I personally have never experienced this so called "food insecurity" and I cant imagine how others must feel going through this. Considering I haven't quite made it to college yet I still one day may experience this. Even though I don't necessarily face this, there are so many people who do face this. It is such a hard thing to face the hard truth. But a struggle many face is this food insecurity. Struggling to know when your next meal will be and where it'll come from, not really having anything to rely on.
I think that it is a good thing that more colleges are starting to recognize this trend and starting to put a little effort in to helping this problem. Many don't realize how big of a problem this really is. It hurts more than you actually realize, and with there starting to be more positive changes, more will actually be helped. It will benefit the image of the school as well as the students and their community, not having to worry as much because it's already there.
While I myself have never experienced “food insecurity” one of my close friends in elementary school did. His name was Jonathan and while we rarely talk anymore, I’m sure it would be hard for him to forget the struggles he experienced in elementary school with lack of food. Every day he would come to school on time, having had no breakfast, or a packed lunch. All he could really rely on was a McDonald’s hamburger for dinner every night. I saw how this lack of food was beginning to affect him, as he would frequently doze off in class as well as faint in the hot sun during P.E. . The school staff claimed it was an unrelated illness, but I knew the real reason this was happening to him. I felt for Jonathan, as I always had plenty of food in my house to enjoy. So I began bringing him a lunch everyday that I packed myself, and I quickly saw an improvement being made. Jonathan was just a more joyful person and the fainting and and passing out stopped completely. This just goes to show how a lack of food can have a massive affect on someone and so if you ever are in my situation, help out your Johnathan with a little snack.
I, personally, have experienced food insecurity. My family always tries to buy enough food to satisfy everyone, though it comes at a serious cost financially every week. I see people at school complaining about the school lunches all the time, throwing milk across the campus, smashing oranges or apples on the main building exterior, throwing out entire salads, and more. Every time I see it, I cringe harshly, thinking about how anyone who didn't have a lunch or possible couldn't afford lunch could've eaten the wasted food. I often see people who are reluctant to share their food with even their best friends, 'waterfalling' a water bottle or ripping off and throwing away the bitten part of a piece of bread. At home, being hungry isn't new to me. I can't make breakfast unless I want to eat the expired oatmeal that's been in the pantry for three years, I normally don't eat lunch because whatever I do have, I either am physically unable to eat or I give it to someone else who doesn't have food. I do this because I understand the discomfort of being judged for not having a school lunch. I actually feel really out of place whenever we have lunch because I look around me and see everyone eating oreos, chips, sodas, and pizza, and I sit there with the half-cooked, lukewarm frozen meal I got in the discount isle. I believe that high schools and colleges during any kind of break should keep their cafeterias open to students who cannot afford the luxury of food and snacks.
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When I was in second grade we had pen pals from a neighboring school about 20 minutes away from mine, in a part of town rough enough that when we did meet up with our pen pals, it could not take place there. Many of the kids could hardly speak english, and many could not even tell you their own birthday. Coming from such difficult situations at home it was hard to provide healthy meals for the kids, and our school noticed that. Even being so young they noticed too, kids shying away from opening their lunch boxes out of embarrassment. This was the first time I had seen food insecurity and not until now did I know there was such a name for it, but my principal along with the rest of the students decided to change that for them. Our whole entire school raised enough money to establish a whole new cafeteria menu, replacing bags of cheetos and cookies with fresh fruits and vegetables. Not to be cheesy but it was amazing to see such a difference in attitude the next time we saw them. I can only imagine the kind of relief the parents must've felt knowing their child can go through the school day with a full belly of nutritious food.
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I personally have not experienced food insecurity, nor do i know of anyone who openly spoke about their own experience. The students mentioned in the article should never have to feel different from the other students who can afford to leave campus on spring break. Not knowing where your next meal would be coming from can definitely make you feel “keenly aware” of your own economic disadvantage, which these closed cafeterias do. If I saw my peers leaving campus to go on vacation or to go home and I knew I couldn’t afford it, I would automatically feel bad about myself. With schools like Columbia and Harvard that changed their spring break-cafeteria policy, progress was made. Of course, more steps in the right direction should be made other than a change of policy and free lunch for all grade levels. More schools should continue to take into consideration the student’s advantages and disadvantages and cooperate to benefit all students, not just a handful.
have never experienced nor known someone personally who has dealt with food shortages in their home. The college students in the article are having to suffer through the breaks in college because the college administrators choose to close the school cafeterias. One college student in the article states that “We don’t have a kitchen. It’s really frustrating. What the hell are we supposed to do?”. Her response to the colleges decisions are warranted because these are students who lack the ability to travel home for such short breaks. More can definitely be done to help those like in this article to find the food they so desperately need. By donating to an organization like mother Hubbard’s cupboard or by advocating to set one up on campus could really change how some kids in college view the breaks they are given.
In my county, one in four children are food insecure. We have free and reduced lunch programs and in some schools children are given backpacks with food for break times, but I can’t imagine how they get through spring break with maybe not much more than that backpack of food. I feel like the part of the article about being “keenly aware of their own economic disadvantage” over spring break is really true, because while I live in a city near the beach, there are kids right here that have never seen the ocean. I frequently go to the beach with my family and friends, so to hear about my classmates going all the time if I’d never been would be torturous, not to mention the more extravagant vacations to the Bahamas, Turks and Caicos, Disney World, and elsewhere. I definitely think all colleges should keep their cafeterias open over spring break for those who would be food insecure otherwise, or even for those who aren’t able to go home like the author. I feel like public elementary, middle, and high schools should adopt this policy as well, though I realize the reality of transporting these kids to cafeterias might not be feasible for those outside of walking distance to their schools. This could be remedied if school buses were still to operate and bring children to their school cafeterias over spring break.There’s really no reason that children should go hungry in America, so I hope that this changes with access to food being more accessible in the near future.
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I felt that universities should be doing more to provide the basic necessities to their students. However, just like most boarding schools, they leave their students to fend for themselves. The school should at least provide a little bit of support as the tuition is not cheap. In addition, in the article, it states that one of the students rely on microwavable food for his meals which I doubt is healthy so the schools are impacting the student's health. The schools should also allow students to stay on campus during spring break for free instead of charging them a fee. This gives students who aren't traveling some extra cash to spend which takes economic pressure off them. The students are given the choice to use the kitchen to cook their food which is cheaper than buying food. Overall I feel that schools are doing a pretty bad job at keeping students fed.
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Some of my friends get lunch from the cafeteria. They always complain about how terrible the food is. They have things like pizza, french fries, and hamburgers every week. Whenever I can, I try to give them something from my lunch. I agree with the paragraph which states not having enough food can affect your school performance. I believe this to be true. If you are constantly hungry and always thinking about food during tests, that would be terrible. I couldn’t imagine trying to concentrate in school while being hungry. The data from the article surprised me that 1 in 4 college campuses open their cafeterias during breaks. Honestly, I thought there wouldn’t be that many. As mentioned in the article, most students travel off campus for spring break and other events. Now that I think about it colleges really should have their cafeterias operating for anyone who is staying on campus.
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