Narrowing the equity gap in student food security: A student-led approach at the University of Wyoming

Abstract

About 40% of U.S. college students experienced food insecurity even before the pandemic, when the numbers rose further (Rafferty et al., this issue). The burdens of the problem rest disproportion­ately on the shoulders of students whom our society already disadvantages, such as students of color and those from families who struggle with low income. Although most institutions of higher education have begun efforts to address food insecurity among students in general, fewer have built strategies that explicitly aim to tackle these stark disparities in which student groups face the highest rates of food insecurity. In this practice brief, we share experiences and practice recom­mendations from our shared work to narrow these gaps at the University of Wyoming (UW).