Colleges help students with food pantries

Food pantries are popping up across college communities to help keep students from having to skip meals to pay for classes.

Schools like University of North Texas and Tarrant County College have food pantries on site, filled with nonperishable grocery items available for any current student.

Many students might be able to scrape together the tuition, but the logistics of college can overwhelm their wallets.

In one recent study, more than half of students surveyed had food insecurity in a 30-day period.

Food insecurity at universities has become a bigger problem than the “freshman 15.”

On average, a resident UNT student pays about $20,000 a semester attending the university for nine hours of classes.

Tuition accounts for only about $4,000 of it.

Having a food pantry is a great Band-Aid, but it’s only a temporary solution for a very serious problem.

Universities should find ways to minimize the cost of attending college, especially for the growing number of nontraditional and low-income students.

This story was originally published April 19, 2016 at 6:00 PM with the headline "Colleges help students with food pantries."