Students Struggle with Basic Needs Insecurity

Red to Black Peer Financial Coaching is located in Drane Hall room 215. Photo by Reece Nations.

By Leah Kellum

College students may have help paying for tuition, but meeting other needs isn’t always financially easy.

About one in five undergraduate students experience food insecurity, according to nationally representative data collected by the federal government. Results of basic needs surveys published by the Department of Education’s National Center for Education Statistics in 2023 found that, overall, around 23% of undergraduate students and 12% of graduate students experience food insecurity.

The Biden-Harris administration’s proposed budget for Fiscal Year 2025 released in March would raise the maximum Pell Grant by $750 each year, eliminate certain fees for student loans, and includes various programs aimed at addressing student’s basic needs. Otherwise, unmet needs like food, housing and textbooks are often left for students to manage on their own.

Fortunately, there are resources and programs on Texas Tech’s campus to help students with their situations. Red to Black Peer Financial Coaching Graduate Student Assistants Guadalupe Olvera and George Allen, also students in the accelerated bachelor’s-to-master’s Personal Financial Planning program, explained the extent of current college students’ situations.

“Recently… our most popular session has been maximizing financial aid,” Allen said. “So, helping students understand what goes on with scholarships and different types of student loans, and just kind of what options there are for financial aid out there.”

Red to Black’s financial coaches are usually fully booked each week, Olvera said. The number of coaches available at any given time determines how many sessions they can do.

Olvera said that they aim to “educate students about their finances,” and give the students a “financial education” to prepare them for their futures.

“I think it’s just a way to really try and raise that financial health and financial wellness of our student body and really try and instill good habits for them as they go forward into the real world after they graduate,” Allen said. Allen also said Red to Black Peer Financial Coaching partners with Raider Relief Advocacy and Resource Center on campus. Any student experiencing a financial crisis can apply for Raider Relief, though one must attend financial coaching to receive funding from the program.

Both in Drane Hall, the Red to Black Financial Coaching office is located in room 215 and the Raider Relief office in room 113.

Alex Arguello, graduate assistant at the Raider Relief Advocacy and Resource Center and Master of Social Work student, said the program helps provide “food or housing, financial education, academic supplies, basic cleaning supplies,” and other necessities.

Cans line the shelves of Raider Red’s Food pantry, located in Doak Hall room 117. Photo by Reece Nations.

“So usually, we help students that are facing some sort of situation that’s out of their control,” Arguello said. “And usually, that involves an instability in some sort of basic need.”

Arguello said from 2022 to 2023, Raider Relief had 1,001 applications. About 12% were rewarded with emergency funding and the other 88% were connected with resources in the community.

Arguello also said the emergency fund is for the student’s entire time at Texas Tech. Arguello said she wanted students to know that this is a resource available to them. She said she encourages students to reach out if instability occurs.

“I don’t want them to think, ‘Oh, I don’t have the GPA requirement, or it’s my first semester,” Arguello said. “We’ll still try to help them.”

An annual survey of shelter and unsheltered homeless people in the Lubbock area conducted by the South Plains Homeless Consortium in 2023 – known as a Point-in-Time Count or PIT Count – found that of the 240 individuals documented, 25 were between the ages of 18 and 24 and 99 individuals were under the age of 34. Students coping with basic need insecurity can fill out Raider Relief’s referral form to be connected to free resource assistance.