Reducing food insecurity at MIAD’s People’s Pantry

Students, staff and faculty at the Milwaukee Institute of Art & Design (MIAD) are addressing short-term food insecurity on campus with direct action. One of the college’s newest resources, the People’s Pantry, provides free food for anyone in the MIAD community who needs a meal, no questions asked.

Grounded in the principles of mutualism and interdependence, the People’s Pantry provides a limited selection of food items to address short-term hunger or food insecurity. Together with the longer-standing Community Closet, which supports gender exploration and affirmation and career readiness by providing free clothes to students, these resources make MIAD’s campus a more welcoming and accessible place.

“As someone who is pretty low income who doesn’t really get help from anywhere else, it’s a really important resource to have because I can come in and grab food if I need it,” says Mason Sevilla, a senior majoring in Illustration – Animation Track and a student worker in the Equity + Inclusion Center. “I’m not here getting groceries necessarily, but it is a huge help to just have a meal ready pretty quickly. Especially as someone who’s also disabled, to get home and just have food ready to make quickly.”

The pantry also supports students for whom the meal plan is not a viable option. “I’m vegan, so I’m not on a meal plan even though I live in the dorm,” says Emily York, a sophomore studying Fine Art + New Studio Practice and another Equity + Inclusion Center student worker. Commuter students, she explains, also tend not to use MIAD’s meal plan. “I think it’s just really important to have all these other options,” she says.

The People’s Pantry, along with the Community Closet, were started by Equity + Inclusion Center staff in response to student needs. Staff, faculty, board members and even students donate food items and funds to the pantry. In addition to donations from the MIAD community, the pantry seeks and accepts monetary donations from the broader Milwaukee community.

Sevilla points out that students dealing with food insecurity might face barriers to access for other food pantries or resources. “A lot of other resources that are available specifically for food insecurity may require a little more research,” they explain, pointing out barriers like applications or even needing a car to access an off-campus resource. Although MIAD Student Services assists students who are facing long-term food insecurity, having an on-campus resource for short-term needs is an important and easily accessible community resource.

“I’ve been seeing a lot of improvements in the pantry even in the short time that it’s been around,” continues Sevilla. “There’s a lot more things here and they’re also getting taken pretty quickly, which means that people really need this.” York adds that students are “always so excited if we can add to it or help with it … we all want it and we’re all trying to help it improve.”

“The pantry is a very important resource and one that I’m very passionate about,” Sevilla explains. “Something that I experience a lot in college is that there’s almost an expectation of not necessarily wealth, but that you have some sort of help in your corner. And for a lot of us, that’s not the case.” Sevilla hopes that potential donors will “[keep] us students in mind, us students who don’t really have anyone in our corner. We need that help and we need that support to keep this important resource alive.”

Donate today to help maintain and develop the People’s Pantry at MIAD!