Problem-Solution
Manuel Melendrez
Eng. 101
May 14, 2012
Tobacco Free Ever since September 1, 2010 UW-Stout enforced a new policy on campus that mandated that the entire UW-Stout campus finally become tobacco free. The problem that often occurs is that many individuals choose to just shrug it off as if nothing has changed and continue to break the campus policy. If there is a problem that you’re trying to fix, you must find the best solution possible so the problem doesn’t keep occurring otherwise you’re just wasting your time. What does it mean to have a tobacco free campus exactly? It means all students must be off campus to use any sorts of tobacco that include: snus, chewing tobacco, cigarettes, and cigars. The main problem that the campus has been concerned with is that the students of the campus are not abiding by the rules that are in front of them, they make these rules for a reason and we must abide by them at all times.
An idea I came up with is that the campus could create more jobs on campus involving students and the campus police. What I could see the campus doing is to take students and put them on patrol around campus to write and give out citation’s to people who are caught smoking. This would be creating more jobs for students on campus, still costing the campus money to pay the students but the money paid to students instead of campus police would be less thus not raising tuition in the near future.
By having the students more involved on the campus, it would help spread awareness about the policy and more students can get involved also by simple just asking an individual who is on campus smoking, politely ask them to step off campus away from innocent bystanders who don’t want to be exposed to the secondhand smoke. Second hand smoke causes coughing, phlem, chest discomfort and reduced lung function in nonsmokers.
If this proposed idea doesn’t turn heads, I have another one that may work; the campus could improve the awareness amongst students about the campus policy and provide counseling and classes regarding students who want to quit smoking. The incentive to going to the classes or getting counseling could be giving the students nicotine gum or patches to help them ease off the highly addictive nicotine at no cost. The students would have to pay a fee regarding there counseling classes, but it pays off in the end by receiving nicotine gum and patches at no cost. These nicotine patches will help to stop the secondhand smoke exposure to innocent bystanders who could be greatly affected by the long term exposure of this harmful carcinogen.
Did you know that secondhand smoke alone contains more than 4,000 chemical compounds that include the following: Carbon Monoxide which aids in poisoning the human body, Ammonia, and other deadly toxins. This is quite intriguing also, 4 of the chemicals found in second hand smoke: Benzene , 2-naphthylamine, 4-aminobiphenyl, and polonium-210 are classified by the EPA as known carcinogens, cancer causing agents.( US Department of Health & Human Services) Secondhand smoke is just as worse as taking a puff of a good ol menthol cigarette; a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine found that nonsmokers who are exposed to secondhand smoke were 25 percent more likely to have coronary heart diseases compared to nonsmokers not exposed to smoke (Jill P) . I don’t know about you but these statistics are not appealing by any means, second hand smoke is very toxic and harmful to everyone.
The process would go as followed; the University could have a day set aside to present the students the plan of action. They could call it: Tobacco Awareness Day that focuses on the disadvantages of smoking regarding: cancer, second hand smoke, damaging effects on the human body, and bring in people who have been negatively affected by long term usage of tobacco. Various statistics regarding death, cancer, mouth cancer, and second hand smoke affects should be talked