I am writing in response to the article about the “good guy” room on the Lawn (“Paige Deesnyder selected for ‘good guy’ room on West Lawn,” 4/15/2009). My comments are not directed at how the selection committee chose the recipient of the room; from what I can tell Paige Deelsynder is a wonderful young woman and deserves the room she was awarded. Rather, my comments are directed at how the committee handled the process. I nominated a different candidate for the room, and I received an e-mail from someone on the committee stating that my nominee made it to the second round and asking me for additional information. I provided the necessary information, and two weeks later when I hadn’t heard anything about my nominee’s status, I sent a follow-up e-mail asking if a decision had been made. I received no reply. I never heard from anyone on the committee regarding the ultimate status of the person I nominated. I found out by reading The Cavalier Daily at lunch. Obviously people who take the time to write a letter nominating a peer for such a high honor care about the outcome. To me, it seems like common courtesy for the committee to notify those who wrote letters to tell them the ultimate status of their nominee. However, to ignore an e-mail asking about it is downright rude. I hope that the committees in future years handle the process with more grace.

I am responding to Amelia Meyer’s recent column (“A costly culture,” 4/15/2009). While I certainly sympathize with Meyer, I would like to expand the fact set a bit so that one does not form the impression that the Alumni Association exists solely to try to separate hard-working students from their funds.

In this article Meyer criticized the Alumni Association’s “Dress for Success” event held at Banana Republic on April 15 and 16. She had two concerns: “the fact this it is held in a store well-known for selling high-priced clothing . . . [and] the fact that the ad mentions Foxfield implies that it caters to a specific audience.”

I would like to point out that this event was free and open to all students. Students were not required to purchase any items; if they chose to they received a 25 percent discount. Banana Republic offered to host this at the store, a venue convenient to grounds. Foxfield is an event occurring this month that draws a number of University students. Graduation was also mentioned in some of the advertising, but there was no mention of this in her column.

This event is part of year-round series of free programming for students. It was created to assist students in the job interview process. The presentation included interviewing tips – tips on advance preparation, answering and asking the proper questions, and advice on steps following the interview. The second part of the presentation offered advice on attire. Banana Republic officials offered general advice on apparel — for example, noting what jewelry and shoes were appropriate.

The Alumni Association offers a number of extracurricular programs free to students. It has sponsored First-Year Food Fest, Second-Year Lecture series, Third-Year Ring Ceremony, class leadership and numerous seminars including those on internships, personal finance and recently a lecture with Larry Sabato. All of these activities cost the Alumni Association over $250,000, money which comes from alumni donations, fees on non-student activities, etc., and not from student activity fees or other changes to students. There are also numerous scholarships, short-term student loans, assistance to approximately 2,000 student organizations from the U.Va. Fund, and funding for 70 student organizations and student oriented programs in the amount of $459,000 from the Parents Committee which operates from Alumni Hall.

The annual graduation banquet is sponsored by the Fourth-Year Class Trustees. It is meant to offer a less expensive alternative to student and parents who are in town for Finals Weekend and would otherwise need to book reservations and dine at one of Charlottesville’s admittedly fine, but frequently expensive restaurants. The Alumni Association is donating the space and the price, which has been set by the Trustees, covers the cost of food and drink for the event.

And finally, I would like to clear up any misunderstanding about becoming a member of the Alumni Association. It is free to join as a student. Payments for membership are made after you graduate. Membership as a student entitles you to discounts at many local restaurants, clothing stores, the University Bookstore, certain athletic events, hotels and Kaplan Test Prep courses.

As I said earlier, I certainly appreciate the point that Meyer is making in her article, and I think that the Alumni Association is doing all it can to ameliorate the situation.

In The Cavalier Daily’s lead editorial yesterday, (“Adequate response,” 4/15/2009) the Managing Board called for Student Council to “propose solutions instead of resolutions” in order to address discrimination at the University, and I agree that this is needed. Council now has new representatives, committee chairs, and committee members that are poised to start taking action, and to craft projects and programs to address discrimination. The Cavalier Daily also rightly observes that “a bill cannot do very much to address the real issue of discrimination.” However, the same can be said for a lead editorial. If we mean to actually change anything at the University, taking a stand against intolerance is the first step, though it is just one of many. Council, along with The Cavalier Daily, will need to work alongside other student groups to continue standing against hatred. It will take the help of every student to reestablish our community of tolerance and trust with a renewed understanding that bias has no place at the University.

