Keene State College junior Scott Dyer worked with the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) to bring his own group to campus called the Keene Cannabis Coalition (KCC). 

According to Dyer, this student-run group is ultimately working towards the legalization of marijuana for both recreational and medical use in New Hampshire.

Dyer, founder and president, stated the purpose of this group is, “to pursue and raise awareness of legalization efforts throughout New Hampshire.”

Dyer said he started this cause through the Integrative Studies Program (ISP) course, Student Empowerment and Activism, taught by KSC Education Lecturer Elizabeth Dubois.

In this course, students are required to become activists themselves by, “creating a purposeful plan to implement in the community or with an organization,” Dubois said in the March 27 edition of The Equinox.

Another group on campus, Students for Sensible Drug Policy (SSDP), has similar intentions. However Dyer explained the KCC is focused solely on marijuana legalization, whereas the SSDP mission is for a better drug policy for all drugs.

Contributed Graphic / Jesse Reynolds

When KCC held its first meeting Monday March 31, Dyer said he was expecting maybe 15 students to attend and was pleasantly surprised when 28 showed. He said several others contacted to him expressing interest but were unable to attend, bringing the new group’s total member count to around 35.

Chair of the Publicity Committee for KCC, Dylan Renner, said this group’s main purpose is to bring more awareness to this up-and-coming issue.

“We support reform for marijuana medically and recreationally, but definitely in a very responsible way.  We’re not trying to come off as a bunch of stoners who want to make it easier to get our weed, that’s not the point at all. Marijuana has a lot of benefits,” Renner said.

Currently 19 states allow medical marijuana, including several New England states such as Connecticut, Maine and Rhode Island.

According to NORML’s website, research shows that marijuana is a, “valuable aid in the treatment of a wide range of clinical applications,” including “pain relief, nausea, spasticity, glaucoma, and movement disorders.”

“Over-the-counter pills and prescriptions that are chemically made, obviously some of that works but marijuana is a natural substance,” Dyer said.

Dyer continued, “It has a lot of scientifically proven things that the government and others didn’t take into consideration when they made the drug illegal.”

One way the KCC plans to bring attention to marijuana law reformation is through educating not only its members, but also the KSC community at large.

“We really want to distribute accurate health facts about marijuana,”  KCC Vice President Jesse Reynolds said.

“That way, members of the group can go out and distribute that information to others,” he said. “It’s a subject that’s getting popularized and definitely gaining mainstream attention, but it’s also still somewhat taboo and that makes it hard to find accurate information about it, we really want to change that,” Reynolds said.

Apart from marijuana’s medical benefits, members of the KCC noted the monetary benefits of legalization through regulating and taxing the drug would be significant.

“You can’t ignore the fact that the money being brought in right now in Colorado [where marijuana is legalized] is substantial,” Renner said.

Renner continued, “That’s a lot of money that can be used towards a lot of issues that we have in this country — anything  from education to unemployment.”

Through informational tables at events like Earth Week and Solarfest at KSC, the KCC explained they want to distribute informational pamphlets to evoke knowledge in students about marijuana reformation and also spread awareness about the coalition.

Dyer said they are hoping to bring the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws (NORML) to campus Spring Weekend. In addition, the group is also working to bring 2014 New Hampshire Governor candidate Andrew Hemingway to campus to speak about a variety of topics including marijuana legalization. Group members said they hope for this to take place during the 2014 academic year. “If you enjoy smoking marijuana, whatever, that’s one thing, but if you’re interested in learning about how marijuana reformation works and trying to fight to get marijuana laws changed, I mean — that’s what it’s all about,” Reynolds said.

Reynolds continued, “If you’re sick of having to worry about cops and live in constant fear for doing something that’s not really harming anybody else and that’s not really harming yourself and you want to learn more about your rights when it comes to the police definitely considering joining the KCC.”

Rachel Heard can be contacted at rheard@keene-equinox.com

Certified instructors offer free Rape Aggression Defense class on KSC campus

Several weeks ago, Keene State College’s Campus Safety offered its free Rape Aggression Defense (R.A.D.) training program to women on campus. 

