Photo by: Rick Danzl/The News-Gazette
Volunteer Ed Friedl of Champaign removes eggs from a refrigerator for clients visiting the food pantry at Parkland College.
The Parkland College food pantry started out small, available just once a month, but it's now once or twice a week.
"We see hundreds of people," said Dean of Students Marietta Turner.
Faculty members and coaches got behind it and spread the word on campus, some even bringing students to the pantry personally.
Before it opened in 2013, Turner and some professors used to keep granola bars and other food in their drawers to help students who hadn't eaten in three days or who told them, "I couldn't study because I couldn't think, I was so hungry," Turner said.
"It became abundantly clear we had a variety of students who were having food insecurity," she said.
A recent American Association of Community Colleges study found that one in six community college students faces food insecurity.
Parkland has a much different population from the UI, with many more students who are from low-income backgrounds, first-generation college students, or older workers going back to school to gain new skills. Many are on their own, or trying to take care of families or elderly parents, said Turner, who regularly sees students struggling to pay for food, medicine and gas to get to school.
"We have students who are single moms with a family who are studying at Parkland, all the way down to your typical college student, an 18- or 19-year-old kid who is on their own for the first time," said Dawn Longfellow, the food pantry's operations manager. And some clients are international students, she said.
In September, the pantry had more customers than the regular Thursday evening food pantry at the Wesley Foundation in Urbana. Both serve veterans, seniors, families and adults who are unemployed or underemployed, but "at Parkland, we definitely see a lot more students," Thomas said.
In September, 31 percent of Parkland's clients were students; in October, it was 20 percent.
On a recent Wednesday in late October, at least 10 students showed up, including April Jones, 39. She and volunteer Nan Gaylen shopped together for food, choosing from stacks of salad dressing, peanut butter, frozen blueberries, chicken, fresh bread and cans of kidney beans, beef stew, tomatoes and cranberries.
A mom of three — ages 14, 7 and 2 — Jones works at Rantoul Foods but enrolled at Parkland to pursue her dream of starting an interior-design business. She does some design work now, including unique car-seat upholstery, but knows a college credential will help.
The pantry is "very helpful," she said. "When you've got school bills and kids, it's kind of hectic on the money. Any food assistance helps."
Several other students who showed up didn't want to be interviewed. Longfellow said many students are "very self-conscious," which is why professors sometimes accompany them the first time.
Turner said some students are worried about being asked "embarrassing questions." They do have to show an ID, but there's no income test, she said. Others tell her, "I don't want a handout." She encourages them to volunteer there first, to "pay it forward."
Because the pantry is a bit of a hike from central campus buildings, Turner and other administrators asked Longfellow for "prepacks" to hand out to students when the pantry isn't open — ravioli, mac 'n' cheese, "a couple of days worth of something," Longfellow said.
The school also hopes to move the pantry closer to central campus, inside the "M" wing, or math wing.
And Parkland's hospitality program wants to create recipes to give out to students so they can use the pantry's staples to make inexpensive meals.
"If you can learn how to throw rice or pasta into chicken or eggs, you can make a good dish," Turner said. "This is another means of helping cut down those costs. Nobody in America should be hungry."
