Feminist action research in response to food insecurity among college students

Abstract

Feminist action research can instigate community, organizational, and policy changes to address social issues. We describe how we considered inclusion, participation, action, social change, and researcher reflexivity, as well as researcher positionality, in design and implementation of the 2016 Michigan College Campuses Food Pantry Summit. Specifically, in this case study, we describe ways we used these principles to plan this event around concept mapping, an interactive, collaborative research approach. Our event led to the formation of a regional community of practitioners, enabled an exchange of institutional best practices among campus pantries, and informed federal policy on food access for college students.

More Than Just Hard Work: Educational Policies to Facilitate Economic Mobility

“…Because campus pantries are often created in response to concerns on their respective campuses, they are siloed and function separately (Price, Sampson, et al, 2019). Campus food pantry directors and staff report deep concerns for student success and show interest in working across institutions to solve problems and develop a community of best practices with interest in policy changes to support food insecure students (Price, Watters, et al, 2020;Reppond et al, 2018;Sampson et al, 2020). Campus food pantries are designed to meet immediate needs and are often supported by volunteer time and monetary donations from faculty, staff, and administrators (Reppond et al, 2018).…”