by Camille Perlman
Campuses may position themselves as their students’ home away from home. But for those students experiencing housing or food insecurity, what campuses provide becomes all the more fundamental. And, while programs that address housing and food insecurity programs are not anything new, these basic needs were amplified by the pandemic, and practitioners have been working to create wider safety nets by either starting a program or striving to make their programs stronger. The number of students who need this support has grown, and campuses are looking for ways to respond.
This work can be daunting to many people, especially when they feel they don’t know where to start. Several questions bubble up to the top: Who on campus knows how to create these programs? Who will fund them? And even if a program is up and running, there are still questions, like who will sustain them and how do students find them? Residence life and housing are often tapped to lead the creation of these programs because they are already core players in students’ lives and well-being. They keep a pulse on students’ needs, and they know how to connect students to resources when they become aware that extra support is needed. They are also needed to sustain and promote these programs, and they are savvy about the work of building partnerships to get programs going and keep them running. Specifically, their experience with reaching out to other departments across campus to form a cohesive team of staff to support initiatives makes them the experts to go to when putting these programs together.
The key players on this team range from the student health center, dining, housing and residence life, enrollment, and student financial aid services to off-campus housing, community relations, and diversity, equity, and inclusion offices. Together, they funnel students to the services they need and work together to intentionally serve them. These are the core campus services that help, in addition to any partnerships formed with off-campus organizations such as places of worship.
The collaboration of several campus departments is essential here. Program managers agree that partnerships are the core of their success because when a program hits obstacles like a lack of funding or not having enough hands to do the work, being able to count on partners who understand the program goals and what is needed is critical. For example, housing knows that it’s up to them to find emergency housing when a student needs it; they understand their role here and know that the goal is to get this student out of crisis mode.
Working with intention by knowing who the team members are and what they do is important, but so is putting things in place to have a successful program: for example, having a plan to transmit the message of assistance to students who need food and housing. Some campuses work with student financial aid to help them send out this message, while others work with faculty in living-learning communities and supply them with information to pass on to students.
Now more than ever, it is clear that more students need this support. “We have seen that there is an increase in the number of students who are experiencing food and housing insecurities,” says Anabel Chavva, program coordinator for the HOPE Scholars Program and service learning and leadership within student life at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas. “A recent survey on our campus saw that, of 4,500 students surveyed, one in two students has experienced a basic need insecurity.” And more campuses share the same: Madeline St. Clair, manager of the Maverick Food Pantry at the University of Nebraska Omaha (UNO), says they have distributed 2,765 bags of food within the past year. Steph Beecher, basic needs coordinator for the Student Care and Assistance program within the Office of the Dean of Students at the University of Iowa, says they distribute about 3,080 meals a month to students.
And just how are campuses bringing resources to the students who need them? This is how they are making it happen: increased networking for partnerships on and off campus, more applications for grant funding, and additional student involvement, with students helping students. Some campuses are enhancing existing programs that have been around since 2011, while others are in the early stages of their programs.
Many program managers agree that a great place to start finding resources to ease food insecurity is the Swipe Out Hunger organization. They can not only help establish meal swipe programs on campus, but they also offer a plethora of resources for connecting with partners who can help stock food pantries on campus and answer questions about other food security programs such as SNAP (Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program). “We connected with the national Swipe Out Hunger Program, which runs large-scale meal swipe donation events,” says Maddie Atuire, senior coordinator of the Basic Needs Center at the University of Colorado Boulder. “After this connection, we were interested in possibly facilitating a similar program on the CU Boulder campus. We recognized that it might be a way to help offset student food insecurity and allow for students to participate in a small way to help fellow CU Buffs. The program pilot was launched in the spring of 2019. We partnered with campus dining services to collect meal swipes, and then financial aid assisted us to identify the students who most likely needed assistance. We did proactive outreach to those students and received 484 applications in the first semester.”
