School lunches-The Future of Campus Dining By Jamie Rippe

The most popular food sold in college cafeterias are sandwiches, followed by desserts, and then fruits. Currently, MassBay outsources from Bakers Best, a local third-party service that provides both food and service through contract. Decisions about wholesale distributors are made on the campus level, meaning students’ response to the food sold directly impacts the choice of what is stocked in cafeterias, and what suppliers are picked. The National Association of College and University Food Services (NACUFS) holds regional and national conferences each year to discuss new companies and trends in consumerism. NACFUS institutional members include four-year universities, large public universities, private colleges, and two-year institutions such as MassBay. There are six regions of the NACUFS association: Pacific, Continental, Midwest, Northeast, Mid-Atlantic, and Southern. The regional ambassador for the Northeast Region is Crista Martin, a graduate from Harvard University.

Qualitative research was gathered in phase three of the research in the fall of 2023 in Crista Martins Report, “Campus Dining: 2023 and Beyond” and was just published in these last six months. A culmination of more than a year’s worth of quantitative and qualitative research combined into this report and was released by the NACUFS. The report emphasizes the growing need for flexibility, innovation, and newer technologies as the industry evolves.

MassBay Community College’s Student development Office conducted an online survey with enrolled students in the Spring of 2017. The survey consisted of 308 MassBay students (broken into these subgroups: 55% women, 75% African American, 62% students who attend classes on the Framingham campus. A whopping 56% of students in respect to all campuses combined through this survey reported low to very low food security. The national average statistically for community college students found that 56% of students reported low to very low food security. As per the MassBay website, a student gets classified as low or very low food security if they reported at least two of the following. Students being hungry but choose to not eat because there isn’t enough food/money. Students eating less due to money, and students not being able to afford balanced meals. Lastly, prior food bought spoiling and the student being unable to replenish themselves adequately is at play.

MassBay has taken measures to fight hunger on their campuses. Student Development office, and many other college wide departmental offices spearhead food insecurity to make sure MassBay community has food while on campus. Since 2016 spring, a host of monthly farmers supplied by The Greater Boston Bank host a free monthly market, that provides fresh produce through an assortment of different fruits/vegetables. It is located on the Wellesley campus and is open to students attending Ashland and Framingham campuses alike through preregistration. It has benefited more than 2,648 students and faculty. In frequented student spots too such as Student Development, Athletics, Advising, and Financial Aid snack bins have been placed that offer free, sustainable snack options to all students. The same snack bins can be found in Advising and Student Development on the Framingham campus.

Bakers Best is the supplier for Wellesley’s cafeteria. The company has 40 years of experience. Michael Baker opened Baker’s Best Catering in 1984 in Newton Highlands. After numerous inquiries about catering, Baker’s Best began their catering business in 1991, a mere seven years after opening shop doors. Many options on Bakers Best are not offered at MassBay that would sell rapidly. They offer a tortellini pasta salad, brown rice pilaf (priced at 3.95, so more affordable than majority of current stocked offerings), fingerling potatoes, and many, many, desserts. After sandwiches, desserts are the 2nd most commonly sold commodity on campuses. MassBay utilizes this in the campus store through candy but would see stronger reception if implementation of the fresher Bakers Best desserts were sold in the caf as well. The cafeteria currently lacks a hot breakfast option for vegans, but on the Bakers Best website a vegan chorizo breakfast burrito is listed. There are many ways campus dining is changing. Post-pandemic, there are more tight regulations for food safety than historically there have ever been before. The increasing regulatory circumstances surrounding food as well as changing tastes pertaining to consumer dietary habits is shifting the current way campus dining conducts their operations to adapt best to the present in the most successful way.

Sources

“Campus Dining: 2030 and Beyond .” National Association of College & University Food Services, www.nacufs.org/Resources/2030-and-Beyond. Accessed 30 Apr. 2024.