The University Police Department should have immediately notified students of the bias-motivated assault

Since the bias-motivated assault committed April 4 was made public late last week, the long response time from the University has been a point of concern for many. No safety alert was sent by the University Police Department because no weapon was used in the crime, rendering it a simple assault. Lieut. Melissa Fielding said simple assaults occur every day and the department must balance the usefulness of safety alerts with their frequency to maximize their impact. Though this is true, students should have been notified immediately of the bias-motivated assault.

At the time of the incident, the department’s policy on safety alerts was only to notify students when a weapon was used or when there was a likelihood for repetition of the crime. Fielding noted that bias-motivated crimes occur very rarely at the University and the last incidents were in 2005. That year, however there were three incidents of these crimes and all were racially motivated. This shows the potential for repetition of bias-motivated crimes when they do occur. Under the policy in place at the time the department should have notified students of the incident with a safety alert, especially because the perpetrators of the crime were not immediately caught and are still at large.

Since the incident, the department has changed its policy to send out a safety alert when a bias-motivated crime is committed. The department should be commended for recognizing its error and adjusting the policy so quickly. The updated policy, however, highlights that a safety alert was warranted under the original policy.

Student Council can and should do more than buy candles to support the LGBTQ communities

 In response to the bias-motivated assault, Student Council passed a bill last night condemning anti-gay violence and supporting lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer communities at the University. The bill also pledged $350 to purchase 1,000 candles for Thursday’s Stand Against Hatred event that will culminate in a vigil. It can do no harm to reaffirm the values of the University community following an act of blatant discrimination. But a bill cannot do very much to address the real issue of discrimination.

The sponsor of the bill, College representative Eugene Resnick, said Queer and Allied Activism requested money from Council for the event and Council President John Nelson said there was room in the Student Activity Fund budget to purchase candles for the vigil. Both Resnick and Nelson said the money for candles shows the tangible support of Council beyond just words. Nelson added because the vigil is in response to a recent incident and groups were unable to anticipate it in their budgets, Council is ideally positioned to help with funds. Though this is true, if Council wants to take a stand against anti-gay discrimination, it will have to do more than buy candles for one event.

To have a lasting impact in removing discrimination from the University community, Council should pair with QUAA and other groups and individuals to promote awareness and propose solutions. Resnick said academic legitimacy in the form of a Queer Studies Minor would be one example of greater support for LGBTQ communities. This bill is admirable, but further collaboration with LGBTQ communities is needed to find ways to remove discrimination from Grounds. If Council can propose solutions instead of just resolutions, it will have a better chance of addressing discrimination at the University.

The University prides itself on the fact that it is rated one of the most affordable public universities in the country. When the Princeton Review and USA Today rankings were released in January, the University was listed in first place. In response to the rankings, President John T. Casteen III said, “By providing a superior education at a good price and with appropriate sources of financial aid for students from various economic circumstances, we aim to level the playing field for our nation’s young people.”

However, there is more to affordability than tuition costs and room and board fees. Programs provided for students as extracurricular activities, career advancement opportunities, and exercises in class bonding are often prohibitively costly. A student’s experience in the University should be affordable in all respects, including extracurricular activities.

Take the Alumni Association’s “Dress Your Best and Interview for Success” program in which students have the opportunity to hear tips on what constitutes appropriate work attire at Banana Republic this week. Those who register for the program receive a 25 percent discount on everything that they buy in the store that day. “Find that interview outfit (and perhaps one for Foxfield, as well)” reads the announcement advertising the event.

There are two things wrong with this program. First, the fact that it is held in a store well-known for selling high-priced clothing (suit jackets alone can be more than $250) deters a lot of students from attending because they simply can’t afford to spend so much money. Though the event itself is free, students are encouraged to purchase items from an expensive store. Second, the fact that the ad mentions Foxfield implies that it caters to a specific audience, one that can afford to — and that wants to — buy tickets to such an event.

