{"id":66138,"date":"2022-04-19T20:51:53","date_gmt":"2022-04-20T02:51:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/?p=66138"},"modified":"2022-05-24T13:53:53","modified_gmt":"2022-05-24T19:53:53","slug":"like-a-looming-heaviness-student-food-insecurity-and-saits-resources-to-support","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/2022\/04\/19\/like-a-looming-heaviness-student-food-insecurity-and-saits-resources-to-support\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018Like a looming heaviness\u2019: Student food insecurity and SAIT\u2019s resources to support"},"content":{"rendered":"
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SAITSA’s Wellness Coordinator:<\/strong> Ryan Seggie poses for a portrait in his office in SAIT’s Stan Grad Centre in Calgary on Tuesday, April 12, 2022. Seggie is SAITSA’s wellness coordinator and is helping revamp SAITSA’s Wellness Bank and Emergency Food Fund. (Photo by Carly Anderson\/The Press)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

F<\/span>ood insecurity among post-secondary students is a growing problem, impacting nearly every aspect of a students\u2019 life, including academic performance, physical health, mental health, and social life.<\/p>\n

\u201c<\/span>It\u2019s like this looming heaviness, or … think of it like a backpack that\u2019s totally full and so heavy. You have the demands and you\u2019re trying to perform and you\u2019re trying to learn, and you kind of have that so to speak on your back,\u201d said Melissa Gray, a registered psychologist and counsellor with SAIT Development and Counselling.<\/p>\n

According to a 2021 report<\/a> from Meal Exchange<\/a>, 56.8% of Canadian post-secondary students faced food insecurity last semester, in the fall of 2021. This number rose compared to the results of a similar study<\/a> from 2016 which found that nearly 40% of students faced food insecurity.<\/p>\n

Being a post-secondary student can be challenging to begin with but adding factors such as financial strain and food insecurity can make it feel unbearable.<\/p>\n

\u201cIf there\u2019s any kind of those foundational needs, the person is hungry and they\u2019re concerned literally about being able to meet that basic need, but we\u2019re asking them to use their brain to really commit lots of energy and it\u2019s just going to create a barrier that has nothing to do with their potential,\u201d said Gray.<\/p>\n

SAIT Development and Counselling<\/a> is available for counselling sessions with students who are facing financial hardships or other stressors.<\/p>\n

In addition to SAIT\u2019s counselling services, SAITSA also has several resources to help students who are facing food and financial insecurity. However, they have had to temporarily shut down two of these services, the Wellness Bank<\/a> and Emergency Food Fund<\/a>, as they are facing request volumes that are too high to keep up with.<\/p>\n

The Wellness Bank and Emergency Food Fund \u201cwere so popularly used. [SAITSA] actually ran out of stock [and] the budget,\u201d said Ryan Seggie, SAITSA\u2019s wellness coordinator.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo, what we\u2019re doing now is revamping programs based on who needed it the most, what they needed, so we can really streamline the money that we\u2019re using and put it towards what\u2019s most needed,\u201d said Seggie.<\/p>\n

Before being temporarily shut down, the Wellness Bank provided students with essential personal care and hygiene products, while the Emergency Food Fund provided students with grocery gift cards and other food supplies.<\/p>\n

SAITSA hopes to once again offer these services to students, and they are trying to find ways to offer these programs again.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe are working with outer resources … to figure out how we can get more [donations] in,\u201d said Seggie.<\/p>\n

Although the Wellness Bank is not currently available to students, free menstrual hygiene products are available in SAIT\u2019s Resource Centre in MC107. SAITSA also runs a Good Food Box<\/a> service and students can order discounted boxes of fresh fruit and vegetables that can be picked up on campus.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s like this looming heaviness, or … think of it like a backpack that\u2019s totally full and so heavy. You have the demands and you\u2019re trying to perform and you\u2019re trying to learn, and you kind of have that so to speak on your back. – Melissa Gray<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\u201cThe [SAITSA] Resource Centre is where students can go right now to ask pretty much any question,\u201d said Seggie.<\/p>\n

In addition to SAIT and SAITSA\u2019s services, the Calgary Food Bank<\/a> is available to students who are facing food insecurity. They offer emergency food hampers that can be requested online or by phone and they have drive-thru and walk-up hamper pick-ups by appointment only. The main location is in southeast Calgary, but there are a variety of satellite locations around the city to make it more accessible.<\/p>\n

For more information, SAIT\u2019s Lamb Learner Success Centre has a list of other financial services and resources<\/a> available to students.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Food insecurity among post-secondary students can be overwhelming and can impact nearly every aspect of a student’s life. SAIT has several resources available to help students who are struggling financially. [ READ MORE ]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":738,"featured_media":66142,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_ef_editorial_meta_text_assignment-slug":"S5 Food Insecurity CA","footnotes":""},"categories":[13,1580,2],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-66138","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"category-post-secondary","9":"category-campus-2"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66138","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/738"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66138"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66138\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":66757,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66138\/revisions\/66757"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66142"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/saitjournalism.ca\/thepress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}