Voices of Experience: Understanding Food Insecurity Among Older Adults in Champaign County

Academic Mentor | Minakshi (Mina) Raj
Community Partner | Healthy Champaign County, Sola Gratia Farm

Project Description
According to data from 2022 (Feeding America), over 25,000 residents of Champaign County are experiencing food insecurity and an additional $20 million are required to meet their collective food needs. Nearly 15% of Champaign County residents are age 65 or older, yet not enough is known about the specific challenges of older adults with food insecurity in our county. Healthy Champaign County (HCC), a nonprofit comprised of campus and community organizations working to promote healthy eating and active living, has convened a "Feeding Champaign County Food Summit" each of the last three years in response to a clear need for coordinating food access and security work. More than 100 leaders representing organizations across the county come together annually to address food security through the Summit; and yearly, the issue of how to address the needs of specific communities within Champaign persists.

This community-driven project seeks to provide Healthy Champaign County with information directly from older adults in Champaign County to better understand their food-related challenges, needs, and preferences. The project will involve seeking perspectives through surveys and interviews with older adults to conduct a needs assessment.

Role of the Community-Academic Scholar
The undergraduate researcher will:

• Be involved throughout the research process, including IRB, recruitment, data collection, and analysis
• Have some direct interaction with community members while conducting short interviews along with another member of the team
• Support development of a survey, data collection, analysis, and putting together a report for HCC and for other interest groups in the community
• In addition to a final report and presentation to HCC, the undergraduate scholar will have the opportunity to compile a food-related community resource for older adults who participate in the study