“Some are only getting food for themselves, but some are getting for themselves and a partner, or themselves and a partner and children,” Hutchison said. “So, we are actually serving more than 2,685 people a month.” 

Most students report using the bank so that they can afford other bills, she said. After paying for rent, books, classes and supporting dependents, food may be hard to afford. 

“We know that the cost of food has increased for everybody and that makes it more difficult for people to stretch their dollars even further,” Hutchinson said. “We know there is an issue for food security overall. The recent statistics show that about 45% of college students would meet the requirements or the eligibility or the definition of food insecurity.”

MSU’s food bank partners with several different people to serve the community, including the Greater Lansing Area Food Bank, the RISE program and the Student Organic Farm. Hutchinson said whenever items are out at the bank, they have enough support to offer replacements. Donors that support the food bank and their partners have been sufficient enough for the bank to obtain more food as the need increases, she said. 

“I would just encourage people that, if they are facing food insecurity, to check us out,” she said. “I know it can be hard to ask for help but that's what we’re here for.”

While the MSU Food Bank assists in lessening food insecurity, Hutchinson said the bank is not going to fix all food insecurity issues. The bank hopes to cut grocery bills in half for students, but some students need more help. 

Two students living in the Spartan Housing Cooperatives serving on the Green Team have expressed the need for more community gardens to help supplement that other half. 

Environmental studies and sustainability fifth year Luca Cornille, the official coordinator for the Green Team, said several of the co-ops have gardens, but not the infrastructure or knowledge to make them sustainable. 

“The biggest thing would be improving the current gardens,” Cornille said. “Most of the gardens are some sort of raised garden bed or blocked off area and a lot of those garden beds are old and worn down.” 

Cornille said weeds, like dandelions, often find their way into the gardens. The co-ops aren’t the only place Cornille has heard of interest for community gardens though. Cornille is in a student group called Sustainable Spartans, and they have expressed some consideration as well. He has spoken with the Student Sustainability Leadership Council and the RISE program too. 

“I’m hoping to just draw more attention to food insecurity as a whole in the MSU community because it doesn’t seem like there’s a ton of visibility about it,” Cornille said. “Projects can’t really get off the ground without awareness.”

Crop and soil sciences returning senior Jonathan Medendorp is also a part of the Green Team and hopes that once the co-op gardens become stable, they might be able to donate the surplus. 

“If we could get to the point where we were producing an excess and able to donate to the local community I would be happy,” he said. “I think that being able to get fresh food that is grown in a way that our members have seen it from seed to flower or fruit or vegetable, they’ve had a piece of it and they know everything that’s been added to it, it can really do a lot of good.”

Medendorp said gardening has more benefits than just assisting in food security, noting the social and mental health aspects involved. He said while East Lansing isn’t technically a food desert, there is a need for quality food at a lower cost, which a community garden could assist with.

The Green Team is hoping to partner with other organizations to help their gardens and possibly be a part of a campus community garden. 

The RISE program, Residential Initiative on the Study of the Environment, is a living learning community in Bailey Hall and is responsible for running the Bailey greenhouse. This program supplies some produce to the MSU Food Bank and sells others to Brody Dining Hall. Jorhie Beadle, the assistant director of the program, said that RISE provides hands-on educational learning to students interested in sustainability. The RISE program has also partnered with other groups around campus. 

“We work closely with the Student Organic Farm, we work closely with the 1855 Community Garden and then obviously Bailey Greenhouse and Urban Farm,” Beadle said. “Those are kind of our three main outlets where we explore food insecurity.” 

Beadle said people commonly try to solve food insecurity with ultra-processed foods and preserved foods. This causes those who are food insecure to lack nutrients and fresh food. Beadle said there have been student groups who have contacted the RISE program with interest in creating a community garden but acknowledge that they are hard to maintain. 

“There’s so much infrastructure,” she said. “When I think about the 1855 garden, there’s irrigation, there’s fencing around it and all of that was through a grant. There’s workshops and education on how to maintain the soil and raised beds and then there is obviously a population that’s here in the summertime.” 

Beadle said the RISE program does struggle to find volunteers for the summer months to keep the Bailey Greenhouse and Urban Farm maintained. If student groups are wanting to start a community garden, there are a lot of logistics that need to be addressed and a population of people in the summer who stay in East Lansing. 

“I think it’s always an idea that needs to be developed more,” she said. “I would say that one of the largest variables students forget to consider is that a lot of the production happens in the summer and a lot of time students aren't here in the summer.”

Beadle said the RISE program has so many partnerships because it helps them maintain what they have going. While student gardens can address food insecurity, they need to be developed in order to remain sustainable. She said one group that really helps assist the 1855 community garden is the Garden Project. 

The Garden Project is a part of the Greater Lansing Area Food Bank and helps supply access to land, education, seeds, plants, tools and networking for community gardens. The project supports nearly 90 community gardens and feeds more than 10,000 people across mid-Michigan. 

The Green Team is currently working to make connections with groups like these and set a foundation for co-op community gardens, while spreading awareness about food insecurity.