subject: Health & Fitness Fast Becoming a Priority at Educational Institution [print this page] Health & Fitness Fast Becoming a Priority at Educational Institution
For a college student, life revolves around running between classrooms, libraries, group study sessions with friends and of course, parties.
After all, college is the beginning of a new life for them. Away from home and the enforced discipline of parents, late nights, junk food and beer become the rule rather than exception. It's not without reason that 'Freshman 15' has become such a common term in college parlance.
It is for this reason and many others that educational institutions around the country are placing so much importance on developing fitness and recreation centers for their students on campus.
Importance of Educational Fitness Solutions
It's no longer uncommon for colleges and universities to have professionally run fitness centers to encourage a healthy lifestyle among their students. While health and fitness are important for people of all ages, they're more so for college students having their first brush with living on their own.
First of all, college is a hotbed of poor dietary habits. Unhealthy cafeteria food combined with the temptation to snack on stuff like fries and cookies and irregular meal times can take a toll on the best of bodies.
Another reason why post secondary educational institutions need to give priority to health and fitness is the essentially sedentary lifestyle that most college students end up having.
From sitting in lecture halls to spending long hours in the library and in front of their laptops to complete coursework, students expend a good part of their day in a state of physical inactivity. Unlike high school, there is no scheduled gym class for them to get physically energized.
Since most students don't have the resources to become members of fancy fitness studios or the time to go for extended jogs around the campus, having a gym right there in the college premises is perfect for a short and rejuvenating workout using their favorite equipment.
Stress & Anxiety Part of College Life
College students, believe it or not, are also vulnerable to copious amounts of stress induced from the pressure to perform well academically to keep their scholarships and to fit in with the crowd. Staying away from their families and pangs of loneliness can also lead to severe anxiety.
Working out is one way they have of reducing stress. Besides, exercising is also known to release the "feel good" hormone endorphin into the system.
For a lot of college students, the pressure to look good can manifest itself in a lot of harmful ways like severe dieting, eating disorders, use of weight loss pills, etc. Providing students a place where they can lose weight in a healthy manner may bring down instances of such extreme measures.
Last, but not the least, who can think of campus life without late night parties? While partying is a great way to make new friends and cope with stress, they also make it easier for students to indulge in excessive drinking and binge on calorific food. Students may not realize it, but just a can of light beer adds 150 calories to their systems.
By no means are we saying that students should put an end to partying. All they have to do is maintain a careful regimen of exercise to burn the extra calories they add during their weekend revelries and to that end, educational fitness solutions help them stay on course.
Given all these factors, it's not hard to understand why fitness is so important for college students and why educational institutions are spending precious dollars on providing them world class facilities to burn some calories as well as stress.
From massive gyms equipped with the state of the art exercise machines to multi-purpose dance and group workout studios; from basketball and racquet ball courts to jogging tracks; from Olympic sized swimming pools to waterslides and climbing walls, fitness solutions for universities have reached new levels of sophistication that are both impressive and hard to beat!
