At least 1,130 colleges and universities in the U.S. have become smoke free and at least four in Washington State. Green River Community College, Seattle Pacific University, Walla Walla University, Everett Community College, and others are among the few that have transitioned to this amazing trend.
Cigarette butts, lighters left, and empty boxes, this is the sight that vice president of college services at Everett Community College Pat Sisneros remembers. His school recently went tobacco free and he is seeing an improvement in scenery.
Bert Umayam, my grandpa, was an avid smoker for 20 years. Then one day in 1990 he quit. “My kids kept asking me to stop so I stopped.”
Bert then gives me this statement that blows my mind, “Once you stop, you hate the smell of smoke.” To think that a person can no longer even stand a wift of what they had done for 20 years is mind blowing.
Turning Edmonds Community College into a tobacco free school would have a positive effect on the school, students, and faculty. Being on campus here can be a blessing and a curse. For those students and faculty members who are avid smokers having designated smoke areas helps them to relieve their habit. However, for those faculty and students especially who don’t have an itching need to smoke, they are consumed by the lingering odor.
Tobacco products aren’t restricted to just smokes but also chew as well. Since I play softball for the school we share the hitting facility and field with the baseball players. It is really a sight to see when your peers have no respect and just spit and chew on the field and in the cages.
The same thing goes for smoking when students don’t have the respect to go to the designated areas. Sarah Crane, student athlete at EdCC, said “Sometimes people smoke around smoke designated areas instead of actually in them and it’s not my place to tell them to move.” She later goes on to explain how she avoids the smoke designated areas because of the lingering smell that gives her headaches.
She also explains that it’s a terrible inconvenience when she is trying to walk to the dorms from her class in Snohomish. Walking behind Alderwood would be the faster route, but since that is one of the smoke designated areas she takes a longer way so she doesn’t have to smell the smoke.
When the students do go to the designated areas they don’t always dispose of their contents properly. To turn our school into a tobacco free campus would benefit many people. If we were to become tobacco free, we would follow a policy very similar to that of Everett Community College’s.
Everett acknowledges that tobacco in any form is a significant health hazard. Non-smokers at Edmonds, when asked about EdCC becoming a tobacco free campus were all for the idea. Student athlete Briana Lloyd-Bennett stated, “The smoke makes me sick sometimes. It just hurts my nose when I smell cigarettes. As soon as I smell the smoke I can’t help but cough.”
She tells about how annoying it is when the smoke follows her. “I hop into the elevator at the dorms and the smell of smoke lingers. Next thing I know I come home smelling like a chimney,” Briana Lloyd-Bennett explains. Not only does the smell of cigarettes linger in the halls and elevators, but also on peoples clothes.
Pat Sisneros, the vice president of college services at Everett Community College, is “pleasantly surprised that there are no issues.” Pat said that their current tobacco policy wasn’t cutting it because students had voiced their concerns about second hand smoke. Everett was much like Edmonds, where they had designated smoking areas and they tried to put them in areas with less walking traffic.
However, with enough students voicing concerns and complaints the school looked at becoming a tobacco free campus a few years ago. Their main reason for deciding to become tobacco free was mainly for public health reasons. Everett was undergoing the construction of the new Nursing and Health Sciences building and Pat thought that the timing was perfect to implement a new tobacco policy.
Pat wanted Everett to be a part of this positive change. He hoped that with the new policy the campus would be cleaner. He also wanted to use the positive influence of the college to try and get students and faculty to stop smoking, or to not even start.
The transition to a tobacco-free campus wasn’t likely to go over well with the students who smoke. Everett Community College student and smoker Jenell Clark, expressed her thoughts about the change on her campus loud and clear.
“It sucks (expletive deleted),” Clark said, Cigarettes are stress relievers, she continues, if I don’t get a smoke in before class it leaves me aggravated. Clark continues to say how she doesn’t understand why her rights were taken away. The majority of people would respect and understand the rules set by the campus. So why punish the actions of everyone when it’s only a select few.
Being that some smokers are inconsiderate about their smoking habits I wanted to know if she was one of them. “I had gone out of my way to be courteous of you now please why don’t you do the same.” Clark said, knowing that not everyone is as courteous as her she said “We need to be smarter as non-smokers and smokers. We need to realize and accept the rules, expectations, and boundaries of everyone.”
Even the people that aren’t necessarily ok with the new tobacco policy such as Clark find a bright side to it. As of Sept.1 a $20 citation is issued if caught smoking on campus. Pat say that no citations have been given out. The students and faculty are adapting well to the new policy. Turning Edmonds to a tobacco free campus would help with keeping our school cleaner and greener.
Smoking is too expensive and would better your health if you never picked one cigarette up. My grandpa said that he was glad he quit and hopes that no one in our family starts, especially his grandchildren, I being the oldest of them all. A startling statistic is that over 90% of people who smoke started prior to age 18. So think twice about lighting up and think about making our school a tobacco free one.
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