This 12-16 hour self-defense class is designed to look at self-defense from the perspective of a woman’s physical strength, as opposed to other self-defense classes that often focus on a man’s physical strength, explained Director of Campus Safety, Amanda Guthorn.

“In R.A.D., we want women to really look at and be analytical about the types of things that they can do to defend themselves and also to give them more body confidence. So if they’re not used to using their bodies in a highly physical way for defending themselves, we give them the confidence to do that,” Guthorn said.

Campus Safety offers these classes which are taught by certified instructors at least once a semester.  The classes vary in scheduling ranging from weekend classes that run 8 a.m. to 3 p.m. on both Saturday and Sunday to a series of four three-hour weeknight classes.  Students must attend all classes to become R.A.D. certified.

The turnout at the most recent class had six participants register, however only three showed up. KSC senior Amanda Kaczynski said she believes the lengthy nature of the program might be steering students away.

“It seems like a great program, but I think it’s hard to—for students— to commit to a class that takes up that much time. Maybe if it was shorter, people would be more interested,” Kaczynski said.

Guthorn said it is absolutely necessary for the class to be 12-16 hours of learning. “People want to take one class and learn a few moves but there is really a lot more to it than that,” Guthorn said.

Photo Illustration by Brian Cantore / Photo Editor

R.A.D. Instructor, Deb Williams, explained the class begins with the history of R.A.D. and why it was developed.  Williams explained the instructor then moves on to defining terms like abduction, rape, stalking and aggression so everyone is on the same page.

Next, federal and state laws are discussed, because they are so different, the instructor will focus on the state in which they are teaching the class, according to Williams.

Williams said the majority of the class is spent in the studio working on physical activity.

Williams decided she wanted to become a R.A.D. instructor after taking the class herself and described the experience as “life-changing.”

“I am not a survivor, but I saw the benefits of what it can do for a survivor, and I also saw the benefits of what it can do for this age student,” Williams continued, “This is a program that every senior and high school or freshman in college should take because we offer both R.A.D. for women and R.A.D. for men and I’m really passionate about saying that this is something that everyone should have the opportunity to do.”

Resisting Aggression with Defense is the male version of R.A.D.

In this program, several concepts are covered including the bystander approach, which is teaching how to advocate for or help someone who is being subject to harassing language or even physical abuse.

According to Guthorn, men also learn skills to remove themselves from a place of conflict without responding aggressively and having the situation catapult into a physical altercation.

Guthorn urged any female students who are considering taking the class but are unsure to try it out.

“At the very least, it can be a fun experience for friends to do with each other and it’s a good opportunity to be physical in a group atmosphere. How strong are you? Let’s find out.”

This class can be empowering for women who have been victims of some form of assault, but it can also have the same effects on others as well.

“Maybe they’re [participants] not just learning it for themselves. Maybe they’re learning it because they have a friend or a family member that has been a victim, that has been victimized by a predator or an assailant and they want to learn how they can protect themselves and possibly others from being victimized. I think for us as women it helps us advocate for other people, not just for ourselves. Be a good bystander, be a good buddy, [and] be a good friend,” Guthorn said.

Although R.A.D. classes are offered only a few times a semester, Williams said instructors are more than happy to arrange a specialized, closed class for a large group of females like sororities, athletic teams or student workers.

Rachel Heard can be contacted at rheard@keene-equinox.com

In the cold winter months, some families throughout the Monadnock Region turn to their wood burning stove to quickly and efficiently heat their homes. However, research has shown that wood smoke is the largest contributor to the city of Keene’s less than ideal air quality conditions.

According to Environmental Studies professor Dr. Nora Traviss, five years ago the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services (NHDES) improved their method of air monitoring (done at a fixed location on Water St.), which allowed them to see the 24-hour hourly average of fine particulate matter in the air as opposed to a snapshot taken once every seven days.

According to the Environmental Protection Agency’s website, “particulate matter is a complex mixture of extremely small particles and liquid droplets. Particle pollution is made up of a number of components, including acids (such as nitrates and sulfates), organic chemicals, metals, and soil or dust particles.”

