When Sais can’t make it during normal hours, the Sacramento State pantry enables him to order groceries online and pick them up from a locker. WATCH: Community colleges pay student expenses beyond tuition hoping to boost graduation rates
Given the irregular hours that often define college student life, some on-campus pantries have developed 24-hour service models that don’t require constant staffing. But many of these food pantries, including at major universities, are funded entirely by donations - which limits their size and scale. Growing awareness of the scope of the problem has led to the creation of on-campus food pantries at hundreds of universities over the past decade. “We have definitely seen a massive increase in the level of need across campuses, from red states to blue states,” Friedlander said. “It kind of starts this slow-rolling disaster where we’re reverting to the old SNAP rules right at a time where obviously the need around food security is only going up,” said Bryce McKibben, senior director of policy and advocacy at Temple University’s Hope Center.Īnecdotal evidence suggests that hunger among college students is rising due to inflation, said Robb Friedlander, director of advocacy for Swipe Out Hunger, which focuses on college food insecurity. The expanded rules won’t apply to this year’s freshmen class. “In the next couple months, potentially thousands of college students could be losing access to this program,” said MacGregor Obergfell, assistant director of governmental affairs at the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities. The expanded SNAP eligibility will only last one more year, and the entire program will revert to pre-pandemic rules at varying points over the next year, depending on individual state schedules. adults say race in college admissions should play small roleīut with the public health emergency over, students already receiving SNAP benefits had until June 30 to recertify and stay in the program under the pandemic-era rules. Researchers estimate as many as 3 million college students were added to the program as a result.ĪP POLL: Most U.S. Department of Agriculture relaxed eligibility SNAP requirements for college students during the pandemic, allowing in those on financial aid with no expected family support and anyone who qualified for work-study programs, regardless of hours worked. Radha Muthiah, president of the Capital Area Food Bank, calls it a hidden crisis, “one of those issues that came out of the shadows during the pandemic.” She estimates at least 30 percent of college students are food insecure.
Sais, whose eligibility was restored earlier this year, is part of a largely hidden group that researchers and policymakers are still trying to address: full-time college students struggling with serious food insecurity. “There were times when I was taking a test and instead of focusing on the test, I’m focused on what I’m going to be able to eat tonight,” said Sais, who graduated from Sacramento State University with a degree in political science and journalism and is now a first-year graduate student at the same school.
In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, Sais said, he missed an “important letter” and temporarily lost his eligibility in SNAP, the foundational anti-poverty program commonly known as food stamps.
WASHINGTON (AP) - Raised on welfare by his grandmother, Joseph Sais relied so much on food stamps as a college student that he thought about quitting school when his eligibility was revoked.
0 kommentar(er)
