{"id":36737,"date":"2022-12-16T15:44:17","date_gmt":"2022-12-16T22:44:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorados-college-students-are-feeling-the-pressure-as-inflation-exacerbates-food-insecurity\/"},"modified":"2022-12-16T22:44:17","modified_gmt":"2022-12-16T22:44:17","slug":"colorados-college-students-are-feeling-the-pressure-as-inflation-exacerbates-food-insecurity","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/colorados-college-students-are-feeling-the-pressure-as-inflation-exacerbates-food-insecurity\/","title":{"rendered":"Colorado\u2019s college students are feeling the pressure as inflation exacerbates food insecurity"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

\"William
William Ulloa runs pasta sauce through a Walmart's self-checkout machine.<\/span>Paolo Zialcita\/CPR News<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Ramen. It\u2019s a staple of a college student\u2019s diet. It\u2019s quick, filling and has at least some flavor. And most importantly, it\u2019s cheap.<\/p>\n

But, that\u2019s changing, as William Ulloa, a senior studying education at Colorado State University, has discovered. As inflation takes hold of people\u2019s pocketbooks, the price of nearly all food is increasing \u2014 and salty, dry noodles aren\u2019t immune.<\/p>\n

\u201cGotta love the ramen,\u201d Ulloa said while grocery shopping at a Walmart. \u201cOh man, it did go up. This used to be a dollar, now it\u2019s a dollar (and 12 cents).\u201d<\/p>\n

According to federal data<\/a>, grocery prices have risen nearly 12 percent since last year.<\/p>\n

A first generation student from an El Salvadoran family, Ulloa is already financially independent. On top of being a full-time student studying education, he also works a part-time job in retail to help make ends meet. And while prices have gone up, wages have typically remained stagnant.<\/p>\n

\u201cI get two paychecks a month \u2018cause I get paid every other week. One check goes straight to paying my rent and utilities,\u201d Ulloa said. \u201cThe other check is for everything else, which would be groceries, gas, bills. So realistically I have a little over $500 that I could use throughout the month.\u201d<\/p>\n

Despite living within walking distance from a King Soopers, Ulloa drives 15 minutes to a Walmart because prices there are cheaper. While he\u2019s shopping, he\u2019s strategic about what he picks up. On a recent visit, he considered a number of factors when placing things in his cart \u2014 its cost, its longevity, its tastiness and how easy it is to cook.<\/p>\n

At one point, Ulloa stopped to look at nuts and trail mix, an aisle he admits to skipping most of the time. He picked up a can of cashews, but staggered at the price.<\/p>\n

\u201cI love cashews but $10 for a jar of cashews \u2014 not gonna happen,\u201d Ulloa said.<\/p>\n

Ulloa didn\u2019t even bother stopping in the vegetable section. He said grocery vegetable portions are too big and often go to waste because he and his roommates don\u2019t have the time to cook.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe [once] bought a big pack of strawberries. I think we only got through half of it and then the rest went to the trash.\u201d<\/p>\n

At the end of the trip, Ulloa\u2019s giant Walmart cart was barely full. He took home a couple ramen packs, pasta sauce, frozen breakfast meals, toothpaste and a gallon of orange juice, among other items.<\/p>\n

The total? Nearly $40 \u2014 almost 10 percent of his monthly budget.<\/p>\n

\u201cI get scared every month \u2018cause I\u2019m like, \u2018Am I gonna have enough to pay my bills and whatnot?\u2019\u201d Ulloa said.<\/p>\n

The state is taking college food insecurity seriously<\/div>\n

Food insecurity is a major concern across college campuses nationwide. A study from Temple University<\/a> found that 38 percent of college students are impacted by food insecurity. It can lead to a lower GPA, poor mental health and other effects.<\/p>\n

The rise of food insecurity among college students has led Colorado\u2019s Department of Higher Education to introduce the Hunger Free Campus Checklist<\/a>, a list of goals that state universities are encouraged to meet to reduce food insecurity on-campus. The goals include opening a free campus food pantry, providing food stamp program enrollment assistance, raising awareness, and collecting data on the scope of food insecurity.<\/p>\n

Fabian Sigala Orozco oversees the campus food pantry at CSU Pueblo. He said a big part of his job is raising awareness among students about the free program\u2019s existence.<\/p>\n

\u201cProbably 35, 40 percent of the students are using it, but it would be more if we can get more promotion, making sure that the students know [about] this,\u201d Orozco said.<\/p>\n

Several campuses across the state have recently opened food pantries. Students are welcome to visit and receive free grocery items, oftentimes fresh fruit, and shelf-stable products, like cans of soup or beans.<\/p>\n

Many of these food pantries, like CSU Pueblo\u2019s Pack Pantry<\/a>, are reliant on outside donations to stock the shelves. Orozco said that while demand has been higher this year, donations from other food banks, organizations and even regular people are down.<\/p>\n

\u201cDue to the cost of the food, the inflation that is happening, we are kind of having a little bit more limited (inventory) in regards to what we can get,\u201d Orozco said.<\/p>\n

Salina Edwards, a graduate student at Colorado Mesa University in Grand Junction, helped her college establish initiatives to address food insecurity, including opening a food pantry. She said donations to the pantry have remained steady, but she\u2019s still feeling the effects of inflation.<\/p>\n

As a grad student, Edwards is basically a seasoned pro at eating on a budget. She\u2019s developed strategies to make her dollar stretch as much as it can while eating tasty, nutritious food.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe biggest thing for me is like, I never go to the grocery store hungry \u2018cause that is my biggest weakness,\u201d Edwards said. \u201cAnd then making a list is definitely the way to go.\u201d<\/p>\n

Edwards doesn\u2019t like the stereotypical image of a college student eating ramen to survive. She said that with the help of the state program and food pantries at their colleges, there\u2019s more than enough food to go around so that students like her and Ulloa don\u2019t need to worry about how they\u2019ll afford groceries.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re kind of debunking that (stereotype) and saying \u2018No, that\u2019s not something that you have to go through during your college career,\u2019\u201d she said. \u201cYou deserve to be well and have the access to food that you need so you can be successful while you\u2019re at college.\u201d<\/p>\n

So far, about a dozen Colorado universities have completed the state\u2019s Hunger Free Campus Checklist.<\/p>\n

To read more stories from Colorado Public Radio, visit www.cpr.org<\/em><\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

According to federal data, grocery prices have risen nearly 12 percent since last year, straining college students’ budgets<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":36738,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[438,132],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-36737","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-food","tag-fort-lewis-college"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36737","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=36737"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/36737\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/36738"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=36737"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=36737"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=36737"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=36737"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}