Instead of holding an event that a number of students could potentially benefit from at a prohibitively expensive clothing store, why not hold it at a much more financially accessible location such as a department store? Students who want to spend money on a suit at Banana Republic can still do so, but students who would rather buy something less costly would then have an opportunity to shop somewhere that sells clothing at a variety of different prices.

The Annual Graduation Banquet is another example of a high-cost University-sponsored social activity. The banquet, held in Alumni Hall the Friday before graduation, costs $70 per person. According to the invitation, “The Banquet is the ideal venue for family and friends to enjoy dinner with one another.” Maybe so, but that enjoyment will likely be cut short when you realize it costs $420 for six people to eat dinner there.

Affording college is not only about being able to pay tuition and buy books, although those are two of the most important things to be concerned about. College is about much more, and a student’s experience at the University is undoubtedly affected by the social and extracurricular activities he or she chooses to — or is able to — participate in. Having to miss out on a chance to spend time over dinner with fellow fourth-year students because tickets cost too much, or missing out on a valuable career-building experience because of the price tag on every suit in the store makes a student’s experience here that much less comfortable makes the school feel that much less inviting.

Those at the University who plan activities like those listed above should do more to recognize that the socioeconomic status of students is an important factor in determining the activities they choose or do not choose to participate in during their time at the University. Moreover, the University should accommodate these varying levels of socioeconomic status by subsidizing certain extracurricular activities that warrant students’ participation — activities like career workshops and networking events. Just joining the Alumni Association as a student costs $350.

Fourth Year Trustees President Christina Polenta noted that the Trustees have “attempted to use our budget so that we could provide events to the class that are much less expensive than they would be ordinarily.” This is the right idea — one that the University should work harder to implement in all of its programming.

It is time that socioeconomic status is no longer a factor in determining what activities and events students can or cannot participate in. The student experience at the University should mean more than money.

Amelia Meyer’s column appears Wednesdays in The Cavalier Daily. She can be reached at a.meyer@cavalierdaily.com.

The most critical lesson a person can learn as a young adult is to take responsibility for his actions. At a time when one is being introduced to driving, drinking, drugs, and other choices that will have a lasting impact on one’s life, it’s important for parents and teachers to foster an environment in which young people are able to take responsibility for their actions. The recent suspension of a high school girl in Fairfax County for taking her birth control pill during the school day shows that young adults are not being allowed to nurture their sense of personal responsibility, which can have grave consequences when it comes to venturing out into the world.
College life is fun and exciting in large part because it is the first time most people get to make most of the decisions that affect their everyday life without the input of authority figures. Although there are resources for college students to advise them through their transition from a relatively rigid life structure to a wealth of newfound freedoms, no one is holding their hands through the process. Some students make wise choices and most students make at least one or two bad choices, but the transition from constant surveillance to relative freedom is likely easier for those who have been given doses of freedom and learned to handle themselves responsibly.

At high schools in Fairfax County, students are not allowed to possess or self-administer any drugs, whether they are over-the-counter or prescription. But it is more than likely that most of these students are doing just that whenever they are not in school. It cannot be expected that students stop taking care of their health when they are on school grounds, nor should they feel compelled to put their health in the hands of a school nurse or other administrative figure. It is paramount that students who require prescription pills learn to self-administer those drugs without the supervision or instruction of school officials. In addition, it is reasonable for students with colds or similar ailments to be responsible enough to treat their symptoms during the school day. High school is a time during which young adults learn to handle themselves responsibly, which is a skill that becomes increasingly important as they enter college and eventually the real world. The school rules currently in place regarding over-the-counter and prescription drugs inhibit young adults from acquiring those skills.

If the school is concerned about student safety, it should incorporate lessons about safe drug use into its already existing health classes. Students can be disallowed from sharing over-the-counter or prescription drugs with other students or consuming over-the-counter or prescription drugs outside of a private location such as the bathroom. Such a system would create an environment in which students can learn to take responsibility for their health without endangering others, rather than punishing them for taking control of the situation.

The case of the girl being suspended for two weeks because she took her birth control during the school day highlights the administration’s unwillingness to allow students to take responsibility for themselves. It would have been simpler for the girl to have adjusted her time for taking the pill to some time not within school hours, or to have spoken with the school nurse about keeping a supply of pills for her that should could come take. But in reality, the girl was doing the right thing by taking responsibility for her sexual health and using contraception. It’s ludicrous to encourage students to take responsibility for their health in Family Life Education classes while simultaneously punishing students for taking care of their health during the school day.  

