About Food Story

Aims

- A survey of 964 Bucknell students in Fall 2020 found that over a third of students regularly skipped or skimped on meals. Over 60% of students indicated that they ‘sometimes’ or ‘often’ worried whether they could have all the meals they need (FNFT 2021). Students from disadvantaged backgrounds were particularly affected. This data strongly suggested that a significant number of Bucknell students were unable to access the food resources they need to thrive.
- Our project, Food Story, is working with students to document students’ own perspectives on food security and insecurity at Bucknell. Our project is unique in centering student perspectives and voices to understand issues and barriers and identify solutions.
- During 2024, this project will engage students actively in collecting their own food stories though photographs, narratives and video, then analyzing these and proposing solutions to improve food access and awareness of available resources.

- Food security is defined as having reliable access to nutritious, affordable, satisfying and readily attainable food. (Bucknell Food & Nutrition Task Force, 2021)

- Collecting stories and photographs is a research methodology called PhotoVoice. It has a number of benefits as an approach to research, especially research to create change. Read more about PhotoVoice here.

- This platform is owned by the Maganda Makers Business Club in the Kimberley region of Western Australia. This platform was originally developed by Cindy Mitchell as MagandaVoice, a secure digital storytelling platform to use in her PhD research, and is now being piloted for other PhotoVoice projects. Thanks to Cindy and Maganda Makers for allowing us to use their platform!

- We are inviting all Bucknell students to participate by sharing their ‘Food Story’ on this Platform. Our aim is to collect stories from the campus community, creating a safe space for people to share their stories.
- We ask that all stories be submitted anonymously. Please ensure that people appearing in your submissions are not identifiable. Stories will be exhibited on campus.
- Please read the informed consent statement below and then click through to upload your story.

This project was made possible by the Office of the Provost’s Thrive Innovation Fund. Thank you to our funders!