THE STUDENT VOICE SINCE 1904
THE UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
FRIDAY, APRIL 29, 2011
WWW.KANSAN.COM
VOLUME 123 ISSUE 143
TIME is not on our side
Is too much work and too little time putting students' health at risk?
BY JOSH HAFNER editor@kansan.com
when Claire Kerwin awakens, she can see nine square markings spaced across her lower back, the fuzzy borders of residue and lint that days-old Band-Aids leave after removal. But these aren't from Band-Aids. Each square represents a patch adhered to her skin, applying the stimulant methylphenidate to boost alertness, energy and focus. A junior in architecture, Kerwin hoped to bend the limits of time, or at least of her own body, to meet a project deadline. The patches kept her awake for 78 hours straight.
Illustration by Kirk Whit
Lizzy Alonzi, a junior in computer science, spent about 30 hours each week on homework for just one programming class. Grueling late nights spent staring at screens in Eaton Hall's computer lab wore down her mental and emotional health every week.
"It's too much," said Alonzi. "It's brutal."
Steven Heger had been dating Erin Brown for six years when he began building Formula-style cars for Jayhawk Motorsports, the University's automotive racing team and capstone project for
mechanical engineering seniors He works 12 hours a day on the car, Monday through Friday, leaving little time for Erin, now his fiancee.
"Erin says I love the car more than her," Heger said.
Here and at other universities across the country, time-intensive programs require students to work
They learn, work, eat and often sleep there in an attempt to bring design ideas to life as scaled-down buildings.
"I started hallucinating," Kerwin said of her 78 hours without sleep. "It was before a review, where you take everything you completed before a project — site plans, floor plans and so on. Those are the times you get little sleep in studio."
50- to 100-hour weeks preparing for careers where such commitments are either compensated or illegal. Along the way, students must choose daily between their professional futures and their own health. Often, they endanger both.
Studio, the class and classroom where design models are built plays a demanding role in the world of architecture students.
The patches Kerwin used were prescribed to her as an ADHD medication. Its makers recommend one per day for nine hours. She applied a fresh patch every eight hours, for three days.
When you work 74 hours every week, something has to give.
That semester, Kerwin worked at studio most nights from 6 p.m. until 2 a.m., or "around eight hours a night, five days a week." That's 40 hours — for most, a full workweek. The actual class for Kerwin's studio met three times each week for four
and a half hours each class. That's 13 and a half hours. On rough weeks, Kerwin would pull two "all nighters," working straight through until morning. That's 12 more. Adding it up, she often worked 65 hours per week, all for one class. If Kerwin opted to attend her non-studio classes instead of squeezing in a nap, that number rose to 74 hours.
But when you work 74 hours every week, something has to give.
With little time to cook healthy meals, she ate mostly junk food, preferably Cheez-Its. She rarely exercised or maintained friendships with students outside of studio. She drank so many Rockstar energy drinks to stay up one semester that, as a joke, she began pinning them on her studio's wall. There were more than 100 cans in all. The high caffeine in energy drinks causes dehydration, and dehydration causes kidney stones, which Kerwin developed in following months.
SEE TIME ON PAGE 3A
Classifieds...9A
Crossword...7A
Cryptoquips...7A
Opinion...6A
Sports...10A
Sudoku...7A
All contents, unless stated otherwise, © 2011 The University Daily Kansan
ONLINE AT KANSAN.COM
Highway speed limits may rise because of new bill
Gov. Sam Brownback signed a bill that will allow multi-lane highways to raise speed from 70 mph to 75 mph.'
FOOTBALL | 10A
Annual football spring game set for Saturday
The coaches will decide if this game will be in a traditional game format or a less-formal defense versus offense game.
---