Personal responsibility should be cultivated at all stages of life in order to prepare people for the more serious challenges they will face as they continue to grow, move on to college, and eventually the real world. Current high school policies inhibit students from nurturing their sense of responsibility which can have serious repercussions when those students reach their college years and are faced with a wealth of choices and no directions. High school administrators cannot expect students to stop taking responsibility for themselves during the school day. The life of a student does not stop between the first and last bell.

Michael Khavari’s column appears Wednesdays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at m.khavari@cavalierdaily.com.

There is an elephant in America’s room, and no one wants to talk about it. We have a built instinct to sidestep any unpleasant reminder to weight, to rationalize our expanding bodies, to disbelieve the suspect numbers displayed on scales and to ignore the frequent and desperate calls for change. Nevertheless, obesity is the spreading like the plague amongst Americans, particularly amongst children. Children should not have to experience such a medically traumatic health hazard at such a young age. Childhood obesity should be stopped before they grow into obsese adults, afflicted with various weight-related diseases. It is only by societal recognition, diet, exercise and an understanding of our opponent and invariably its weaknesses that we can ever hope for adults and especially children to regain healthful bodies.  

Childhood is a critical stage of growth and development, both physically and mentally. An extra thirty pounds is a social and health burden that no child should have to endure. Unfortunately, a new study conducted by the National Center on Educational Statistics shows that obesity afflicts 1 in 5 American four year olds. In addition, differences in race were already well established, with 13 percent of Asian children, 16 percent of whites, 21 percent of blacks and 31 percent of American Indians weighing in as obese. This rate is worrisome among children so young, even in a population at higher risk for obesity because of other health problems and economic disadvantages. Marketing firms know that they have a young audience. The average child sees more than 10,000 food ads on TV each year, most for high-calorie, high-fat, and high-sugar meals. The fast food industry spends billions per year on these lucrative marketing ads, and sometimes even infiltrates schools by signing contracts with them. Through these media bombardments and promotion of toxic foods, it is easy to understand why children crave well publicized children’s food, such as happy meals. Perhaps if vegetables were marketed with the same enthusiasm, we would have a different world. As things stand now, it is not surprising that we continue to see an increase in the percent of obese children, who will in time, become a population of obese adults.

Another reason that obesity persists is due to the way that the public views weight problems. It is generally assumed to be a “personal problem,” and is politely ignored by society. Obesity, however, is not merely an aesthetic imperfection: it is a health pandemic. In the past twenty years obesity has increased by 60 percent for adults and, in the past thirty years, tripled in children. Obesity also contributes to type two diabetes, heart disease, increased blood pressure, endocrine and metabolic disorders, polycystic ovary syndrome, hyperinsulinemia, dyslipidemia, reproductive hormonal abnormalities, sexual dysfunction, and infertility. Clearly, obesity crosses the line from a few excess pounds to a national health condition.

While many point fingers at the domination of fast food restaurants in the United States, such as McDonalds, these dining options alone cannot assume the total blame for our eating epidemic. Nonetheless, they do demonstrate a symptomatic American eating impulse that contributes to our nation’s perceived corpulence. Americans are indulging in meals that value expediency and price over nutritional content, and are packed with saturated fats, highly refined carbohydrates, sodium and sugar. The definition of “food” in our culture has been inverted. Once used to describe “any nourishing substance eaten, drunk, or otherwise taken into the body to sustain life, provide energy, and promote growth,” people consume fatty, processed non-nutritional substances that are detrimental to the body’s functions. It becomes hugely problematic when this latter food group constitutes the entirety of a person’s diet, such as director Morgan Spurlock did for his documentary “Super Size Me.” During a month, Spurlock dined exclusively at McDonald’s. In doing so, he took in over 30 pounds of sugar and 15 pounds of fat, and gained twenty-four and a half pounds.

