During a low-income students of color meeting on Friday, April 29, Latecia Joiner, a Lang Media Studies junior, expressed her struggle to eat on campus. Joiner commutes from her mom’s in New Jersey to The New School and either brings food or goes the day without eating. On days Joiner does not bring food, she will go class to class and only have her water bottle. Another student Tangina Stone, a Lang contemporary music with a focus in cultural studies senior, said she too faces a similar struggle.
“If I wake up late I don’t have time to eat before I leave home. When I get to school I just don’t eat because I know I’m not going into the cafeteria. It is too expensive,” Stone said.
For students at The New School, staying well-fed on a budget can be challenging. With the high prices in the cafeteria and generally exorbitant cost of New York City food, as well as rising tuition rates, some students are having trouble affording food. With the opening of a food pantry on campus and a meal share program run by the University Student Senate, more resources, however, are becoming available to students.
The New School is not the only university facing this issue. Students across the country are finding it hard to afford food. This is more than the stereotype of college students who eat ramen and dollar pizza for every meal, these students don’t know where their next meal will be coming from. Students who experience housing and food insecurities was the recent topic at a national conference, #RealCollege Convening, the first of its kind, organized by the Wisconsin Hope Lab.
The opening of food pantries on college campuses nationwide is an attempt on the part of universities to provide assistance for the many students going unhelped and hungry. Feeding America, a nonprofit, which provides emergency food assistance to over 46 million people in the U.S and operates over 200 food banks found, said in a 2014 report that 10% of their adult clients attend college, including two million full-time students. Since 2007, more than 200 colleges now operate food pantries, the Wall Street Journal reported in 2015.
At The New School, Tracy Robin, assistant vice president of Student Health Services, said that more students have been coming to counseling services saying they are struggling to afford food since the fall. Student Health Services has been making food, pharmacy, and metro cards, along with referrals to public resources in New York City available to students in immediate need.
“We recognize that many students are struggling with the high cost of living in New York City, which includes the high cost of food,” Robin said.
After noticing that she’d heard from more students this fall, Robin’s and other administrators from Student Health Services got together to brainstorm ways to help students. Soon after, that group grew to include students, staff from other departments and faculty. The group began to meet in the Social Justice Hub and came to be The President’s Task Force on Food and Housing Security. The Task Force set up the Food Pantry, and it’s initiatives were created specifically to meet the needs of students struggling to get by.
Rachel Knopf Shey, assistant director of Wellness and Health Promotion at the New School’s Student Health Services said it has been her dream to open a food pantry at The New School since she started working here six years ago.
“It’s really exciting. I feel so proud of The New School and all of us who came together,” Knopf Shey said. “I think this go around was a few people in health services coming together and thinking about students who are struggling and need support with housing and food.”
The New School’s food pantry opened its doors on Friday, April 22nd. Tucked away behind a Parsons workspace on the 12th floor of the 16th street building, the pantry is open to all registered students in need of food or toiletries. It also accepts donations.
To a student passing through, the pantry may look like a staff kitchen with just some tables, a fridge and two microwaves. Inside though, you’ll find neatly labeled shelves like “dairy and protein” stocked with little boxes of hummus and crackers. Some of the other shelves are filled with dried goods like cereal and cans of corn, and one rack has a basket of little bottles of Dove deodorant, mouthwash and other travel-sized toiletries. There are also three cardboard boxes for donations lined up on the floor against a white wall that’s covered in dry-erase doodles.
Until recently, the space solely contained three vending machines (one broken and now removed), a counter with a sink and three tables with chairs. The Task Force worked with the Facilities Department who set up the space, painted the floors and counter in a shiny black coat, and the room is now The New School’s Food Pantry open to students in need.
Prior to the opening of the food pantry, counseling services already offered, and still do offer, a gift card program to help students experiencing food insecurities. As the New School Free Press previously reported, students receive gift cards to Trader Joe’s or CVS as well as free Metrocards if they were unable to purchase them on their own. During the fall semester, 23 students received these cards sometimes receiving them more than once.
Through what Knopf Shey described as a “grassroots effort,” The Task Force was able to finally open the pantry this spring by partnering up with Food Bank NYC, a nonprofit “hunger-relief” organization that’s dedicated to ending hunger in New York City.
Data on how many students experience food insecurities on campus was not immediately available but next year, student health and counseling services will include questions about food and housing in a mental health survey. Currently, The New School conducts The National College Health Assessment survey via email every two years. Though less than 15% of students completed this online survey, members of the President’s Task Force hope that in the future it will paint a better picture of the number of students in need.
Administrators will also be collecting data on how many students visit the food pantry and take advantage of it.
“The Food and Housing Security Group continues to meet to look at plans to address food and housing insecurity and additional ways to help students in general with financial struggles,” Robin said.
Along with the newly opened food pantry, students in need of food have other options available to them on campus.The University Student Senate’s meal share program is an attempt to deal with the seemingly-growing amount of helpless, hungry students on campus.
Students who live in some on-campus housing buildings are required to sign up for a New School meal plan. This depends on which housing location the student lives in.
According to the 2015-2016 Housing Rates and Fees, a student living in the Kerrey Hall dormitory is required to pay up $1,635 per semester toward a meal plan. When these meal plan dining dollars are not spent, the remaining balance does not transfer over the following school year.
Serengeti Timungwa, one of the current USS co-chairs thought there was an opportunity here to help students in need.
She met other students who were having to choose between buying supplies for their classes and eating. When she heard this, she and other senators decided to create a Facebook page they called the USS Meal Share Program. Timungwa started the program in the Spring of 2015. On the Facebook page, students with leftover dining dollars can offer when they are available to swipe meals for other students in need.
“One girl spent around one thousand of her dining dollars. She literally left her card in the cafeteria and people that were hungry used it,” Timungwa said. “Others met up and had a meal together. It is beneficial for everyone because you are spending the money you are already charged for, but it’s also a way to build community.”
Fellow students on the USS Meal Share Page can let others know if there is free food available on campus. Rather than wasting food left over from events, students post images, anything from veggie platters to pizza, with a captioned location to notify where it can be found.
According to the USS, as of February 10, 2016, 61 percent of students on the page asked for meals but no one volunteered their card for a swipe. Thirty eight percent of students who asked for meals did receive a swipe. Since the page started in the Spring of 2015 until February 2016, students posted a total of 71 notifications about left over meals available on campus. This data does not reflect conversations that were held through personal messages and is only a reflection of the public posts that were made on the USS Meal Share Facebook page.
Timungwa is one of the current administrators of the Facebook page and plans to continue the program until a larger effort is made by the school that allows students to distribute dining dollars more efficiently. She has sat in meetings where students voiced their concerns about food insecurity, and has brought up the issue several times during meetings held by The Social Justice Committee.
For the upcoming semester the on campus meal plan, known as The Dining Dollars Program is being restructured for Fall 2016, but no word on what exactly that restructuring will entail. Full descriptions of dining plans will be provided on The New School website before student bills are issued in July.
There are currently no discount options for students of lower income at The New School Dining Services. Jessica Roberts, director of Sustainability and Campus Operations, said Dining Services strives to keep prices as low as possible to maintain the operations of the program. However, leftover food waste from eaten meals in the cafeteria is composted. “The limited pre-consumer waste we do have is donated to the NY Common Pantry through the New School’s chapter of the Food Recovery Network,” Roberts said.
The food pantry will be open for throughout the rest of the semester and into the summer. If you are interested in volunteering at the food pantry, email foodpantry@newschool.edu.