Oklahoma colleges tackle food insecurity, an invisible threat facing students, employees

EDMOND — It’s not unusual to see a line snaking its way down the hallway leading to the entrance of a small room tucked inside the University of Central Oklahoma’s student union.

The university’s students and employees wait in those long lines to choose items like nonperishable food staples such as beans, rice and canned goods from neatly labeled shelves. But unlike the grocery store, these shelves have no price tags and the items are free to UCO students and employees who need them. 

Organizers say the Central Pantry’s small size belies an outsized mission. It has helped feed hundreds of UCO students and employees since it became the state’s first college food pantry to open its doors in 2012.

Nicole Doherty, the director of community engagement at UCO and director of Central Pantry, says there is a common misconception that anyone who can afford to attend college must be able to afford food. 

“Which is just not the reality as we see every day on our campus and many other campuses in Oklahoma,” Doherty said. 

College students aren’t usually the first group that comes to mind when people think of hunger, but about 3.8 million experienced food insecurity in 2020, according to an analysis from the U.S. Government Accountability Office. A 2020 Temple University survey found that 50% of college students could not afford to eat balanced meals, and 35% missed meals because they couldn’t afford them, said Austin Prickett, a spokesman for the Oklahoma Regional Food Bank. The organization serves more than 1,300 food pantries across central and western Oklahoma, according to their website. 

“You could just be scraping by and the money that you pay for your tuition is all you have,” Prickett said. “That doesn’t mean they’re fully skipping every meal, it could just be, I can only eat breakfast today, so that’s not a full balanced diet”. 

Prickett said many college students suffer from low-level food insecurity, which means they may be eating everyday but are not getting enough to maintain a healthy diet.

“That’s why the pantries are there,” Prickett said. “We want them to be there to help folks get by, and we know also that if you’re not eating a well-balanced diet and eating all your meals, it’s going to make it a lot harder to pay attention to class and to get through your college work.”

Community support

There are 19 college food pantries in Oklahoma that are affiliates of the Regional Food Bank. Affiliate food banks can purchase food items from The Regional Food Bank at a significantly cheaper cost than if they were buying the items from a store. The Regional Food Bank assigns donors to college food pantries, such as local supermarkets, so that pantries have a ready supply of food available. 

Food pantries try to provide students with the items that they need to have a nutritious, balanced diet, Prickett said. The Regional Food Bank of Oklahoma has nutritionists on staff and will award pantries that meet the criteria a Healthy Pantry Certification. The Healthy Pantry Certification shows that a pantry provides good nutritional products such as fresh fruits and vegetables. Currently, 5 of the 19 college food pantries in Oklahoma have this certification. 

“A lot of people come in and they might see, for instance, vegetables. They might see a vegetable and say, ‘What is this? I’ve never seen this before, And it’s a turnip, right?’ And so I said, ‘Oh, well this is what you can do for turnips. You can mash it like a mashed potato. You can do this.’ So we also have recipe cards because we are a healthy pantry with the Regional Food Bank. We’ve put together several different little cookbooks,” said Monique Bruner, the president of the Campus Resource Center at Rose State College.

Bruner said the Campus Resource Center serves an average of about 200 students a week. Bruner, who created the food pantry in 2018, said she was moved to do so when a student confided in her that they only received $70 in food stamps for a month’s worth of groceries. 

“I thought, I wonder how many other people are out there that just need a little help,” Bruner said. 

Bruner said funding for the food pantry initially came from private donations, but as more support was given to the project, eventually the student senate at Rose State voted for a portion of student activity fees to be allocated to the pantry’s budget. Bruner also applies for grants to supplement the pantry’s expenses, which has made additions such as a storage shed possible.

“If I hadn’t got that grant we would not have had the money to get a storage building,” Bruner said.

‘A lot of personal experience’

A common problem that college food pantries have is keeping high-demand items in stock. These include peanut butter, pasta, meat products, frozen products, rice, and eggs. 

Brian Blevins, the coordinator for Basic Needs Resources at Oklahoma State University, said that his desire to help create a food pantry there came from his time working at Central Pantry at UCO and his own personal experiences with food insecurity. 

“I’ve had a lot of personal experience, I’ve had a lot of professional experience, and Oklahoma is also a pretty hungry state, so there’s a lot of work to be done,” Blevins said. 

College food pantries often struggle with a lack of space. Having to store items like meat and cheese means that freezers and refrigerators are needed. In addition, the storage needed to store nonperishable items can make college food pantries cramped. 

Doherty, with UCO’s food pantry, said it has been a long term goal of hers to find a larger space for Central Pantry. Doherty said that she has applied for many different spaces on UCO’S campus over the years, but none of them have been approved by the university. 

“The people that are shopping in the pantry are already experiencing a frustration or a roadblock in their world,” said Doherty. “We want to provide a space that people feel comfortable and welcome in.”

Editor’s note: This story was produced through a reporting partnership between Oklahoma Voice and the University of Central Oklahoma’s journalism program.