“MassBay Addresses Food Security Issues after Study Finds 52% of Students Are Hungry.” MassBay Community College, 11 Oct. 2017, www.massbay.edu/press/addressing-food-insecurity.

“Seasonal Menu.” Baker’s Best, 26 Apr. 2024, www.bakersbestcatering.com/seasonal-menu/.

“Our Story.” Baker’s Best, 20 Oct. 2023, www.bakersbestcatering.com/our-story/.

Zyn, Juul, and the Battle Against Underage Nicotine Use By Andrew Knight

Over the past few years, nicotine use has seen a shift. More customers are putting down both cigarettes and vapes alike, in favor of a new development in nicotine delivery technology, Zyn. A Zyn is a pouch containing nicotine. To use Zyn, one puts a pouch between their gum and their lip. The drug is then absorbed into the bloodstream through the mucus membrane of the inner lip, in a mechanism that mimics that of smokeless tobacco. The pouch contains a flavoring, a sweetener, and nicotine salts. The pouch is immensely popular among those looking to curb their smoking habit. Unfortunately, the product has also taken another market by storm, that of underage nicotine users.  

The product has caught the attention of those who are underage primarily for the convenience factor. Long gone are the days of having to get up from your class and walk to the bathroom to get your nicotine fix. All it takes is a little “lip pillow” in the “upper decky” and you have your buzz, all from the comfort of your classroom seat. Zyn has distinct advantages over chewing tobacco as well. When one puts dip in their lip, they must have a can or bottle nearby, as they need to spit out the juices constantly, or they will experience nausea or vomiting. 

Zyn is owned by the company Swedish Match, which was recently acquired by tobacco giant, Philip Morris International, in 2022. Philip Morris International can be recognized as the parent company of the cigarette brand Marlboro. The product differs from others offered by PMI, as it offers nicotine satisfaction without the harmful effects of tobacco use or vaping. Because the route of delivery is through the gums, the lungs are left unharmed. Cigarettes, vapes, and chewing tobacco also contain a long list of harmful chemicals that are also introduced to the body during consumption. Zyn’s short ingredient list contains no known carcinogens, and as such the packaging only has a warning about nicotine’s addictive properties. (Philip Morris International)

Zyn gives consumers the desirable effects of nicotine while avoiding the presence of harmful carcinogens. This has been the mission of the company since its launch. Its parent company, Swedish Match holds a mission statement of “a world without cigarettes.” Which is ironic now given the company's new owner. The negative health effects of cigarettes, as well as their addictive properties, have been well documented since the beginning of tobacco’s cultivation. Despite this tobacco has always been a cash crop, with a consistent market for consumption. Traditional nicotine delivery systems, cigarettes, and smokeless tobacco give the buzz along with a slew of carcinogens. This, understandably, will make one associate the nicotine itself with the incidence of cancer. What many don't realize is that, according to all available data, nicotine alone will not give you cancer. (Cancer Research UK)

Since the product's release in the United States in 2014, Zyn has become a product with a cult-like following. With a distinct boom in popularity coming in the past two years, along with it’s growing presence on social media platforms. Influencers on TikTok and Instagram showcase the product in comedy videos. Videos with young men holding a pouch in their upper gums with captions such as “Zynaccino” “Zynbabwe,” and my personal favorite, “Forgive me, father, for I have Zyned.” Any word can be taken, and the first syllable replaced with Zyn, to create a slang term. The slang of Zyn culture is represents Generation Z’s coining of absurd terms. Beyond the words for the product itself, terms were coined to describe both the practices of Zyn use, as well as descriptive words for the product. “Upper decky” is the term used to describe the upper gums, where one might hold their Zyn. “Ferda” is a shortened term for “for the boys” which most accurately describes the product’s primary market in the United States. 