As a national health epidemic, it is our country’s obligation to help citizens prevent the disease. Campaigns against smoking and drunk driving have proved very effective in raising the national consciousness against these public-health issues. As long as the problem of obesity is acknowledged as a real threat, there is no reason that practical solutions can’t affect change. Public service Anti-obesity campaigns are gaining ground, and health officials are requiring restaurants to release their nutritional (or as is more often the case, non-nutritional) information. The U.S. is one of the world’s richest, most progressive and largest nations; there’s no reason for its people to be the largest as well.

Kendra Kirk’s column appears Wednesdays in The Cavalier Daily. She can be reached at k.kirk@cavalierdaily.com.

Nearly 80 percent of all sexually active men and women will contract human papillomavirus at one point during their lifetimes, according to the American Social Health Association.

So why doesn’t it seem that everyone is running into Student Health in a mass panic, believing they have contracted a sexually transmitted infection? The answer perhaps lies in HPV’s misunderstood complexities and the debate surrounding its preventative vaccine Gardasil.

According to the Center for Disease Control, there are more than 100 different HPV strains. Most HPV infections do not cause symptoms.

“There are often no obvious symptoms of having HPV, which is why it is so important [for women] to get their annual pap [smear] to check for internal cellular changes,” said fourth-year College student Julia Villageliu, a Peer Health Educator and Office of Health Promotion intern.

Some infections may actually disappear on their own.  

“Students should know two things about HPV: almost everyone will get a form of the virus at one point and that HPV will not cause problems or cancer unless it is persistent,” said Christine Peterson, gynecology director and physician at Student Health.

Peterson explained that a persistent virus does not exit a person’s body on its own and will cause a patient to develop genital warts if he or she has contracted a low-risk strain or cervical cancer, which is associated with a high-risk strain.

HPV is passed through skin contact and genital contact as well as through vaginal, oral and anal intercourse. The STI can spread rapidly among sexually active people because many men and women who have HPV do not realize it, and can thus easily transmit it unknowingly, said third-year College student Elizabeth Greksouk, a Women’s Center intern and a member of Sexual Assault Leadership Council.

Using condoms is necessary when engaging in any sexual activity to prevent contracting the STI, Villageliu said. Condoms, however, are not the only preventative measure. Approved by the Food and Drug Administration, Gardasil is a vaccine designed to prevent women from contracting the infection. The creation of Gardasil has increased awareness of HPV and how to combat it. Gardasil, which is manufactured by Merck & Co. was approved by the FDA in June 2006.

According to the CDC, Gardasil protects women from four HPV strains — two strains that cause 70 percent of cervical cancer cases and two strains that cause 90 percent of genital warts cases.

The FDA has approved the Gardasil vaccine for females between the ages of 9 and 26. The vaccine could potentially prevent the more than 250,000 deaths of women worldwide that occur each year from cervical cancer. In the United States alone, an estimated 3,800 women die each year from cervical cancer.

Gardasil is offered at Student Health for $149 per shot; three shots are necessary to fully guard oneself against the infection. Although pricey for a college student, many insurance companies are now footing the bill for the regimen, Peterson said. She said she believes that women should get the vaccine before they become sexually active.

“Students still need to be well educated on HPV even if they do choose to vaccinate because the vaccination does not protect against all strains of HPV,” said Jamie Leonard, Peer Health Education coordinator and faculty advisor at the Office of Health Promotion. “Other sexually transmitted infections are spread similar to HPV, so while learning how to protect themselves from HPV, students are also learning how to protect themselves from other STIs.”

Leonard compared Gardasil to the flu shot.

“Even if someone got the flu shot, I wouldn’t advise them to be sharing cups, kissing, etc. with people who they know currently have the flu,” she said.

Despite the evidence from medical professionals and researchers that the vaccine can effectively prevent both cervical cancer and genital warts, controversy still surrounds its administration.   

“First, there is a contingent in society that is just anti-vaccine in general, whether it’s for measles, small pox, HPV, etc.,” Leonard said.
Peterson and Leonard, though, agreed that not vaccinating young women is not an ideal decision.   

“It is a poor decision to not get a young woman vaccinated because at some point, the woman is going to become sexually active,” Leonard said.  

She suggested that instead of trying to ‘guess’ when sexual activity begins, it is more beneficial for girls to get vaccinated when they are young and still not at risk. She added that some parents believe that their daughters cannot acquire the disease because it is sexually transmitted.

