The Campus Kitchen at Johns Hopkins University is the newest member of the national CKP network, but they’ve already got a seat at the table with some of Baltimore’s key stakeholders when it comes to food and hunger.

CKJHU is part of Baltimore’s new Food Policy Task Force, founded by Mayor Sheila Dixon and headed by the city Health and Planning departments. CKJHU team members join representatives of the business and non-profit communities, as well as members of the academic community and although they’re not voting members, they’ll sit in on meetings and provide input.

“We bring in more of a youth presence in food issues,” said Jerome Axel Brown, CKJHU coordinator. Their role also provides a way for other community members to tap into the resources Johns Hopkins has to offer, but Axel hopes other task force members will “see the students themselves as an untapped resource of the city.”

At the task force’s first meeting in November, Axel and others brainstormed along with the rest of the group ways to address not only food security issues, but related public health issues like obesity and malnutrition. Perhaps unexpectedly, Axel notes, these two often go hand in hand. “What Baltimore needs is not necessarily more food,” he said, ”but healthier food and to bring more fresh food into the city.”

This month, the task force will meet to bring their ideas together and move to action. Axel is looking forward to the opportunity to further CKJHU’s involvement with the task force through work study and internships.

CKJHU’s presence on the Food Policy Task Force is part of the philosophy of their new Campus Kitchen: connecting service and student leadership to broader food systems issues. “We are taking it on from a health and social justice perspective,” said Axel, “by thinking about how hunger is a public health issue.”

He encouraged other Campus Kitchens to ask “How does your work fit into the larger effort?”  University public health, nutrition, and sociology departments, as well as local health departments, can get you started. (You can also check out the Community Food Assessment resources at the Community Food Security Coalition and the USDA.)

Axel hopes that their approach, connecting analysis with service, will not only change the city of Baltimore, but also the lives of their volunteers: ”The CKP experience should be part of a student’s life, not just something on the periphery,” he said.

P.S. The volunteers at CKJHU aren’t the only ones in Baltimore doing awesome food security work: this article features the new food service director for Baltimore City Public Schools, who is starting the Great Kids Farm to grow food for school lunches, as well as the Great Kids Cafe, a social entrepreneurship project.

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