As an elite university, Duke aims for academic and moral improvement of its students.
But are the fresh-faced students who enter Duke each year leaving it in worse health four years later? It turns out the combined impact of Duke's social scene, dining options and academic pressure on students' health may not be as much as they believe.
Although students have voiced concerns relating to sleeping habits and nutrition on campus, Director of Health Promotion Franca Alphin said the issue is not more problematic at Duke than at other universities.
"I don't think Duke students are any more unhealthy than other college students," she said. "As with any other school, the things that are highlighted are the things that are most problematic like drinking and food issues."
Freshman Karan Chhabra said certain things may be Duke-specific, such as tenting and a more vibrant social scene, but other aspects of a possibly unhealthy lifestyle are characteristic of college students in general.
"I'm sure it would be similar at any place as competitive as Duke," he said. "But tough schedules and tough coursework make me have to let go of some other priorities like sleep, exercise and eating three normal meals."
Some gripes are common. Students on East Campus are limited to the First Year Board Plan, which includes a set number of meals at the Marketplace and 415 food points or fewer. For freshmen who spend most of their time on West Campus or simply cannot find food to suit their tastes, unhealthy meals are inevitable, Chhabra said.
"I don't eat meat or McDonald's or much Cookout. And I skip breakfasts at the Marketplace because they're boring," he said, adding that he periodically receives packages of homemade meals from his mother in New Jersey.
Unlike Chhabra, freshman Laurel Sisler eats at the Marketplace regularly, but said she has trouble finding healthy options there.
"I could go on and on about how the Marketplace is unhealthy," she said. "They just cook with a lot of unnecessary oil. I guess they think it tastes good when they're cooking such large amounts, but they make it unnecessarily unhealthy-like pasta that would be decently healthy is drowning in oil."
Honing healthy habits on campus is still a work in progress, Alphin said. She noted that the University's partnership with Bon Appetit-the company that provides catering to both the Great Hall and the Marketplace-has helped offer healthier options for students, but Duke still has a long way to go.
Despite the limited options, sophomore Michael Worsman said there are ways around unhealthy choices.
"When I first came to Duke, I found it extremely difficult to stay healthy, and I didn't realize how easy it would be to get out of shape and eat unhealthily," he said. "But as soon as I got into the swing of things, it got easier."
In addition to changes in diets, Alphin said students begin to sleep less after their first semester.
"Sleep is really at the crux of all health issues," she said, adding that students can feel overwhelmed more easily or make poor dining choices due to a lack of sleep. These effects can then lead to depression, weight gain or poorer health over time, Alphin noted.
Chhabra, however, said sleeping patterns stem from habits prior to college, and students who have more reasonable schedules may sleep more than those who start early and end late.
To help students make healthier dining decisions, Alphin said nutrition information corresponding to campus eateries will soon be available on the Dining Services Web site, but calorie and fat information will not be provided directly at the time of purchase.
"There is no definitive research that giving everyone calorie and fat-gram information is the best thing to do because people misinterpret the information," she said. "Students will misconstrue the information and might be more restrictive in their decisions."
She noted that there is more to healthy eating than just calories and fat-grams and that information could mislead students about what is healthy and what is not.
Still, Alphin said students will leave Duke "perfectly healthy."
"What you have to look for are risk factors in someone else's life," she said. "If that student is not that healthy to begin with, then they are more likely to be unhealthy throughout college."
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