“They also may believe that by vaccinating, they are giving their daughters ‘permission’ to have sex,” Leonard said
Greksouk said she does not believe that receiving the vaccine will encourage sexual activity.

“Regardless of the vaccine, there are still plenty of other STIs to discourage against unprotected sex or not staying abstinent, if this is your choice of birth control,” Greksouk said. “Thinking that the vaccine would cause promiscuity or less pap smears is simply uninformed.”

Groups who advocate against the vaccine claim that Gardasil has several potential side-effects including paralysis, permanent injury and death.. Peterson said, however, that these harmful side effects are no more likely to occur from an HPV vaccination than they are from a placebo vaccination.   

Despite the controversy, Villageliu and Greksouk both emphasized the importance of educating students about both HPV and Gardasil.

“With HPV, as with all STIs, know your status,” Villageliu said. “Get your annual pap exams, talk to your sexual partners about their history, talk to your doctor about getting the HPV vaccine. Stay on top of what is happening with your body, and the likelihood that the infection will become serious will be greatly reduced.”

There are many groups on campus that support and educate about HPV and Gardasil, including Peer Health Educators, the Women’s Center and Student Health’s gynecology department. 

The following statement reflects the views of the student initiated movement known as “Justice for Jason Smith.” Before reading, know that we are not Jason Smith’s friends. We are a group of concerned students called to act by a shared sense of conscience and civic duty. We committed ourselves to this movement to oppose the injustice endured by Smith, and to point to the deep flaws in the dysfunctional honor system that is quietly pleading to be saved from itself.

While we cannot claim to know Smith personally, we do claim that the honor case brought against him was improperly carried out and undeniably trivial. Many columns published in The Cavalier Daily over the previous weeks, particularly third-year law student Robert Baldwin’s (“In defense of Jason Smith,” 4/7/2009) support this claim. We are pleased that there is continuing discussion of the many issues and flaws involved with Smith’s case. However, we think that students should also consider the implications of Smith’s case upon the honor system as a whole.

During last week, our group posted flyers in the Central Grounds and McCormick Road area. We intended to keep the University community aware of controversy surrounding the honor trial of Smith. Some of these flyers included the phrase: “Eating your roommate’s pop-tart. Honor Offense? We think not.”

Just two months ago, students overwhelmingly voted against an honor referendum because they agreed with the above statement. Students made it clear that certain acts of lying, cheating and stealing were too small to be considered an honor offense. In a debate hosted by the University Democrats, Nadia Islam, founder of Students for Honor, expressed her worries that if the proposed multi-sanction system passed, students could be punished (though perhaps not expelled) for committing offenses that were trivial. Josh Hess, a prominent member of the Honor Committee wrote in The Cavalier Daily in February, “Imagine a system bent on punishing every indiscretion — punishing students for “trivial” acts of lying, cheating, and stealing with sanctions as grave as suspension.”

The open trial of Smith demonstrates that what Students for Honor and Committee leaders expressed would not happen under the single sanction system, did in fact happen. It would be very easy to say “I told you so” to students who voted “no” on the honor referendum. Under a multi-sanction honor system, Smith would likely fail the class and perhaps face an additional penalty, though he would not be expelled. But a more productive approach than looking to the past at a failed referendum is to ask Students for Honor and the Committee: does this single sanction system work? Can we as a community still hold confidence in the way the honor system works right now?

The Committee assured students that ‘non-trivial’ acts could not be punished. But the Committee never draws the line between what is trivial and what is non-trivial. Can someone be expelled for using a fake ID? Can someone be expelled for lying to their roommate? Can someone be expelled for telling their teaching assistant they were sick and could not come to class? We are confident that were the University to poll 100 students with these questions, we would get a variety of answers.

So we ask Students for Honor and the Committee this: What makes Smith’s lie more non-trivial than someone using a fake ID? What makes Jason Smith’s lie more non-trivial than telling someone you’ll call them the next day?

Help us save Smith from injustice. Help us save our honor system.

Michael Hamilton and Eric Huang are fourth-year students in the College and administrators of the Facebook group "Justice for Jason Smith.”

