THE FIGHT FOR FOOD: ADDRESSING FOOD INSECURITY ISSUES OF VENEZUELAN REFUGEES IN ECUADOR

Emily Heflin completed the Illinois Global Scholar capstone project in the Spring of 2021. Emily has been interested in the issue of food insecurity and world hunger since her freshman year in Global Citizenship. Since working on the project, Emily has learned more about the challenges of dealing with a large issue and the lack of knowledge about the issue throughout many countries in the world. Emily looked at tackling food insecurity in Ecuador, a location of inspiration from her Spanish courses. When looking at food insecurity and contacting individuals in Ecuador, Emily learned that one of the greatest issues of food insecurity in Ecuador was from the refugee population from Venezuela and the lack of education about food insecurity and refugees in general. As a part of her project, Emily created a series of lesson plans that is being translated into Spanish that can be used in an elementary classroom to educate students about refugees, food insecurity, and most importantly, what can be done to help.