The cult following comes from that sector of the nicotine market. Young men, primarily, are the ones seen showing their support for the product online. While these viral trends have given way to a boom in the product's popularity, they have also put a target on the back of the company. Neither PMI nor Swedish Match have engaged in marketing campaigns targeting underage nicotine users. The viral online promotion has come from underage users, for underage users. All of the online posts and advertisements posted by Zyn are age-gated, and their website will confirm your age before allowing you access to their content. 

This boom in the presence of Zyns in contemporary pop culture has given birth to a new category of entertainers called “Zynfluencers.” Even in noncomedy videos, men can be heard toting the benefits of Zyns. The most notable “Zynfluencer” being former Fox News anchor Tucker Carlson. Carlson has made some wild claims about the product offering all kinds of benefits, from an increase in focus and alertness to a boost in testosterone levels and sexual prowess. On the Full Send podcast, Carlson can be heard describing the sensation of the product as “The hand of god reaching down and massaging your central nervous system.” Aside from the increase in focus and alertness, these claims have no scientific backing. Carlson, along with numerous other Zynfluencers doesn’t hesitate to encourage their young audience to “pop on in the upper-decky.” As stated before, Swedish Match, nor its parent company Philip Morris International sponsors these Zynfluencers. (Grier and Kirshner)

Even without the company having a direct involvement in marketing to those who are underage, those in the political sector have not been shy about voicing their negative opinion on the product. They make the claim that the products many flashy flavors, including Pineapple, Cinnamon, and Citrus, are evidence of their target market being those who are underage. Senate majority leader, Chuck Schumer, famously called the product “a pouch packed with problems,” and claimed that the product set its sights on “teenagers and even younger,” and that it used social media to “hook ‘em.” Schumer urged the FTC and the FDA to investigate the product. (Gabbatt)

The appropriation of a smoking cessation device by underage users, the use of viral marketing to promote such a product, and the eventual government crackdown on said product is not anything new. Six short years ago, Americans saw the same battle against underage addiction in the form of another company, Juul. Like Zyn, Juul was founded to curb one's smoking habit, and like Zyn, the mission backfired. Minor’s loved the product and the flashy flavors it came in, and they took the product as their own. Instead of curbing the addiction of former smokers, Juul ended up working to hook another generation on nicotine. 

Government action against Juul was swift and effective, and just three short years after the product release in 2015, lawmakers were able to quarantine the company from the underage market. Lawmakers pressured the company to pull the majority of their pod flavors from shelves. All the fruity flavors that filled the high school bathroom stalls in 2018 were pulled from the shelves. One could no longer get their hands on fan-favorite pods such as Mango, Fruit Medley, Cucumber, or Creme Brulee. Though tobacco and menthol flavors are still being sold in gas stations and convenience stores around the country, the company's stake in the underage nicotine market is far from what it once was. (Kirkham et al.)

Though the attack on the company proved successful, the attempt to curb underage nicotine use has largely been unsuccessful. As with any holes in all markets, the hole left by the 2018 Juul ban filled quickly. The banning of mango, cucumber, creme brulee, and fruit medley Juul pods quarantined the youth from the consumption of Juul products but gave birth to a more harmful vape market. What took the place of Juul was disposable vapes. Disposable vape hardware is shipped from China, and sold in the US under a slew of differentnames. These are what are now found in the trashcans of high school restrooms, and on the roof under the Massbay bathroom windows. Cheaply made Chinese vaping devices go by different names such as Elfbar, Puffbars, and Crave disposables. Though, flavored vapes are illegal in the US, with the only legal flavorings being tobacco and in some states, menthol, these fruity disposable vapes are still widely available. The market has developed to the point that there is no single company the FDA can target for regulation. Because of their near impossibility to be regulated, these products have gone unchecked, and have been known to burn lips and explode in the pockets of users. One company can be regulated, but a thousand companies, with no central distribution, is much harder for the government to control.(Noguchi)

Zyn’s fall under the category of nicotine replacement therapy, but, speaking from experience, it operates far differently than nicotine patches or gum. Unlike nicotine patches, Zyns have a high amount of nicotine, and they can give you a strong buzz. The nicotine is absorbed rapidly through the lining of the gums and, due to the high doses found in Zyn pouches, the effect is very similar to smoking a cigarette or hitting a vape, though admittedly not quite as intense. Regardless the buzz satisfies an addict's need for nicotine effectively, and will make one rethink that cigarette or puff bar. 