In the fall of 2022, they received 2,470 meal swipes, which were allocated to 131 applications. “We did targeted outreach to students with an Expected Family Contribution of zero and encouraged them to apply,” Atuire notes. Looking ahead to the future, “In 2023, I would like to expand our outreach beyond students pulled from the Office of Financial Aid based on specific financial criteria. Since the opening of the Basic Needs Center, we have had the opportunity to do in-depth case management with individual students facing food and housing insecurity. Now that we have a base group of students that we know may need other resources (even without financial aid data), I would like them to be included in our search for applicants. I’d also like to expand our outreach for donations beyond those who have a meal plan. Anyone can donate a swipe, even without a meal plan, via an online platform. I think it could be beneficial to encourage that process more than we have in the past.”
Residence life and housing are often tapped to lead the creation of these programs because they are already core players in students’ lives and well-being.
St. Clair’s campus uses resources from Swipe Out Hunger as well, and she shares her praise for the organization. “Swipe Out Hunger (SOH) has been an incredible help! They gave out $3k to 30 university pantries this past fall through microgrants; though we were not a recipient, I know some pantries created student worker positions or purchased inventory and other products. Additionally, they have donated fridges to any campus pantry that requested one. They have monthly webinars on donation drives, SNAP benefits, handling hunger over school breaks, etc. SOH has also helped connect our food pantry to the local food bank to establish a partnership for cheaper food and more resources. One thing I appreciate the most is ‘The Feed’: an online and resource hub. I’ve been able to ask questions, provide advice, and build relationships with others that are doing the same work. SOH has helped other states introduce and pass Hunger Free Campus bills which impact students greatly.”
Their plans for 2023 include new partnerships and more outreach. As St. Clair explains, “When we get a partnership with our local food bank, we hope to transition into a basic needs hub (personal hygiene, parenting supplies, etc.). We are also working on a SNAP outreach and application assistance program as about two million college students are eligible but not receiving SNAP benefits.” They also want to create a food recovery program to reduce food waste and provide free fresh food to their pantry guests. And they are planning helpful resources for their graduating students. Currently, they are working with another department to put together a clothing closet featuring career clothes that students can access on campus, and they are creating a community resource guide so students have information about resources available to them in the local community after they graduate. And last but not least, they want to assess students’ basic needs and plan to use the Hope Center’s Student Needs Survey. “To my knowledge, this would be the first time UNO has data on students’ basic needs.”
At Kennesaw State University, they are working on maintaining the strength of their program partners and their donation solicitation efforts. Marcy Stidum, executive director of CARE Services and student volunteerism and service within the division of student affairs, says that “CARE Services programs continue to operate through strong relationships with our campus and community partners and supporters, as well as intentional and strategic fundraising. CARE operations are dependent upon these supports, as most CARE programs and activities are made possible through donations. Our pantry continues to run based on donated items and funds, as well as a strong partnership with Atlanta Community Food Bank. Additionally, CARE Services offers enrichment opportunities and experiences for our students, and this summer a group of students were able to travel to Disney World thanks to the sponsorship of generous donors.”
They have also had success in expanding fresh food options and mentoring opportunities. “One of our community partners, MUST Ministries, brings their mobile food pantry to campus once a month, providing fresh produce and food boxes to the KSU community. We have also implemented a mentor program, partnering ASCEND students with volunteer mentors from the community who receive targeted training and support specific to working with the ASCEND student population.”
At the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, the HOPE Scholars Program continues to succeed. And while their partnerships are already very strong, with donors who helped them graduate their sixth scholar recently, they remain intentional about continuing their work and spreading the word about their resources. Chavva explains that they recently hosted several different events during the Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week on their campus as they continue to bring awareness to these issues.
Several of the staff interviewed here also mentioned including more in-depth student case management in their programs, which makes sense given the relentless feeling of struggling that food and housing insecurity can bring to students’ lives. And if all goes as planned, in the near future the Hope Center will have more information to share with the higher education community that can help campuses with their response programs. In November 2022, the Hope Center received a grant from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation that will allow them to study and improve federal and state responses to students’ basic needs insecurity. As the Hope Center shared on their website, “At a time when three in five students don’t have enough to eat or a safe place to live, these policy changes are essential to supporting students’ ability to succeed in higher education.”
Camille Perlman is the managing editor of Talking Stick for ACUHO-I.