Sometimes I wake up in the morning in terror. Everything is blurry. I mistake my notebook for a piece of toast. I call my roommate the wrong name twice because I can’t distinguish her face from a distance. When I finally find my glasses, I realize I have been talking to a chair the entire time. I have terrible eye sight; without my corrective lenses, my face is pressed so close to a computer monitor, I can see the tiny squares that make up the screen. Without my 5-inch thick glasses, I never mosey out at night or enter public bathrooms. The world is a scarier place when everything looks like a blob.

For the visually impaired, like me, there are three options to improve your vision. One, some choose to swap in their eyes for a new pair. Tom Cruise, for instance, went through this particular procedure in the movie “Minority Report,” but for normal people who make less than a million dollars per year, this isn’t probable (I would also look really weird with blue or green eyes). Second, there are your standard prescription eye glasses or contacts. This option is perfectly acceptable if one is willing to endure the small annoyances: glasses can give headaches, smudge and leave an annoying mark on the nose, while contacts can dry out, tear or — my personal favorite — be washed down the sink by accident. The third option is to throw down big bucks and undergo LASIK surgery. Although it’s pricey, this last option is growing more popular throughout the United States.

LASIK stands for Laser Assisted In Situ Keratomileusis, or in plain English, a procedure that reshapes the cornea (the clear covering of the front of the eye) with an excimer laser. The cornea is a part of the eye that focuses light to create an image on the retina, much like how a camera lens works. Vision problems arise when the shape of the cornea and the eye are imperfect, which makes the image on the retina seem unfocused or blurry. Problems with the eye focusing are called refractive errors, which include three primary vision errors: myopia, hyperopia and astigmatism. Myopia, or nearsightedness, makes seeing distant objects difficult whereas hyperopia, or farsightedness, makes seeing near objects difficult. Astigmatism is a distortion of the image on the retina caused by irregularities in the cornea, which makes it difficult to focus on fine detail.

While glasses and contacts simply compensate for these imperfections, LASIK surgery removes corneal tissue with a laser to reshape the cornea and improve its focusing power. Although I’ve never given LASIK a try, the procedure sounds relatively straightforward. A flap of the cornea is cut by a hand-held microkeratome blade or a laser keratome. A hinge is left at one end of the flap, which is then folded back to reveal the stroma (the middle section of the cornea). A laser then vaporizes part of the stroma and the flap is replaced. Although LASIK may sound like some complex and time-consuming procedure from “Star Wars,” it only takes about 30 minutes. Post-operation procedures include checkups with the doctor, antibiotic eye drops, “artificial” tear drops and an eye shield to protect the corneal flap during healing. Overall, about 90 percent of nearsighted and 82 percent of farsighted LASIK patients report improved vision. Some people’s vision improves immediately, while others gradually improve within several weeks or months. It is also important to remember that LASIK has both benefits and risks, just like any other surgical procedure. LASIK is not particularly recommended for pregnant women, minors and people with health problems. Patients may risk losing their vision completely, and others may experience problems with light glares or severe dry eye symptoms. LASIK does not guarantee 20/20 vision, especially for people with very poor vision, and those who receive LASIK surgery may still need to wear contacts and glasses after surgery. For farsighted individuals, the results may decline with age. About 1 to 2 percent of patients have complications from surgery, 6 percent of patients develop complications within the first three months and between 5 to 10 percent return for a second procedure.

Although LASIK is becoming more affordable, its cost mostly depends on the equipment, doctor and procedure. According to USAEyes.org, the average cost for LASIK is about $1,350 per eye. Be wary of bargain deals that promise LASIK for only a few hundred dollars.

Health insurances and Medicare usually do not cover the surgery. Though the LASIK procedure certainly can sound appealing, doctors recommend that people who have health problems or severely dry eyes may want to reconsider the option. The same goes for those of us who are active in contact sports or employed in specific career fields.

Whatever vision correction option is the right one, the bottom line is that I want to one day see a stop sign without having to stand right in front of it. I hope to drive home on Interstate 64 without my contacts ripping or popping out. I want to be like those hipsters who wear nerdy thick-rimmed glasses just for style. Or, I want a couple thousand dollars to pay for LASIK.

Does anyone accept Cavalier Advantage?

Alex Truong is a fourth-year College student. He can be reached at a.truong@cavalierdaily.com.