More specifically, fine particles are found in smoke and haze.

“In switching the method, it came to everyone’s attention that fine particulate matter was more elevated than previously thought,” Traviss shared.

Vanessa Brooks / Equinox Staff

She continued, “that makes sense for thinking about once every seven days to every ten minutes, you’re getting a better and fuller picture,” said Traviss.

Traviss explained that through research, it has been determined that fine particulate matter caused by wood smoke does pose health risks.

“The small particles in wood smoke can be inhaled deep into the lungs, collecting in the tiny air sacs where oxygen enters the blood. Some particles are so small they enter the bloodstream. Inhalation of small particles can cause heart problems, irritate lungs and eyes, trigger headaches and allergic reactions and worsen respiratory diseases such as asthma, emphysema and bronchitis,” according to the Southwest Regional Planning Committee’s website.

While there are health-related concerns surrounding the issue of Keene’s air quality, there is also a regulatory compliance related concern.

“If the levels of fine particulate matter are high, Keene could have implications for the county being out of compliance with the Clean Air Act, then a number of consequences can happen, none of which would be good for local businesses or for even the organizations at Keene State,” Traviss said.

Students in Traviss’ class are working on a project collecting data through air monitoring.  Senior Rachel Guerin explained that she and fellow classmates will go out at night when most people are burning wood, from around 9:30 until 12 or 1 a.m. They use a Thermo Scientific pDR-1500 instrument to measure the concentrations of particulate matter in four different neighborhoods; East Keene, Court Washington area, high school area and then the middle school area.

The project has not yet reached the point of analysis but Guerin said the process so far has been informative.

“[This project] has been eye-opening. I didn’t know a lot about air quality before starting this project, and I’ve also learned how an issue can involve so many different organizations and how laws and regulations that the government put in place don’t always work for everyone,” Geurin explained.

To try and combat the air quality issues in Keene, Senator Molly Kelly implemented a task force two years ago. The task force is led by the Southwest Regional Planning Commission, Cheshire Medical Center, the NHDES, the city of Keene and KSC.  According to Traviss, there has been an extensive outreach program to the community to educate residents about  the right way to burn wood, to encourage them to purchase cleaner more efficient wood stoves that create a lot less fine particulate matter and to make sure they’re not burning wet wood.

Traviss said wood stove smoke can release levoglucosan, a sugar anhydride found in wood smoke that has been directly related high levels of fine particulate matter. She said this has been done through public presentations to the community, some public service announcements and N.H. newspaper articles.

In addition to education, Traviss said a wood stove change was implemented in 2009, where the city tried to encourage people to swap out stoves and residents could get a voucher for a $1,000 credit toward the purchase of a new, more efficient, stove.

While the wood burning stoves have been directly linked to the air quality in Keene, the meteorology and location of the city are also contributing factors.

“The elevated levels of particulate matter are seen during air inversion events.  That’s when you have the right temperature and wind conditions, basically cold calm nights where there’s no wind and the ground is really cold and the warm pollution just migrates to the ground and gets trapped there.  We have a number of air inversions because we live in a valley and we’re prone to having a lot of cold days in the winter with no wind,” Traviss said.

On the days when Keene is experiencing air inversion events, Traviss urged  residents and even off-campus students with a wood burning stove in their home to not burn wood on these days.

Traviss said she wishes there was a better, less voluntary way to inform people about air inversion events in Keene.

Campus Manager of Environmental Health and Safety for physical plant, Sylvie Rice, said that she informs the KSC community about air inversion days but students have not been yet included.

“I get alerts from the state when there is going to be a bad air quality day, when they can predict it and usually I forward that information to all faculty and staff to alert them that the levels are unusually high. I haven’t been sending that to students because students emails are very closely protected so I can post things online on MyKSC, but I have not been doing that and perhaps I should,” Rice said.

Senior Rachel Guerin said even though the air quality issue may seem like it is out of the hands of students at KSC, they are still impacted and can help in small ways.

