From Pizza Loft to The Flight Deck Pub, NSU’s food options are every diet’s worst enemy.
I know complaining about the lack of healthy options on campus is a little cliché, but after spending the past few months trying to live a healthier lifestyle, there was one massive, unavoidable roadblock in my way: the Don Taft University Center food court.
Although I am a commuter student, I practically live on campus. I spend all day, Monday through Friday, from 10 a.m. to 10 p.m., studying, working and wandering around campus. As a result, a majority of my daily meals are in the UC.
The already severely limited amount of food options on campus became even more restrictive when I completely cut Pizza Loft, Monty’s Café, The Flight Deck Pub and Starbucks from my diet. I relied heavily on moderately healthy veggie subs at Subway, bland and soggy salads at Greens Etc., sugary smoothies at JuiceBlendz, and carb-heavy brown rice bowls at Chick-N-Grill.
My only escape from the monotonous meals has been the weekly farmers markets, which are, sadly, only once a week, and there are rarely days when I have adequate time to go off campus for lunch. Eventually, after getting sick of eating the same thing every day, I faced an ultimatum: I could either resort back to my previous comfort food diet or not eat at all.
Dieting shouldn’t have to be an impossible task for NSU students. Picking unsatisfying salads at Greens Etc., rotten fruit salads at Outtakes and overpriced meals at the Food Bar over pizza and burgers is hard enough. Yes, we have an impressive gym on campus and a variety of group exercise classes, but how can any incoming student avoid the notorious freshman 15 if nutritious, balanced meals are few and far between? The university should strive to make it easier for healthy eaters left wanting more. Every university’s goal should be to foster a healthy living environment for its students and providing a wide variety of healthy options should be a priority.
While I can always leave campus and find food elsewhere on days when I cannot stomach another prepackaged salad, residential students who do not have a car do not have the same liberty. In fact, to make matters worse, several residential students are required to have a meal plan. If students are forced to eat the food NSU offers, the least the campus can do is add more variety instead of just carbs, carbs and more carbs.
There are probably thousands of changes NSU can implement to become a healthier campus. For example, NSU should consider adding another healthy restaurant on campus other than Greens Etc. or at least switch out one of our existing options because what we have is not enough. In addition, the prepackaged salads and fruits in Outtakes should be fresh because they are repulsive. In fact, the quality of the produce, including Subway and Chick-N-Grill, in each restaurant shouldn’t be just tolerable.
But, unless NSU does something significant to improve the availability of quality, healthy food options, the campus is doing the entire student body a disservice.
