Montclair State Professor Bikes Across NJ To Support Food Pantry

MONTCLAIR, NJ — An associate professor of nursing at Montclair State University recently bicycled the entire length of New Jersey to raise funds for a trendsetting campus food pantry.

Taking to his bicycle last Saturday, Andrew Scanlon rode nonstop through the Garden State. His journey took him from the New York border to New Jersey's southernmost point in Cape May, about 200 miles in all.

The grueling odyssey – which took about 13.5 hours – was done in the name of the Red Hawk Food Pantry at Montclair State University (MSU).

According to an MSU blog, the school became the first four-year university in New Jersey to open a student food pantry on campus when it launched in April 2016. A survey conducted at that time revealed about 10 percent of MSU students struggled with food insecurity on a daily basis.

That need is still present in 2019, with about four in 10 respondents reporting some level of food insecurity, a follow-up survey concluded.

Learn more about the Red Hawk Food Pantry.

Scanlon said that hunger shouldn’t be one of the worries college students face.

“It’s hard enough getting a university education,” he said. “Students shouldn’t have this problem to deal with.”

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