from the students and faculty.

“They are liking it,” he said. “It is a good morale boost for all of us to do something for the students and Missouri Southern.”

Ahmed requested Dean Carnahan, dean of students, to carve for the students that night. He also said he asked Eric Norris, Student Senate president, to attend.

“He has very graciously accepted,” Ahmed said.

Sodexho will serve a traditional meal, which will consist of carved turkey, carved ham, green bean casserole, glazed carrots, traditional desserts, pies, cranberry sauce and a salad bar.

Ahmed said he has also planned a dinner for the Christmas holiday.

“Again at Christmas, I will reach out to the leadership team at Missouri Southern if they want to come and help,” Ahmed said, “and come and carve a meal for the students if their time allows. Sodexho and Missouri Southern work very closely together.”

He said as long as he is part of Southern, he plans on continuing to do holiday meals.

All campus faculty, staff and students are invited to the Thanksgiving dinner.

“If somebody is on campus and would like to come and join, I think that’s fantastic,” Ahmed said.

Jennifer McCullough, freshman CIS major, said she thinks it is a “wonderful” idea for Sodexho to serve a Thanksgiving dinner.

“It depends on if my friends were going to it,” she said. “I’d go to the dinner.”

“I think it’s a great idea because some students can’t go home for Thanksgiving,” said Alyssa Karel, freshman special education major.

Amber Englebert, junior English education major, agreed.

“I know when I lived in the dorms,” she said, “we didn’t have a Thanksgiving dinner for people who couldn’t go home. If I didn’t have any place to go, I’d go.”