We left New Orleans for the day to visit the state capitol, Baton Rouge. It was a full day with a tour of the Capitol building, a meeting with Jacob Brumsfield and Caleb Wells of Louisiana State University, as well as a tour of part of their beautiful campus, and a lunch meeting with Rhonda Mercadel.
Our debrief on today's events eventually led to them journaling on the most discussed topic - food insecurities at CWU. They were asked to write about their thoughts on food insecurities on campus and what ideas they have on how to help improve the PUSH program at CWU. Here is what they said:
Brandon:
Today was another phenomenal day here in Louisiana. We made the trek up north to Baton Rouge and toured the LSU campus as well as met with a local state attorney, Rhonda. LSU was enlightening to see the processes that they have in place and the programs set to better the lives of their students. It was also a delight to sit and have a meal with Rhonda and get her view on the city and what she has experienced during the hurricane and how the community reacted to disaster.
Something that stuck out to myself and the rest of the cohort was the food pantry LSU has created to fight food insecurity within their student body. After touring their food pantry, I started to reflect on what type of program CWU has to fight student food insecurity. I quickly came to the realization that our food pantry is in need of a lot of improvement. But more importantly, we need to realize that there are students back home, who we live/see everyday, that may be suffering from hunger and we are unaware of it as well as have very little in place to aid these students in their struggle. It's truly heartbreaking to know this. Luckily, I truly believe that change is possible and that we can make the CWU food pantry project more efficient, empowering, and sustainable.
After conversing with everyone during our nightly debrief, we identified where the program is lacking but also how we can improve it. One big issue is the flow of products into our PUSH food pantries scattered around campus. As of now, the system relies on the donations of students entirely. The result of this has been an inefficient food pantry where the outtake outweighs the intake by a substantial amount, which defeats the purpose of it entirely. People go to this place where we say we are offering this resource, but there's nothing there most of the time. This problem not only leads to it not working but also stunts all future growth of it. We have no way of seeing how much they're used if there's nothing to be used by CWU students, nor is there a system in place to track that in general.
A possible solution we imagined, and plan to move forward with once we arrive back home, is to partner with outside sources such as local groceries, businesses, CWU clubs & orgs, CWU departments, and more. I'm excited about this idea because it encourages us, and Central, to come together as a community to fight this issue together. We're gonna use our insight and connections from here at LSU to initiate this change and then continue to share the impact of our proposed plan to everyone around us. Just imagine what we can do if we had a centralized food pantry on our campus and what could come with that. That will truly make the place we call home more inclusive, safe and better for generations to come.
We can't wait to be a catalyst of change back at Central, but we're only a small voice. We're a voice with passion and resolve, but if you're at all interested in helping us in this cause, please please please don't hesitate to join us. We can't even begin to tell you all how much we can ALL do together as one voice. With size and compassion, we become alot more than just voice. We will make changes.
Samantha:
My thoughts on food insecurity on campus are that the current system is not known about by most students and the system needs improvement. Some ideas that I have to help improve the food pantry system are to get a larger, private, singular space to house the pantry. In addition, having students swipe their card upon entrance to the pantry will allow us to collect demographic data which will help us to improve our marketing strategies to make the pantry better known and therefore more accessible.
Maurice:
Within the CWU Campus, there appears to be some food insecurities. CWU has done a great job of realizing this although, I have not seen great efforts to enhance the amount of accommodations for these students who undergo food insecurities. There are around 8 or so food pantries on campus that students are not familiar with such services. I view this to be a problem because I don’t feel like the services are being used in entirely simply due to a lack of information.
Something I can do to help with this is reach out to Presidents United to Solve World Hunger (P.U.S.H) or the local food bank in town in an attempt to raise awareness within the community about the wonderful resources that our campus has to offer. It is far easier said than done but simply voicing opinions and having my voice heard I feel is a great step forward towards change.
Ramsey:
My initial thought about the food pantries is that it definitely needs improvement. I'm sure that people use the pantries all over campus but, to be honest I don't think anyone knows where these pantries are located. It is a great idea that people can donate food because it is needed for those looking for food however the food that is being donated is also something another student might not want either. As well as when the food is expired where is the food going to because it is not being monitored by any one and I seen that LSU has only one food pantry that is monitored by students and is a bit more discreet than CWU because all you need is your student ID to get food and its free for any student and I'm not sure how they are going about it and I'm pretty sure that its just to have prove of why the food pantry is needed on campus. The only thing i think that could improve from push and fish food bank is that we need to get together with the local community stores and ask for donations because I know they probably throw away a lot of food and it could be more useful to the food bank and the university.
Aubrey:
My thoughts of food insecurities is that it’s real issue on campus. There are several students that come into Student Involvement asking me where the nearest food pantry, I direct them the Student government and they come back asking me if there are any other food pantry’s on campus. Something that could help is advertising where the food pantry’s are on campus and that students are free to take or even donate to the pantry. I just feel like it is not advertised enough because being a transfer student I didn’t take University 101 and I felt that the Freshman knew more about the resources on campus than I did. There are a bunch of students that transfer to CWU too and that is a whole other population that could be unaware of the food pantry and that is why it’s important to advertise it. I think bringing the pantry’s to a single location would be a good idea as well. I feel that some students are embarrassed of having to pick from the food pantry thinking that they would possibly be “judged” by other students when they really shouldn’t have anything to feel embarrassed about. When the students come into our office, they’re shy about asking me about the food pantry to the point where I can barely hear them ask the question or they won’t even give me eye contact. If it were in a single location students would realize that they aren’t alone, and possible build relationships with other students who are going through the same situation. I would love to try to start something like the food pantry that they have at LSU on our campus. Even though I graduate this year, I would like to be apart of the progression of making this happen for the generations after me.
