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Campus Food in Four Countries

Weight gain seems to be a common phenomenon among American college students, based on recent national studies.

American college students all gain weight while they’re in school, according to one study. On average, females gain 3.75 pounds and males gain 14.11 pounds over the typical four-year period that they’re in school. Close to 30 percent of all college students in the United States are overweight or obese, according to national studies done by the National College Health Assessment and the College Health Risk Behavior Survey.

Where are those extra calories coming from? Dietary patterns of many college students do not meet recommended levels, surveys show. For example, only 5.7 percent of college students eat the recommended five or more servings per day of fruits and vegetables. Additionally, almost 22 percent of the college students surveyed take in three or more high-fat food item servings per day. Half of the students surveyed eat fried foods and fast food at least twice a week.

Many students feel that the college campus food they eat is unhealthy. But for many college students, it’s their only option because they don’t have time or lack the transportation they need to get to a grocery store off campus.

Some foreign college campuses offer healthier food models. For instance, nutritionists prepare the daily cafeteria menus at South Korean colleges. Food choices change at every meal. In addition, all of the planned menus, prices, calories, and information about ingredients are available to students on college Web pages.

Student associations actively engage in monitoring and evaluating the quality of catering service and management. Student voting has a strong impact on decisions made about hiring catering providers. Due to this, catering companies compete to maintain students as customers by providing cheaper and healthier food.

Korean universities’ efforts to provide healthier foods to students, students’ ownership and their active engagement result in a healthier campus environment. Therefore, I suggest that American college students, need to pay more attention to what is being provided in their campus cafeterias so they can act together to build a healthier campus environment.