Public universities across Mississippi are expanding food pantries and other basic-needs services as rising costs for housing, groceries and transportation squeeze students, many of whom juggle heavy course loads with little financial help from family.
The newest pantry is at the University of Mississippi Medical Center in Jackson. It opened for medical and nursing students on Sept. 1 after an August food drive collected donations, Mississippi Today reported in a story distributed by The Associated Press. Shelves hold groceries along with personal care items such as shampoo, toothpaste and laundry detergent pods.
Jonathan Nutt, UMMC's director of student services, told the outlet that the demands of the center's programs can keep students from working enough hours to cover living expenses. He said the pantry is meant to serve any student who needs it.
Other campuses report steadily climbing demand.
At the University of Southern Mississippi in Hattiesburg, the Eagle's Nest Food Pantry logged 2,785 visits last academic year, 81% of them by students. During the first week of classes in August, staff and volunteers gave out more than 890 pounds of food, hygiene products and other goods to 94 visitors.
At Delta State University in Cleveland, visits to the Statesman's Shelf pantry grew from 672 in 2023-24 to 1,672 in 2025-26, an increase of nearly 150%. Tuition at Delta State has held flat, but federal data show on-campus food and housing costs rose 3.6% between 2023-24 and 2024-25.
When Winter Storm Fern closed Delta State’s campus in January, the pantry stayed open and served 416 people that month, about half of them during the storm. That demand helped relaunch Okra Threads, a campus closet that once supplied business attire for interviews and career fairs. This semester it added everyday clothing, shoes and accessories.
At Mississippi State University, Bully's Pantry has been open since 2020.
"Bully's Pantry provides food, hygiene items and school supplies to support Mississippi State students in need," said Suzanne Bowen, who became the pantry's coordinator in August 2026.
The pantry serves MSU students only, Bowen said, and is meant for those who may be dealing with food insecurity or other financial strain. "Our goal is to support students so that these barriers do not prevent them from being successful in school," she said.
Students rely on the pantry while they learn to budget. MSU's in-state tuition and fees rose from $9,815 in 2023-24 to $11,095 this year. The university estimates the full in-state cost of attendance at $26,295 a year, and out-of-state students can pay up to $45,000.
The Mississippi numbers match national research. A Hope Center for Student Basic Needs survey of 74,350 students at 91 institutions in 16 states, conducted between spring 2023 and summer 2024, found that 59% faced at least one form of food or housing insecurity and 41% were food insecure.
The burden does not fall evenly. In a Hope Center analysis of federal data from the 2019-20 National Postsecondary Student Aid Study, 38.8% of undergraduates at historically Black colleges and universities and 34.6% of Black undergraduates reported low or very low food security. The rate for all undergraduates was 22.6%.
Campus pantries are working against a hard statewide backdrop. Mississippi has the nation's highest food insecurity rate, with roughly one in four residents affected, according to the nonprofit Uproot Mississippi, as cited by Mississippi Today in 2025. That year, the Memphis-based Mid-South Food Bank closed 12 mobile pantry sites in Mississippi after federal COVID-19 relief money ran out. Martha Allen Price, executive director of the Hattiesburg nonprofit Extra Table, told the outlet then that demand had risen since the pandemic, driven partly by grocery prices, and that many working Mississippians use pantries as an emergency source of food.
At UMMC, the stakes reach past the semester. Nutt said basic-needs gaps exist on every campus. He said helping students eat is part of preparing them for careers in which they will one day care for Mississipp
