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Recreation, Fitness & Wellness, Student Life, USF Health

Smoking ban? No biggie

Posted by Nicholas Trobiano ⋅ March 27, 2012 ⋅ Leave a Comment

Filed Under College of Business, health, Student Life, students, Tampa, University, University of South Florida, USF, USF Health, USF Wellness, Wellness Education and Promotion

Two women in their twenties puffed long Black Lucky Strike cigarettes beneath some trees on the business administration building lawn. Their books and empty Starbucks cups pilled on a bench just outside a designated smoking area on the USF Tampa Bay campus.

On March 20, officials at the campus implemented the “Change is in the Air” initiative to restrict areas where students and faculty can light up. And so far, it seems that restrictions have made little impact on smokers’ regular schedules.

Sunny, who refused to give her full name, is a second year graduate student studying finance, who stood in the shade wearing jeans and a polo shirt and tight ponytail of light brown hair.

“I think it’s fine,” Sunny said, as she flicked ash from her cigarette butt into the leafy grass. “I know I’m not doing a favor to my lungs, so I might as well not do harm to others.”

She said she doesn’t smoke habitually – just to relieve stress.

“I’m not really a hard core smoker,” Sunny said. “I smoke maybe once in two or three days or when I’m feeling stress or have an exam. But I’m sure someone who smokes all the time or who is a habitual smoker and needs to smoke, I think it is inconvenient for them to go find a place to smoke.”

Sunny said most of her friends who smoke only travel to campus for classes, so they don’t spend enough time on campus to need a smoke break.

“[The ban] is more for people who smoke habitually or who don’t smoke at all,” Sunny said. “I have a few friends in the health sciences, and they really care if you smoke around them because of their major. They would obviously have concerns about it, but we don’t smoke that often.”

Sunny’s friend, another finance graduate student who wore thick eyeliner and a nose ring—declined to reveal her name—but she agreed with the sentiments.

“I’m not a regular smoker so I only smoke as a stress release or if someone else is smoking,” said the female student. “I smoke maybe once every two weeks or three weeks.”

“But you caught us on an exam day,” the woman joked.

The Tampa campus currently has 24 designated smoking areas with signs and cigarette butt receptacles.

To find out more information about the clean air initiative or to find these locations, view the press release and map from usf.edu.

About Nicholas Trobiano

Nicholas Trobiano is a magazine journalism major at the University of South Florida and freelance designer and photographer. He works as a a style intern for Creative Loafing Tampa and a graphic design intern for USF's Communications and Marketing department, where he most recently helped coordinate the NBC 2012 Republic Presidential Candidates Debate in Janurary 2012. He previously served as the graphic arts manager, entertainment editor, and assistant montage editor of USF’s student newspaper, “The Oracle,” as well as a news intern for WUSF Public Media. In 2011, he received a scholarship for his studies at the University of South Florida from the School of Mass Communications and the School's Garner Rose O'Brien Halderman Scholarship providers. When he is out of the office, he enjoys running, cooking, tweeting, and a great bottle of wine with friends. He currently resides in Tampa, Florida.

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