“Even if students are not burning wood knowing that there is a problem can help us.  Some people that go to Keene State have relatives or their families live in Keene and they can inform them of the issue.  Having poor air days affects everyone, especially at risk populations like the elderly, children and people with asthma and heart related issues. Everyone needs to be involved because the air is the ultimate common, everyone breathes,” Guerin said.

Rachel Heard can be contacted at rheard@keene-equinox.com

On Monday, December 2, Vice President of Student Affairs, Andy Robinson, sent out a campus-wide email confirming what many students had heard but could not believe. Longtime Zorn Dining Commons staff member, Gordon (Gordi) Davis, had died at the age of 64.

Students knew Davis as one of the dining common greeters who assisted students in swiping ID cards, making transactions and monitoring entry to the building. However, Dining Services General Manager, Josef Quirinale, said he believes students will remember Davis for more than just his job duties, “Students will remember that he always had something to say and it could be funny, it could be sarcastic, but it was always welcoming.” Quirinale said side from his role as a greeter, Davis was also very involved in the special theme nights the DC hosted.  In the tribute poster placed at the entrance of the dinning commons, Davis is photographed, dressed up as King Henry on a British cuisine themed night.

Keene State College senior, Jennifer Ahlquist, said her favorite memory of Davis was on a theme night.

“I think it was a mariachi theme. Gordi was in a dress running around the DC, and that was just like him—always trying to get people to laugh, trying to put a smile on peoples faces.”

Contributed Photo / Sodexo:
Gordon “Gordi” Davis dresses up as King Henry on a British cuisine-themed night at the Zorn Dining Commons.

Immediately after news of Davis’s passing broke, the KSC community took to social media sites like Facebook and Twitter, expressing sadness towards the loss of an KSC icon but mostly commemorating the impact he had on their lives.

“You brightened every day, and made sure everyone left with a smile. Not only that, but you had a heart so strong it was hard to ignore. I will never forget the kind words you said to me Gordi, I carry them with me always. Rest in peace,” wrote one KSC alumni on her Facebook page.

Popular Twitter accounts, like Keene State Problems and KSC Confessions, both paid tributes to Gordi tweeting: “#RIP Gordi the DC will never be the same” and “The DC should be renamed the Gordi Davis Dining Commons. Retweet if you agree. #RIPGORDI.” Not only did students love talking to and knowing Davis, the feeling was mutual.

“[Gordi] was so engaging and he was truly interested in getting to know everybody.  If he had a conversation with you, it was because he was truly interested in having the conversation and he was extremely very focused on people, he was focused on everybody,” said Quirinale.

KSC sophomore, Alecia Canfield, said she would make it a point to go through Davis’s line entering the DC because of his friendly aura and upbeat comments.

Some students will remember Davis for his ‘policing’ of the DC. Quirinale said Davis’s want to make sure all DC rules were enforced stems from his connection to the college.

“Students want to take food out of the DC so Gordi would want to be the police man and we’d say ‘You know Gordi, that’s not your place even though we appreciate the fact that you tell them.’  He’s a Keene State alum, so he had a great deal of loyalty to Keene State and loyalty to the dining commons,” Quirinale stated.

Davis was a 1972 graduate of KSC and had been working for the dining commons for seven years. Davis also had a radio show on Thursday nights on WKNH, which Quirinale said he was a good fit for because of his ability to be very clever and opinionated.   Quirinale also mentioned he had a knack for DJing.

“[Gordi] had a way of being able to thread music from the 40s, 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s together and make it work, it was a pretty amazing thing, and I know he was enjoying that radio program very, very much.”

A dinner was held on Monday, December 9, to commemorate Davis’s legacy at KSC.

Quirinale said Davis once prepared his own favorite meatloaf recipe for students two years ago and that same dish was served to students Monday night, along with other foods that were selected by a tally of student votes at each station in the dining commons.

Quirinale said the idea stemmed from the fact that Davis would always be interested in students likes asking, “What’s your favorite meal?”

Rachel Heard can be contacted at rheard@keene-equinox.com

Although homelessness and hunger in the Monadnock region may not look the same as it does in other countries or even other states in the U.S., according to the Monadnock Farm and Community Coalition, a regional organization whose mission is to support a sustainable local food system, of the 107,000 Monadnock region residents, 10,587 of these people are not sure where they will find get their next meal.

