Sarah   Wagner

Today was our last class together. Each group presented their projects on a specific health topic. We had four different groups, four different topics, and four different approaches to a final product. We had two videos which took on different emotions, a prezi presentation and a PowerPoint. 

I left the class filled with information I was not aware of. It was a great way to end a fun and interesting semester. I am going to miss this class. 

It's finally completed! Check out our Collaborative Research Project here. 

Is it just me or do other people begin to come up with more ideas when the deadline has approached? I always seem to come up with clever ideas when I am finished with a project.

For this project especially I wish I had the money and time to record myself eating in the cafe or interview people eating in the cafe. I also wish we had time to interview a freshman male and female and ask their daily regimen to see the difference between a girls life vs a boys life. We could even view the food they keep in their rooms. Hmmmmm all the possibilities to expand on. 

Noticing everyones responses to our question, "Why do freshman gain weight?" had me start thinking about my life-style freshman year. Even though I went to a Mount Saint Mary's University I still had a similar experience with temptations. 

The lifestyle of a freshman changes the minute you get a meal plan. It seems like the food possibilities are endless. Mount Saint Mary's was different than Rowan because it was not a one swipe all you can eat fest. You chose your meal and brought it to the cashier where you swiped your card. Dont get me wrong we had a pasta bar, create your own sandwich, ice cream maker, fried food area, and home cooked meal section which was never healthy. Our bookstore even had a candy station where you received your own plastic bag and filled it with the candy of your choice. Talk about pounds on your hips. I rarely exercised but I surprisingly I didn't gain that much weight. Towards the end of the year I never went to dinner at the cafe because I disliked the food so I had soup for dinner or something small. Since we had a small refrigerator I was obsessed with the ices that came in the plastic tube. Looking back I made poor choices but even today I am not making the right choices all the time. 

During class today my group and I decided to devise and conquer. We walked into class stressed out because we did not have the complete idea for our finished project. Before we left class that day we had a few minutes at the end of class to come up with different ideas to incorporate into our project.

This morning I brought my camera around campus and video taped the different areas where Freshman can eat around campus. As I was whipping out my camera I got nervous that someone was going to say something to me. With that being said my nerves took the best of me and I was quickly getting the footage. 

During class on Tuesday, the class discussion was focused on collaboration. There are two different types, dialogic and hierarchical. Dialogic collaboration is new to me, it is the process of giving and taking through conversation in order to reach goals. There are undefined roles which may cause a mess before you reach your goals. 

The hierarchical approach is what we have been doing throughout our entire educational career. In a way we were taught to work collaboratively but we each have our own specific role in the group. After our long discussion about collaboration we were able to got together with our group to discuss our project. With our due date immediately approaching, we quickly distributed jobs (the hierarchical approach) in order to complete our project on time with the all the pieces of the puzzle put together. 

I find it somewhat disappointing that we don't really have the "time" to take on this new approach of collaboration. Maybe we can try this new take on collaboration for our collaborative research project. 

The hardest part about this assignment is time to interview. Even though we were fortunate enough to have three days of class time to interview the schedule of our last "interviewee" conflicted with our WRT class. With the busy schedules of between us four girls between going home to work, a wedding, teaching half the day, and work at night we have had a hard time getting all of us together. 

With that being said, Amy took one for the team and interviewed her friend Kristen without Julianne or myself because time was getting close and we had no other choice. As soon as Amy finished interviewing she emailed the video so we could view the results. It was interesting to see a girl's perspective on gaining weight in college and the fact that food=freedom for Kristen. The videos will be posted on my Oral History page in a few days. Take a look

Weight gain ... weight loss... a constant struggle in my life. With all this talk about weight gain in college I noticed that I never had a significant weight gain but rather a weight loss  that I unfortunately gained again ( sad face ) .

 Freshman year of college of course the first few weeks I was surrounded by all different types of food but the same food just got "boring" after a while and I began to make the healthy choices instead of having ice cream every night because I could. But sad to say these healthy choices didnt have an effect on my weight loss because I wasnt exercising like I should have because the gym was all the way across a major highway where I would need to walk in a tunnel to get to. Since my school consisted of only 1,000 undergrads I would have to share the gym with all the sports teams because they didnt have their own gym. Add that to the list of turn offs. 

Initial weight loss didnt occur until my freshman year summer when my boyfriend broke up with me. Yup the typical story. The only thing was I didnt realize I was losing weight ... I wasn't trying to lose weight ... I wasn't exercising or anything. It was just my nerves I guess. I ended up losing 20 pounds that summer! I felt great. I was able to keep off the weight until what seems like this past Fall. The interview with Johandy was very inspirational and makes me feel like I can restart my life right now and get back on track1 Wait till you hear his inspirational story and advice.

It wasn't until last Thursday when Prof. Mangini questioned me about what our research question that I realized we didn't have one. Weird, right? We definitely knew that we were generally talking about gaining weight in college but we couldn't exactly put into words our exact question. That is when I began to email my group members, Amy and Julianne in order to narrow down our question. This is what we came up with . . . 
What are the factors that lead to weight gain for students at Rowan University? 

We are beginning this research process with two interviews from both the male perspective and female perspective. 


I will keep you posted with more ideas that we have rolling in our minds!

On Tuesday, March 29,2011 my group, Amy, Julianne and myself began our Oral History Project interviewing Johandy Martinez, a close friend of Julianne, about his struggles with weight gain and weight loss during college. During his freshman year he really saw the immediate effects of living on your own and knew he needed to make changes in his lifestyle. During his interview he explained his struggle as well as giving pointers for anyone who is struggling with weight loss. 

Overall, the interview went really well. The chemistry between Julianne and Johandy was very strong and you can see the comfort of "talking" to one another. I kept thinking to myself that if I was the one asking the questions the interview may have went into another direction. 


Next we have planned to get a female's perspective on gaining weight in college but we are developing conflicts in schedules of all participating parties. 

1. What side effects could you face becoming vegan?

2. Do companies make food labels difficult to read for a reason?

3. Is it more or less healthy to eat at a chain restaurant or a family owned restaurant?