As was the case in 2018, I feel if lawmakers can successfully do to Zyn what they did to Juul, the market hole will fill just as quick. Working only to boost the sales of these black-market disposable vapes. When it comes to a drug such as nicotine, I feel as though eradication in the short term is out of the question. It would take generations to eradicate the nicotine market. If the government were to focus less on the regulation of the products, and more on the education of the harms that they come with, similar to how cigarettes were taught about in the early 2000s, nicotine use could become a thing of the past.

Works Cited

Cancer Research UK. “Is vaping harmful? | Vaping side effects.” Cancer Research UK, 27 March 2023, https://www.cancerresearchuk.org/about-cancer/causes-of-cancer/smoking-and-cancer/is-vaping-harmful. Accessed 10 May 2024.

Gabbatt, Adam. “Zyn nicotine pouches are the latest US culture-war front – but are they any good?” The Guardian, 10 March 2024, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/mar/10/zyn-nicotine-pouches-us-culture-war-front. Accessed 10 May 2024.

Grier, Jacob, and Alex Kirshner. “What Chuck Schumer Doesn't Understand About Zyn.” Chuck Schumer on Zyn: Actually, Majorie Taylor Greene and Tucker Carlson are right., 31 January 2024, https://slate.com/technology/2024/01/chuck-schumer-zyn-controversy-explained-whos-right.html. Accessed 10 May 2024.

Kirkham, Chris, et al. “Timeline: Significant events in the history of Juul.” Reuters, 25 September 2019, https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN1WA2LI/. Accessed 10 May 2024.

Noguchi, Yuki. “Flavored vapes are supposed to be illegal, but they're still widely available.” NPR, 12 July 2023, https://www.npr.org/2023/07/12/1187354558/flavored-vapes-are-supposed-to-be-illegal-but-theyre-still-widely-available. Accessed 10 May 2024.

Philip Morris International. “PMI progresses toward sole ownership of Swedish Match, further supporting our ambition to deliver a smoke-free future.” Philip Morris International, 5 December 2022, https://www.pmi.com/media-center/news/PMI-progresses-toward-sole-ownership-of-swedish-match. Accessed 10 May 2024.

Loneliness, Social Media, and Their Effect on Society By Andrew Knight

All perceptions are filtered through the mind. One’s mental health shapes the way one views the world, and if one’s mental health is poor one won’t be able to see the beauty in the world in which one lives. One’s view can become distorted through an overall dark outlook, and it can render one unable to see the good in the world, the value of connection, and the beauty of life. When people lose faith in the world, when people aren’t able to see the current good in the world, people aren’t able to see the good that they can bring to the world. 

One can’t be a part of a good society without feeling as if their society can be good. With this, I introduce the significance of mental health. By improving one’s mental health, one improves their ability to see the good, both current and potential, and one will be able to bring that potential good to the world, thereby becoming a vessel through which the world is improved. The only way to improve a society is to improve its members' ability to see society as something that has the potential to be better. New social institutions, most prominently social media, have lent themselves to decreasing the connectedness of today's population, increasing the individuals feeling of loneliness. This loneliness has dug its roots into society in recent years and has continued to deteriorate the mental state of the population. The vicious cycle of social media, loneliness, and the resulting poor mental health, is the biggest albatross around the neck of society in today's age. 

