College's Too Fat to Graduate rule under fire.

[DaemonSeid]

Originally Posted by AOII Angel

It's not a great measure when you are looking at the line between normal and overweight for athletes with high muscle content. It is a VERY good measure of the level of obesity. You aren't going to find a healthy athlete with a BMI over 30. As for extreme weight lifters, they usually are over weight and can be obese.

webmd's BMI debate

[naraht]

I wouldn't be all that surprised to find out that the BMI measure might be used somehow by some of the Military Academies...

[AOII Angel]

Originally Posted by DaemonSeid

webmd's BMI debate

And none of that contradicted what I said. Yes, the distribution of fat does make a huge difference in how unhealthy your fat is, but nobody who is ranked as "obese" has healthy levels of fat no matter what the distribution of fat they have. All physicians would recommend that they lose weight.

[rhoyaltempest]

I am very familiar with Lincoln U. since my alumnae chapter advises our undergrad chapter there but this is the first I'm hearing of this. I'm with the girl that said that she wouldn't have a problem with this rule if everyone were made to take the course and I agree.

There is a huge misconception out there that "skinny = healthy" and this is just not the case. There are lots of out of shape skinny folks out there that eat nothing but junk. The biggest difference is their metabolisms.

I have a very skinny friend that never exercises, eats nothing but junk and fast food at all times of the day and night, and has a freakish metabolism so she never gains weight, but who's to say that her bad eating habits and sedentary lifestyle won't catch up with her one day? The last I checked, not only fat people get sick. This mentality has to change.

[pbear19]

I think this is a horrific rule. Not because they are doing it, but because they are choosing a select group that have to take this class that has nothing to do with their academic prowess. And to say that someone with a 30 BMI is more in need of a health class than someone with a 15 BMI is extraordinarily offensive. BMI is just not a measure of a person's health acumen in any way.

I also don't buy the "they knew about it when they enrolled" argument. I certainly didn't know every requirement of my undergrad institution when I chose to matriculate, and I doubt everyone here did, either. I learned about them after I was already a student. My first semester freshman classes were assigned to me, I did not get to register myself until second semester.

Should they have waited until their final year? No. But that doesn't matter in the grand scheme of how wrong this is. I would be very upset if I were forced to pay for 3 hours of a class that was solely based on my weight, when not every student was required to pay for the same class. Maybe if there was some way to test out of it, like there is for the "math and communications" issues they reference. Because a person with a 30 BMI is perfectly capably of being in much better shape than someone with a 28 BMI, and a person with a 30 BMI can be ridiculously knowledgeable about fitness and nutrition. The inability to manage weight does not automatically equate to being slovenly and uneducated about health.

I think a required health element is a good thing. But it's amazingly poor judgment to say that only some students have to take it, irrespective of the knowledge or abilities in the subject.