This past fall, a couple of my friends and I volunteered for a couple hours at Terps Against Hunger at Ritchie Coliseum. This was something I was excited to do because I heard many amazing things from fellow Terps about this on-campus organization. This organization works to fight the food insecurity problem in the greater DC area. Terps Against Hunger creates meals made with four ingredients and delivers these meals to many different food banks and pantries. “The United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) defines food insecurity as follows: “the availability of nutritionally adequate and safe food, or the ability to acquire such food, is limited or uncertain for a household” (About Us). 

 

In the meal bags that volunteers create at Terps Against Hunger events, there are four simple ingredients: rice, soy protein, vitamins and minerals, and dehydrated vegetables. The rice serves as a filling, delicious, and cost effective building block for a meal. The protein helps to replenish cells that are worn out and also helps cellular growth and repair. The vitamins and minerals provide the nutrients needed to ensure a healthy life. Lastly, the dehydrated vegetables are delicious and add important nutrients to the diet. In 2019, there were 378,258 meals packed. There has been a total of 2,941,892 meals packed in all the years of Terps Against Hunger at the University of Maryland. The total number of volunteers has been 16,070 which is incredible. 

 

When I was volunteering at Terps Against hunger I learned a couple of facts about food insecurity in the Washington, DC area. According to the USDA’s report in 2016, “4% of all households in the District of Columbia were food insecure in 2014-2016, equating to nearly 37,000 homes in D.C. not having enough food. Among the 11.4% of D.C. households struggling with hunger, 4.0% of households were considered to have “very low food security.” Lastly, 1% of households in Maryland face food insecurity, equating to 232,603 households” (About Us). These numbers are incredibly high and this is all within the area surrounding our University. 

 

Food insecurity affects many people in Washington, DC. Research has shown that “hunger and poverty go hand in hand. With any increase in poverty, we can expect more hunger, higher rates of diabetes, obesity, and behavior problems. Further, census findings show that the poverty rate for African Americans in DC is 27.9% - almost four times higher than the 7.9% of whites” (Bibby).  This is very concerning that there is such a divide in numbers based on race. What is most worrying is the amount of children who are dealing with this issue and still being asked to live a normal life: going to school, making friends,etc. “Schlanger (2013) states that D.C. has a higher rate of food insecurity among children than any state, and around 31,000 children in the District do not know how they will get their next meal” (Bibby). That is heartbreaking, knowing much food is wasted on our campus daily. 

 

The work that Terps for Hunger is doing is important, getting college students involved in helping this large-scale problem. I think that learning the information about food insecurity in DC was just as valuable as making the meals to be distributed. I would say that my team made at least a hundred bags of meals for families in our area we live in. I want to further volunteer at this organization and maybe even others within Washington, DC. This problem is not getting better, but each and every meal we make, clearly makes a difference.