Most people get the bulk of their stimulation from their phones. From 2005 to 2021, social media use has skyrocketed, from just 5% in 2005 to 73% in 2021 (Social Media Fact Sheet). People would rather chat on the phone than see their friends face to face. Rather than checking up on someone they haven’t seen for a while, they stalk their Facebook. Institutions like social media make the exchange of personal information impersonal. A good portion of the younger generation will sit on their ass and scroll through their phone before they will spend quality time with someone they love. A phone is a good tool for people to see farther than their eyes are capable of, but it shouldn’t replace what would otherwise be in your view. What was first created as something that was supposed to bring people together has been allowed to become what’s been pushing the population apart. 

Since its release to the public in 1993 (Ring), the internet has revolutionized human interaction, but in more recent years, it’s acted as a barrier to face-to-face communication. This was especially aggravated in 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic caused everyone to isolate themselves. Since then, the surgeon general, Dr. Vivek Murthy, has released an 81-page paper on the subject of social isolation. In addition to the obvious effect it has on mental health, he discovered a carryover to physical health, identifying a 29% increase in the risk of heart disease, a 32% increase in the risk of stroke, and a 50% increase in the risk of heart attack, as a consequence of insufficient social connection (Murthy 24-26).

In the same period as the rise of the internet, time spent alone has increased, and time spent socializing with friends has decreased drastically. For example, from 2003-2020, the average time spent with friends has dropped by 20 hours per month, from 30 hours in 2003 to just 10 hours in 2020, a third of what it was at the beginning of the new millennium. 

Communication has evolved to where you do not have to be physically with someone to feel their presence. Even with this, statistics indicate that this hasn’t done anything to preserve friendships. Since 1990, the number of Americans lacking more than three close friends nearly doubled. This number was used by the surgeon general as one of the main metrics for loneliness in his paper. The significance of it stems from Dr. Murthy’s statistic which indicates that people with more than three close are unlikely to feel lonely. 90% of those who don’t suffer loneliness have north of three close friends, so it’s a call to alarm that the portion of the population with that social backing has dropped so drastically in recent times. In 1990 the percentage of American adults with three or fewer close friends was 27 percent, now the figure sits at 49 percent (Murthy 13).

As mentioned before, this shift occurred in the same period as the rise of social media, but we can’t equate correlation to causation without hypothesizing the connection. The use of social media has been strongly associated with the incidence of social appearance anxiety disorder. This is a disorder that causes people to become hyper-fixated on their appearance. As Papapanou describes it, “Social appearance anxiety… is a type of anxiety defined as the fear of being negatively evaluated or rejected by others because of one’s physical appearance.” This disorder can make someone hesitant to leave their house, talk to people, and form the connections that make one feel human. The study cited a positive correlation between the level of social appearance anxiety disorder, and the scores of loneliness, and found that the occurrence of loneliness was predicted by the social appearance anxiety score (Papapanou).

With pictures of models, and ideal figures plastering the front pages of every social media site, people are bound to make the comparison between themselves and these often unnatural, and often physically unattainable beauty standards. As physical features are often the first thing one will notice when interacting with others, people value this highly when evaluating themselves. When people evaluate themselves primarily by physical appearance, and they get their baseline comparison of their appearance through the internet, because, as mentioned before, people often look at their phone before looking at their surroundings, they are met with pictures of bodies that are unattainable to most people. 

This kind of comparison is called an “upward comparison.” An upward comparison is when you perceive someone else as having a higher value than you. Social comparison is inevitable, as that is how humans evolved to identify their place in a hierarchy. People make these comparisons with whatever they see, and if what they see comes from social media, and what's on social media is doctored images of models who look good for a living, they are bound to be making primarily upward comparisons. Upward comparisons have been shown to increase both symptoms of depression and social appearance anxiety which, as discussed before, has been correlated with the incidence of loneliness(Çelik 346).

