Student Life and the Sackville Food Bank team up to ease food insecurity
The Mt.A Food Pantry reopened this October to support students experiencing food insecurity. Unlike last year, however, the Food Pantry now operates similarly to the Sackville Food Bank: rather than drop in during open hours and choose items, students can register to receive a biweekly food box. “Food insecurity is a very big issue in general, and it’s very hard to try and combat,” said Manley Liu, Mt.A’s first-generation program coordinator, who also oversees the Food Pantry.
“Food insecurity is when somebody does not have access to an adequate amount of food,” says Rachel Coady, a third-year sociology student at Mt.A who has worked at the Sackville Food Bank since May 2025. “So when there’s food insecurity, that means there are uncertainties about where food is going to come from next, and if you will have enough, week to week or day to day.”
Mt.A Student Life changed the structure of the Food Pantry in response to concerns over student access to food. Coady says the number of students using the Sackville Food Bank has increased. “We had six students register within one week alone in September,” she says, “so the numbers are skyrocketing.” The new system at the Food Pantry hopes to alleviate some strain on the Sackville Food Bank and decrease wait times for food at both locations.
Food availability was also a challenge with the previous drop-in system. “I had heard frustrations from clients in the past who were trying to use the Pantry on how quickly food was going,” Coady said. “They were not able to have their needs met through that sort of system.”
Liu says misinformation about the pantry in the last couple of years allowed some students to take advantage of it, which prevented others from using it. “It’s not a specific Mt.A structure issue, it’s a global issue” pertaining to food insecurity, says Liu.
The new system aims to provide adequate food for students who need it and prevent misuse of the pantry. Liu says he hopes the food box model will “get more food to each individual student as much as possible.”
Food boxes, however, can be harder to personalize than a drop-in pantry. “Not all students enjoy the specific food that you get in a food box,” said Liu. Students with dietary restrictions can explain their needs while registering. “Ideally, those food boxes are then tailored specifically for dietary restriction folks, because you can’t just willy-nilly give someone who has dietary restrictions someone else’s box.”
Over the summer, Student Life worked with the Sackville Food Bank to adapt the Pantry to the new food box system. Both organizations get their food supply from Feed NB, a Moncton-based nonprofit that collects food donations and helps stock food banks around N.B.
“This has been the first week that it’s already been changing into the food box, so we’re still working out the logistics on that end,” said Liu, acknowledging that the transition has “not [gone] the best, but it’s not that it’s anyone’s fault.” Liu says it has been difficult advertising the service to the students who need it. “We’re promoting for students who are food insecure and low income, but that’s very hard to do when sometimes students might not have all the information correctly.”
The Food Pantry’s future is uncertain, but its inspiration, the Sackville Food Bank, shows how it can succeed. The Food Bank has been run entirely by volunteers for the last 39 years. “A lot of our support comes from the generosity of different individuals, local groups, local organizations, who consistently donate to us and find ways to support the various needs of our clients,” says Coady. “I’ve never seen anything like the Sackville community and how they support their local nonprofits, in so many different ways.”
Students who would like to register for the Mt.A Food Pantry, or who are already registered at the Sackville Food Bank and would like to pick up their food box on campus, can reach out to Liu at [email protected] or fill out the form on the Mt.A website.