Nate:
What I think about the food insecurities topic is that a lot of our students who have these insecurities are being given half solutions to the problem. Yes, we are making our efforts to have the resources for the students, but I still think there is more that we can do. Whether it be reaching out two actual businesses, alumni, scholarships or anything that can take the responsibility off of the students is a better situation in my opinion. Also, let's look at having some Solutions in place that could track the information of what is being given to the push pantries and what students are using said pantries and finally what they are taking away from them. I do believe Central is headed in the right direction but I do know for a fact there is still more that we can do. I may not have all the solutions but I do know for a fact I'm willing to have the conversations and put in the work to make sure everyone is good.
Tre:
My thoughts on CWU’s food insecurities begins with the insecurities themselves. A lot of students are scared to admit that they need help and that is the schools job in my opinion to reach out to those individuals and show them that everyone needs help at some point in their life and it is OK to ask. What I think Push could do to improve their services is maybe reach out to companies and make propositions such as what can I do for you too have you donate whatever you can in terms of food to our university. Whether it’s a sponsor or even volunteer services that in return they could donate valuables that could help students.
Leni:
Food insecurity at Central Washington University was a very real problem for me, and it still is for a lot of students that I know. When I was a freshman at CWU my meal plan had run out with 2 weeks left in the quarter. That was, by far, one of the hardest quarters for me to survive. At the time, I had no knowledge of any Food Pantry or Food Bank on or off campus because it was poorly advertised. I relied on a few club and organizational meetings to survive because they usually had some free food; a bag of chips, some cookies, maybe some pop. I also relied on some really awesome friends who bought food for me because I had no money left. It was really embarrassing having to ask someone to buy food for me. I eventually got through the quarter, but I couldn’t help to feel ashamed and humiliated.
I’m not the only student on campus who has suffered like this before. Many students I know, especially students of color who are first generation, suffer from food insecurity, and campus does not have the resources they need to survive. One of my Polynesian friends uses whatever financial aid he has to pay rent for the quarter. In the end, he has very little money to spend on groceries. He will usually come to my house to eat, and I feed him. One of my African-American friends, who is a freshman, used all of his connection card funding for the quarter before finals week. Luckily, his sister who was living back home had to send him money to survive. Another one of my friends is a non-traditional student, he has a wife and child. He has to spend money on the things that matter most like diapers and baby food and formula. Those things are expensive. He still needs to buy food for he and his wife, and sometimes he doesn’t have the funds to do that. The list goes on, but the point is that there are students on campus suffering, and the university does not have the proper resources in place to help the students that need it the most. The university that WE, the students, pay for does not have the ability to help US, marginalized groups, on campus. No student should have to go hungry. A hungry student does not do their best work, and students who don’t do their best work end up failing. Failing students often drop out. And dropping out causes CWU’s retention rate to drop, which at this point is about 78%. Let’s raise the university’s retention rate by feeding our students.
What can be improved? Instead of having all of these tiny, unadvertised, food pantries scattered around campus, why not create one space, one CENTRALIZED location, where the food is brought. Have it advertised to marginalized groups on campus; low-income, non-traditional, students of color, first generation. Have it advertised through UNIVERSITY 101 so that every student knows about it their first year. I didn’t know about the “pantries” on campus until my senior year, this year, my 5th year... c’mon now.
RJ:
Food insecurity on any college campus is real, and is often overlooked and not put as a priority. Often those who need the resource of food drives are often embarrassed or are not aware of resources that are present. We need to make it more accessible to those in need, more available products to give out, as well as private to those who prefer it to be unknown. During the campus visit to LSU, one of the highlights was there food pantry that they have available to their students as well as their community members. It is accessible because it has one central location in which the food is available, therefore they're able to advertise one specific location that students can go to for the resources. CWU has the program P.U.S.H., but it is spread out and not well advertised. Because it is spread out, it’s harder to keep up with stocking the shelves and one shelf might have an item that the student needs but they just happened to go to the wrong shelf. Making it a centralized room, all of the items available will be present and accessible. As for having available products, PUSH at CWU is stocked by the students and faculty of the school. There are no outside sources that are helping stock the shelves, to make sure it's even stocked to begin with. I would often see only a few items available at a time. However, LSU is stocked almost as if its own grocery store. That is because they reached out to the community and made partnerships with their local resources. The shelves are always stocked, but when the expiration date is coming up they cycle it back the community so that nothing is wasted and everything is being utilized. Lastly is privacy, LSU has clouded windows that block out those who are accessing the resources. This is to make sure that they don’t need to feel ashamed. Everyone in the area is going through what their going through there as well, therefore, it creates a sense of community. The staff at LSU said that they would often see the same people every week and because of that, those same people often build a community in which they help each other out and simply just be there for each other. Having a centralized food pantry would be ideal because we are a smaller campus so regardless of where it’s placed so it will be accessible. Rather than being in town and farther away from where students without cars cannot access it. P.U.S.H. is doing good things, but we need to make those good things, great things. So that all may have access to the resource that is much needed for many students and community members.