Another mechanism through which the rise of social media has increased the incidence of loneliness is the skyrocketed frequency of what's called a parasocial relation. A parasocial relationship is defined as a one-sided relationship where a spectator forms a relationship with a performer. The spectator will feel a relationship with the performer, while the performer lacks such a relationship with the spectator. The spectator is just a drop of water in a sea of fans to the performer, while the spectator feels an attachment to the performer(Horton 1). The concept of the parasocial relationship has been around since the fifties, with the rise of mass media, specifically television, but the phenomenon is much more widespread today, with new performers popping up every day, and people having the ability to see thousands of faces within hours, without even leaving their home. A more recent article accurately described the phenomenon in today's society, saying, “Parasocial relationships arise when individuals are repeatedly exposed to a media persona, and the individuals develop a sense of intimacy, perceived friendship, and identification with the celebrity" (Martinie). The article goes on to describe that while at the surface this seems unhealthy, it actually can be seen as one of the positive effects of today's media. Martinie explains that forming these relationships with celebrities can create a feeling of connection, and belonging in people who wouldn’t otherwise feel such things. It can help form an identity when one otherwise lacks the social ability to do so. While this may be a fair benefit to the social climate we currently live in, it’s worth mentioning that these relationships do not go both ways. When one develops a connection with someone, an important part of that is mutual care. This aspect is completely absent in parasocial relationships. Even if the spectator feels as though the performer might have any care for them whatsoever, this is an illusion that can easily be shattered, and when it is, the spectator will feel even more alone. Expanding on this, the feeling of belonging is an important factor that drives people to make connections, when one lacks such a feeling they are driven to go out and find it. With this drive being diminished by a false sense of belonging in a relationship with a performer, who doesn’t even know they exist, one won’t feel the drive to go out and make the two-way relationships that they could count on for a natural sense of belonging. When people replace face-to-face interactions with parasocial relationships online, they devalue the relationships that make them feel whole. 

The devaluation of face-to-face connection facilitated by social media aggravates the distorted view of the world that's plaguing today's society. The cycle of loneliness, social media usage, and social appearance anxiety, causes a reinforcement of the aforementioned loneliness that’s detrimental to our society. The lens in which individuals view themselves determines the lens in which individuals view the world. This applies to both how they view the world's current state and the potential it holds to become better. By reconnecting the individuals that make up society, you improve individuals view of themselves, thereby improving their view of the world. 

Works Cited

“Social Media Fact Sheet.” Pew Research Center: Internet, Science & Tech, Pew Research Center, 7 Apr. 2021, www.pewresearch.org/internet/fact-sheet/social-media/. Accessed 30 Nov. 2023.

Ring, Julian. “30 Years Ago, One Decision Altered the Course of Our Connected World.” NPR, NPR, 30 Apr. 2023, www.npr.org/2023/04/30/1172276538/world-wide-web-internet-anniversary. Accessed 30 Nov. 2023.

Murthy, Vivek. “Our Epidemic of Loneliness and Isolation.” US Department of Health and Human Services, 2023. 

Papapanou, Triada Konstantina., et al. "Strong Correlations between Social Appearance Anxiety, use of Social Media, and Feelings of Loneliness in Adolescents and Young Adults." International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, vol. 20, no. 5, 2023, pp. 4296. ProQuest,10.3390/ijerph20054296.

Çelik, Esranur, and Özlem Tolan. “The relationship between social appearance anxiety, automatic thoughts and depression-anxiety-stress in emerging adulthood.” International Journal of Progressive Education, vol. 17, no. 5, 2021, pp. 345–363, 10.29329/ijpe.2021.375.22. 

Horton, Donald, and R. Richard Wohl. “Mass communication and para-social interaction.” Psychiatry, vol. 19, no. 3, 1956, pp. 215–229, 10.1080/00332747.1956.11023049. 

Martinie, Alexander, and Brielle Aguayo. "The psychology behind parasocial relationships." UWIRE Text, 8 Nov. 2021, p. 1. Gale Academic OneFile, link.gale.com/apps/doc/A681622927/AONE?u=mlin_m_massbay&sid=summon&xid=36c27f65. Accessed 30 Nov. 2023.