In addition, the N.H. Coalition to End Homelessness reports that in 2012, 4,825 total persons were utilizing shelters and 1,725 people were homeless.

Each year, one week before Thanksgiving, the National Coalition for the Homeless and the National Student Campaign Against Hunger and Homelessness co-sponsor National Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week. Schools, communities and cities across the United States partake in this national effort to bring awareness to one of most debilitating issues the country faces.  Keene State College is among those participants.

Allie Bedell / Contributed Photo: KSC students gather for the Oxfam Banquet on November 11.

During the week of November 16-22, two groups on campus organized a week of various events and fundraisers to raise money and awareness about these issues.

In previous years, Habitat took on the initiative alone, but this year the two groups combined efforts.

“The community service office and Habitat for Humanity collaborated and strategized a little bit to share the planning load so that we were hopefully bringing in some new audiences, new ideas and getting more people aware that the week was happening and hopefully learning about ways that they can get involved,” Jessica Gagne Cloutier, coordinator of community services, said.

Several notable events were CANstruction, a peanut butter and jelly-making night for the Hundred Nights Shelter and the Oxfam Hunger Banquet, which is described as “the place where you sit, and the meal that you eat, are determined by the luck of the draw—just as in real life some of us are born into relative prosperity and others into poverty.”

Not only did the college take part in the week’s events, the city of Keene also had a free screening of the documentary, “A Place at the Table” which investigates incidents of hunger experienced by millions of Americans, and proposed solutions to the problem.  The screening was followed by a panel discussion moderated by N.H. Senator Molly Kelly. Panelists included Donna Reynolds, director of the Conval Regional School District’s food service, Kin Schilling of The Cornucopia Project and Phoebe Bray of The Community Kitchen of Keene.

The Community Kitchen Executive Director, Bray, said on any given day up to 300 people could pass through the kitchen’s pantry.  “I hope the numbers aren’t a sign of things to come but I think this winter is going to be particularly challenging,” Bray said.

The facility served 5,300 people food through its pantry and hot meal service in September alone. The minimum wage in N.H. is $7.25 an hour, a rate that some people say is a contributing factor to hunger and homelessness in N.H.

Cloutier said, “I think nationally, we suffer offering people a living wage, so while people may be working it may not be enough to balance all of the financial needs that they have. So, I think it’s probably not as simple as if we raise the minimum wage we’re going to solve it, I think it’s probably a lot more complex than that.”

However, she said that while the living wage, which is high enough to maintain a normal standard of living, is not the main reason, it certainly contributes to it.

“The Community Kitchen sees a lot of folks that come through the kitchen who are working but who aren’t able to balance the high cost of rent with paying for a car to get to and from a job, or making sure their kids can play on a sports team and have a happy, healthy life with putting three balanced meals on the table everyday.”

Cloutier explained that the purpose of Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week is to increase knowledge about the issue.

“It’s really about awareness and understanding, so helping bring some attention to our national hunger and homelessness issues, helping to make our community more aware of opportunities to take action, whether that’s learning by going and seeing a documentary, whether that’s doing some direct service like going to The Community Kitchen and serving a meal, whether it’s a food drive, just helping people be a part of what will one day be a solution.”

Rachel Heard can be contacted at rheard@keene-equinox.com

Keene State College aims to reinvent community conversation

Understanding and taking responsibility for common places and ideas that people share was the theme for this year’s biennial symposium at Keene State College.

“Finding Your Place in the Evolving Commons” was the title and theme that housed a five-day long variety of events exploring “our places in public spaces we set aside for care and cultivation of the resources, public and private, that we share in community with others. The commons refers to this space, recognizing that its reality is often rooted in but not limited to physical locality and literal presence,” according to the symposium’s website.

Program Manager of Diversity and Multiculturalism at KSC and symposium committee member, Kim Schmidl-Gagne, said the commons are there so people can come together to exchange thoughts and ideas.  The symposium raised many questions relating to a variety of different commons, which aimed to boost thoughtful dialogue among students, faculty, staff and the community.

