HUNGER ON COLLEGE CAMPUSES

May be particularly relevant to us in the North Country as the students are returning...

Recent research on hunger at colleges suggests that more than half of all community-college students struggle with food insecurity. A University of Wisconsin professor of education policy and sociology last year surveyed 4,000 students at 10 community colleges across the country. Roughly half—52%—of the respondents reported marginal to very low food security. Specifically, one in five respondents had very low food security; 22% indicated that they had cut the size of their meals or skipped meals and were hungry because they didn’t have enough money for food. The professor also tracked 50 students over six years. She found that two types of students struggle with food insecurity. The first group lived in poverty before they began college; hunger and poverty is a preexisting condition for them. The second includes lower-middle class students who were forced to deal with food insecurity for the first time by their college expenses.

Source: Atlantic, 1/14/16, Hunger at College