The Retriever Essentials food pantry is still open tomorrow during the following hours for your shopping convenience before spring break: 

Friday 11 to 1

Please visit us at Sherman 205, and please pass the word to others who may be in need of food and personal care items. Additionally, you can also stop at our food zones to pick up pre-made food bags. 

The Retriever Essentials Team

UPDATE: The Courtney Rd. route will be suspended March 12th and the 13th. All other routes will be operating as normal. Please see the posted schedules for route times.

For further assistance, please do not hesitate to contact our office. 410.455.2454

- Transit Team

To Our Campus Community:

The Retriever Essentials food pantry is open this week during the following hours for your shopping convenience before spring break: 

Tuesday 4 to 6

Thursday 9:30 - 11:30 a.m.

Friday 11 to 1

Please visit us at Sherman 205, and please pass the word to others who may be in need of food and personal care items. Additionally, you can also stop at our food zones to pick up pre-made food bags. 

The Retriever Essentials Team

Fehintola Elizabeth Bright-Awonuga is pursuing a Bachelor of Arts in Health Administration and Public Policy on the Health Policy Track with a minor in Africana Studies. She has been serving on Retriever Essentials Student Leadership Board since September 2019 and volunteering for the Retriever Essentials for two years, since September 2018.
 
Through the University of Maryland, Baltimore County’s Shriver Center’s Living Learning Community - the Shriver LLC - where our main focus is community service, I became a Retriever Essentials Ambassador Volunteer, so far, for two years. Additionally, I am a second-year peer mentor and am on the Retriever Essentials Student Leadership Board. I collect and inventory donations and pack and deliver donation bags to Food Zones around campus. I act as a liaison that fosters communication between the students, faculty, and staff members who benefit from our organization and my director, maintain our social media pages, and help with tabling events promoting awareness of our organization and food insecurity on college campuses.
Coming into this applied experience, last school year, I thought that it would only be in the position to do standard tasks. I didn’t expect to inwardly and outwardly reflect on my experience and apply to my everyday life. However, I did. And for that I am grateful. As a part of my reflection, I allowed myself to “step into someone else's shoes” to truly understand how I could use my position to positively impact them. I’ve also gained leadership, organizational, intercultural understanding, social awareness, career management, and digital technology skills.
I learned that there are other support systems on campus that offer emotional, physical, mental, and academic support to students. Additionally, I learned that behind-the-scenes work is as valid as on-the-field work. For example, working in the actual food pantry is just as valuable as working at tabling events in which on talks to students because everything creates an interconnected system of impactfulness.
Most shockingly, I came to the realization that if Retriever Essentials didn’t exist the faculty, staff, and students that we serve wouldn’t have this support system. In turn, this can result in poor performance, academically, socially, emotionally, mentally, and physically, and can eventually put this “at risk group” at risk of dropping out of college. “About half of students who started college do not finish,” said President Freeman Hrabowski in his 2018 Convocation Address. Food insecurity is a significant determining factor. For example, in the article Food Insecurities…. Community College Students it states that in a study, “8% of community college students with food insecurity planned to drop out entirely.” Why? Students who are food insecure “have poorer physical health, symptoms of depression and psychological stress”, says Colleges…. Feed Homeless Students article.
On a lighter note, my most memorable part of volunteering with Retriever Essentials over these past years was when we recently moved into our new pantry (located at Sherman 205). It was amazing. All of the volunteers came to move food items, boxes, clothes, toiletries, shelves, and etc. We moved from a big office space to a small closet space and now have upgraded to a classroom space. In the near future, we will be moving into an even bigger space on campus. I’ve seen the growth we’ve made as a program. I have had the privilege to experience this growth. From the triumphs to the tribulations and to the successes and struggles, we’ve persevered because we have a zeal to serve our community. I would tell young people, “only a life lived in the service to others is worth living.” There’s so much to gain from volunteering. It shouldn’t be seen as a chore but an opportunity to create change by pursuing the service they’re most passionate about and giving it their all.
At UMBC, and many other campuses, food insecurity is an issue that is unintentionally overlooked by many in the community, including us, the students. Luckily, we “have the opportunity to make a difference in the world”, once said President Freeman Hrabowski. I do not regret my decision of joining this team because I have seen first-hand the seed this organization has sown. The seed is continuing to sprout, grow, and blossom into something bigger than it once was. I have the privilege of impacting this growth. I hope one day you can too.

References:

Join Retriever Essentials team as the CCMA AmeriCorps VISTA/Program Coordinator for 2020-2021.  Apply online here. Member Duties: The CCMA AmeriCorps VISTA will implement the operation manual to continue institutionalizing all Retriever Essentials programming, while updating the manual to ensure needs are met in the most efficiently. They will coordinate volunteers for daily operations of the food pantry, including donation collection, inventory, bag packing/delivery, and client shopping. The VISTA will also develop a fundraising plan to raise money to support the new permanent pantry space on campus and to fund a staff member. They will work to develop partnerships with departments and student groups and on and off campus partners to provide programming and events around food justice and healthy eating on a budget. Additionally, the VISTA will coordinate the student leadership board to help institutionalize Retriever Essentials. They will train students in researching and advocating for food and housing insecure students. The VISTA will create and update promotional content and develop marketing strategies.

Program Benefits: Childcare assistance if eligible,  Gym Membership,  Relocation Allowance,  Choice of Education Award or End of Service Stipend,  Training,  Living Allowance,  Health Coverage.  For best consideration please apply by April 1st, 2020. https://my.americorps.gov/mp/listing/viewListing.do?id=94195&fromSearch=true

Please consider donating the following items for the campus food pantry:
· Can Openers
· Plastic Wrapped Cutlery (plasticware or reusable)
· Mini hand sanitizers 

You can drop the items in one of our food donation centers at these locations, or stop by the pantry in Sherman 205 during the following hours: 

Mondays 12-2 pm
Tuesdays 4-6 pm
Fridays 11-1pm