“Questions like ‘what do we owe ourselves culturally? What do we value in terms of supporting the arts and what does that bring to us? How do we learn from it? How do we share those experiences, so a shared experience could be going to a concert together, what does that add to our being together as a community?’” Schmidl-Gagne continued, “So that’s what the commons is, those things that we share whether its physical spaces or things that are a little less tangible, like the air we breathe and the quality we want it to be… But I think it really started with how do we have challenging dialogues about these things.”

Samantha Lewis / Equinox Staff:
KSC Symposium organizers place a chalk board on Appian way for students to express their ideas. The theme, “The Evolving Commons” intended to encourage students to share dialogues and become active in the community, organizers said. The photo above has been edited by The Equinox Photo Editor to remove inappropriate content.

Schmidl-Gagne said this year’s symposium theme was selected differently than in previous years.  Early on, faculty members would come up with ideas that were supported and chosen.

In the planning for this year’s symposium, which began two years ago, former provost Melinda Treadwell put out the word around campus that they were looking for a theme and encouraged individuals and groups to submit proposals.

A group that Schmidl-Gagne was a part of called The American Democracy Project, which is a multi-campus initiative that seeks to foster informed civic engagement in the United States, came together and produced a proposal for the evolving commons theme and was then selected.

Schmidl-Gagne explained that this year’s theme was designed to last for a whole year.  There were events hosted last spring relating to the commons and events will continue until spring of 2014.

“This is the third symposium I’ve been involved in and they’ve all been wonderful,” she continued and said that when past symposiums were complete, there was little follow-up action. She said this year is different. “This one—because we’ve been working on it for so long and it will continue—we’re really hoping to bring about some cultural change and some deep learning and deep exploring of the topic,” Schmidl-Gagne said. Junior and economics major Chris Crothers is a student in Political Economy of the Commons, a 400-level economy class which directly correlates to the symposium theme and allowed students to be active in the symposium events.

Crothers presented at an event discussing the conflict in Syria and said the event related well to the theme.

“It was an open event for discussion about the issue.  It brought people together and helped people who maybe didn’t really understand what was going on too well hear from their peers about what is going on in other people’s words and opinions,” Crothers said.  Schmidl-Gagne said she hopes the theme will help strengthen the dialogue between the college community and the Keene community as well.

“We’ve spent a lot of time on campus talking about telling students how to behave off campus or in response to Pumpkin Fest or the Red Sox. I think one of the things that is starting to come clear is that when students move off campus in particular, they feel separate from the communities that they move into, so how can we help the communities they move into talk to the students as neighbors and understand what it means to be a neighbor and have them lead some of that welcome?”

Schmidl-Gagne continued, “I don’t want it to be like ‘you need to behave’— it’s not the finger pointing thing, it is the ‘welcome to our community’ and ‘here’s what our community values and we want you to feel a part of this and we’ll help you, you helps us.’”

All events were open and free to the KSC Community and the public, however the student turnout was not as promising as it could have been.  Schmidl-Gagne noted that the committee realized that many students who were not required to attend an event for a class would find it hard to make daytime events.

Keynote speakers like Colm Lydon, a deputy superintendent in the Boston Police Department, discussed how a common was violated by the Boston Marathon Bombings.

Cheryl Brown Henderson, the daughter of Rev. Oliver L. Brown, one of the plaintiffs in the famed lawsuit Brown versus the Board of Education, discussed education as a shared common. These speakers were scheduled at night to promote student attendance. However some students said that lack of attendance was due to limited promotion of the event. Sophomore Dezary Agosto attended a symposium event as a class requirement two weeks prior to Pumpkin Fest and said she has not heard much about the symposium since then.

“The event I went to was really cool, but I don’t know much about the theme at all.  I don’t think it was well promoted throughout campus really, there’s the chalkboard on Appian Way but I would of liked to know more of what it was all about,” Agosto said.

Crothers said he did some of his own promoting of the event to get the word out.  “I did my best to try to spread the word about [the symposium] because I think the theme is important for students to know about it and be involved with,” Crothers said.

