As an example, last year, an MIT student survey revealed that about 10% of the undergraduates reported going to bed hungry at least once in the previous week because they lacked money for food…
MIT survey article
Interesting set of one-off examples quoted in the MIT info. I have trouble understanding some of the self inflicted problems there - parents not paying the EFC, students not talking to parents about needed care after a sexual assault, needing to pay for classes to get back into MIT. Since MIT meets full need food really shouldn’t be a problem there.
^You’re assuming that some of these students wouldn’t otherwise be going hungry at home, too.
I believe all the schools that meet need also include Board with their offers. Perhaps I’m wrong.
^I think you’re right. But, the devil is in the details. How poor does someone have to be before they qualify for a complete full-ride that includes free room and board? I think there are families out there, in the $75-100k a yr. range who would be willing to forego being on the meal plan, if it meant saving a few bucks. And, that’s where the risk begins of kids skipping meals, IMO.
How many of these students have a part time job, 10-15 hours a week?
The overall message is that students on financial aid are on tight budgets, and when an unexpected expense comes up, the food budget suffers. The specifics of what comes up varies from person to person, but something comes up about 10% of the time according to the survey.
Many dorms at MIT are “cook for yourself,” no meal plan required. The students who report being hungry at the beginning of the year waiting for financial aid checks are probably in those dorms. Possibly trying to stretch their food budgets to cover something else as well. Many reported needing to send money home for example.
@TomSrOfBoston the data compares motivation for working but not raw numbers
I’ll chime in since my son graduated from MIT. We could afford to pay for our portion of the bill and nothing more (EFC was usually around 7-8K, he had outside scholarships, and we paid between $1000 and $3000 a year). He was on the cheapest meal plan which meant it only covered some of his meals. He and got good at finding free food on campus. We could not send him much extra money. He always worked during the school year part time (violin teacher, TA, internship) and full time during the summers. I don’t think he went hungry, but I’d have to ask him.
I found out later that when he did a UROP during the first summer (and he chose to do this; he could have come home anytime), to save money, he couch hopped and sometimes spent the night in his lab (UROPs pay minimum wage, or at least they did). It was a very hard and miserable summer for him (we didn’t know how bad it was), but it was also character building. He loved his time at MIT, and yes, on occasion, he did feel comparatively poor to his friends.
I’ve met many very strapped MIT students. These students do what they need to do.
I had to quit my job while at MIT. I had to basically work on school every waking hour. My frat had 17 meals per week. I ate leftovers for the others.
I have had MIT interns turn down our summer offers even though they were the best opportunities work wise because every dollar lower than the maximum offer they had was money they would otherwise have to borrow.
I was on financial aid at a private college and I skipped some meals due ot money being short… Honestly, it wasn’t the worst thing I ever went through.
The breaks are very hard on strapped kids. The cafeterias shut down, so there is no food. When we lived near Wellesley, we often hosted students who couldn’t afford to go home, foster kids (who had aged out), and international students.
^ D’s school finds that an issue too @Massmomm , though the dorms do not close on breaks (which is already unusual and very helpful to those students who cannot go home or do not have one), the dining hall does, or goes to just a meal a day (with stuff that can be taken with the student for the next meal). .
Some schools give dining vouchers that can be used in the town, make sure a kitchen stays open and stocked with pans and such.
I think people who have never been in a position of food insecurity would find it hard to understand.
“Meets full need” does not mean that the student gets a full ride, with every last cent provided to cover all expenses. It means the school determines the need, not the family. Personal debt is not counted in need. A family could be paying off credit card debt – or even debt to family members – incurred due to past unemployment. A family could have a lowish income but have a lot of home equity. The student could have divorced parents but the noncustodial parent refuses to pay anything toward college. Yes, that last one is self-inflicted, but not the student’s fault.
If the family barely has enough money to feed the family at home, they won’t have extra to send their child in college.
And some students cannot work while in school, either because their visas do not allow it or because some other issue prevents it.
I don’t see why it is surprising that college kids are hungry when school children are hungry all the time. Our public schools send backpacks with food for the weekend home with kids because they otherwise wouldn’t eat for 3 days. Our schools serve breakfast and lunch and know that those might be the only meals the students have for the day.
Just did a quick check on the cost of meal plans at MIT and some of its competitors. MIT’s cost is by far the lowest , between $3.5k to $5k (vs $6-7k at the other schools). So, MIT’s meal plan may offer a bit less. Even if MIT’s FA covers the full cost of the meal plan, it may still fall short of total food cost.
This one of the reasons I like it when schools charge a comprehensive fee (one charge for tuition, room and board). No one, the school included, can pretend the student can cover costs by saving on their food budget. With a comprehensive fee a student might run short on money to send home, cover toiletries, or to get home on vacations but at least they’re going to be eating 3 squares a day. When I hear students on CC say they can cover the cost of a school if they just choose a cheaper meal plan red flags go up for me. Better to make the decision up front that a school is too expensive than to spend the entire semester living off ramen and food pantry peanut butter.
One thing I LOVED when I toured Swarthmore with my S was that it’s a “cashless” campus, meaning you do not need money for anything once your tuition, room, board, and books are taken care of. All events are free. Clubs are free. Transportation to Philly is covered if it is required for a class (museum trips, urban research, etc.).
The “problem” may be that MIT is pretty economically diverse for an elite school.
The Pell eligible rate at MIT is 23%, which could be a rough estimate as to who is most at risk for food insecurity. (This figure wouldn’t include any internationals, and you could quibble about kids on either side near the Pell cut-off line how at risk they are, but it’s a decent start.) Roughly half of those kids actually became food insecure in the survey time frame.