Dissertation Proposal Announcement Ph.D. in Higher Education Program: Kelly Dietz, “Back to the Basics: Three Quantitative Studies on the Impacts of Food Resource Use on Undergraduate Student Success at Rutgers University”

Student retention and declining enrollment rates have been growing challenges for institutions of higher education (Seidman, 2024; Lane et al., 2024). In recent years, food insecurity has been identified as one potential barrier to student success, and research has shown that 23% of college students nationwide experience food insecurity (McKibben et al., 2023; Rabbitt et al., 2023). Food insecurity can affect student health and well-being, with evidence suggesting additional impacts on GPA (Cuite, et al., 2023; Henry, 2017; Martinez et al., 2020, 2022; Meza et al., 2019; Nazmi et al., 2019). However, there is limited evidence on the effectiveness of campus interventions, such as food pantries, in mitigating student food insecurity and its consequences. More research is needed to understand pathways and barriers to pantry use and the impacts of pantry use on academic outcomes (Hagedorn-Hatfield et al., 2022; Landry et al., 2023).

This dissertation aims to reframe food security as an issue of student success and provide higher education researchers and administrators with actionable evidence of the role that food resource use plays in student belonging and success. Three manuscripts will examine (1) relationships between students’ use of campus pantries and indicators of academic success, 2) relationships between students’ pre-enrollment experiences with food assistance and pantry use through a pathway of pantry stigma, and 3) temporal relationships between students’ pantry awareness and pantry use.

Utilizing multivariate regression methods to examine these relationships, all three manuscripts will use primary student-level survey data from Rutgers Quality of Life (QOL) surveys (2016, 2019, 2022). Manuscript 1 will also utilize matched institutional academic data (2022 to 2024) relating to students’ enrollment status, credits attempted and completed, and GPAs.

Findings from this study may have campus-level impacts, potentially informing decisions made by campus pantry staff and administrators on ways to increase pantry use. They will also provide insight into how targeted efforts to increase food resource use as a means to mitigate food insecurity can simultaneously support efforts to improve student retention and academic success.