Editorial: Colleges should help increase food security for hungry students

The image of college campuses like Pitt, which are surrounded by fast-food chains, coffee shops,…The image of college campuses like Pitt, which are surrounded by fast-food chains, coffee shops, dining halls and pizza shops, stands in stark contrast to a reality in which many students struggle with having enough to eat.

An article in the Chronicle of Higher Education recently highlighted a feature at university campuses that is growing in popularity: food banks for college students. According to the article, several two- and four-year colleges, including Oregon State University, West Virginia University, University of Georgia and Valencia College have food banks located on campus. Although food banks have only been established on a few college campuses, the problem of student hunger is thought to be widespread across many colleges, according to the article.

In a survey done at the City University of New York, cited in the Chronicle of Higher Education article, researchers said that in 2010 39 percent of CUNY students reported either going hungry because of a lack of money, skipping meals to save money or not being able to afford nutritious meals. However, only about 7 percent of these students reported using city food banks and even fewer received food stamps.

The results of the CUNY study demonstrate that within the college community there is a large gap between the number of students who are struggling with hunger and those who seek assistance from the government. Because of this gap, we believe that it is beneficial for colleges to provide alternate assistance for the students in their communities.

We believe that the issue of students struggling with hunger or with having insubstantial amounts of food — eating meals that don’t provide adequate nutrition or skipping meals because of financial reasons — is an issue that doesn’t receive enough public attention, and we applaud these colleges’ decisions to implement food banks to ameliorate the problem of student hunger.

The problem of students struggling with hunger should be addressed in more university communities. While it may be unrealistic to expect most universities to establish student food banks, we think that it could be extremely beneficial to students if universities provided reduced-price meal plans to students who demonstrate financial need.

We believe that a reduced-price meal plan project could be one way to help Pitt students who might be struggling. While financial aid packages are often helpful in assisting students with the cost of their tuition, fees and books, we think that it could help our university community if more steps were taken toward making day-to-day expenses more affordable.