Rachel Heard can be contacted at rheard@keene-equinox.com

While hunger and poverty may not be visibly apparent in Keene and other parts of Cheshire county, in September alone, the Community Kitchen located on Mechanic Street in downtown Keene provided over 5,000 people access to food through its pantry and hot meal service.

According to the Feeding America 2012 report, 49 million Americans were living in food-insecure households, 33.1 million adults and 15.9 million children. The Community Kitchen, which was founded in 1983, began with a group of people serving meals three nights a week in various church basements.

Current Executive Director of the kitchen, Phoebe Bray, said the founders quickly realized the endeavor needed to expand.

Leah Mulroney / Equinox Staff:
Volunteers at the Community Kitchen in Keene cook meals, serve guests and help take care of the pantry. With only a few paid staff members, the kitchen is almost completely reliant on volunteers from the community.

“People were asking to take food home, any leftovers were asked for so they realized there was another need and that was for supplementary food boxes and that started a few years later,” Bray said.

As the kitchen grew, it became evident that borrowing space was no longer the most sensible option. “There was no storage, there was no continuity and you would have to clean everything before you could start cooking so the building we’re in now was purchased in 1994 and they then had to raise more funds to convert it into what it is today,” Bray explained.

With only several paid staff members, the kitchen is almost completely reliant on volunteers from the community to prepare food, cook meals, serve guests, help run the pantry and much more.

While many volunteers are residents of Cheshire county, one class at Keene State College is required to lend a helping hand at least three times throughout the semester for a minimum of two-and a-half-hours each visit.

Current Topics in Food Culture is a 200-level Health Science class taught by Health Science Professor, Lynn Arnold.

“We explore the reasons why people eat.  All of the different cultural aspects of making food choices, the aesthetics of health reasons, we explore the different cultures around the world and what their food choices are and we also go in depth into American food culture,” Arnold continued.

“One of the things we look at in that is the question of hunger, food and security because it’s such a huge issue in this country and around the world.”

To incorporate service learning, which is where students apply what they learn from their course work by working in the local community, the Health Science Department decided many years ago that having students volunteer at the kitchen would be most beneficial.

“We chose the Community Kitchen because of the connection with insecurity and this is a way students are giving to the community and serving while also seeing first hand what hunger in the community looks like,” Arnold said.

Bray agreed that while the student volunteers are helping the community, they are also learning a great deal.

“I think the numbers stagger because if you drive through Keene, it looks really nice but the absolute grinding poverty that some people live in is a constant shock to me and I think its an eye-opener for some of the students,” Bray said,.

She continued, “You can learn about poverty and hunger in the rest of the world but when it’s literally on your own doorstep I think it’s really important to take notice.”

Sophomore and student in Arnold’s class, Danielle Recos, said the experience has been eye-opening.

“I was surprised by the amount of people that utilize the kitchen, I was there at dinner time and there was very heavy traffic running through the place. I think sometimes people don’t realize how much they really have until they see what people don’t have, including just a meal,” the sophomore said.

Recos also noted that working with other volunteers was a big reason why her experience at the kitchen was so positive.

“The other volunteers are always very charismatic and very excited to be there, you can tell they all really enjoy helping people.”

Bray said she believes the student volunteers can learn a lot from spending time with these people.

“Our volunteers range from one of our staff that used to be a restaurant cook to a volunteer who is a baker at one of the supermarkets in Peterborough.  On any given day, we have a variety of people in and I think that’s good for a student because I think it’s part of education that you actually learn how to connect with different people from different socioeconomic groups and different walks of life,” Bray said.

Bray said having the student volunteers become such reliable members of the team has been a “Godsend” and she believes it is positive for the college’s image in light of recent events.

“Having just gone through Pumpkin Fest, where Keene State students didn’t necessarily get a great write-up in the Keene Sentinel, it’s actually nice to present a different face of the college”

Anyone interested in volunteering can pick up a volunteer registration form from the Keene Community Kitchen located at 35-37 Mechanic Street.

Rachel Heard can be contacted  at rheard@keene-equinox.com