Audition 101: It takes confidence and passion
Singing, dancing or acting in front of an anonymous panel of judges can be nerve-wracking. But nerves rarely know best.
Use the fields below to perform an advanced search of The Daily Tar Heel's archives. This will return articles, images, and multimedia relevant to your query. You can also try a Basic search
55 items found for your search. If no results were found please broaden your search.
Singing, dancing or acting in front of an anonymous panel of judges can be nerve-wracking. But nerves rarely know best.
Sophomore Gabby Seider prefers painting on her own.
With improvisation, there are no plans.Greg Hohn, a business school adjunct lecturer, never planned on becoming an improvisation artist.He graduated with a degree in English from UNC in 1985 and worked four years in journalism before auditioning for the Transactors, the improv group he now leads. By trial and error, Hohn began to develop the concept of applying improvisation to real life. For the past 10 years, he’s taken this skill to the classroom, teaching students how to apply improv to their careers.His style of improv isn’t meant as entertainment but forces students to make conversation without any preparation.Hohn said he took the class activities with the most depth and put them together to create the course, which now evolves constantly.“The applied improv curriculum that I teach comes out of my experiences,” he said. “My students told me that they were using what they learned in class in outside situations, and I started thinking, that makes sense.”Hohn was asked by the business school dean, Jim Dean, to teach the class 10 years ago as a part of the business communications program at UNC’s Kenan-Flagler Business School. The school was looking for an innovative curriculum, and Hohn agreed.The course, taught at UNC and Duke University, relies on the fast-paced, on-the-spot thinking that defines improvisation. By applying these concepts to business, the class helps students to think on their feet.Jeff Cornell, associate chairman of the Department of Dramatic Art, said improvisation creates honest response in people.“It demands there be an awareness of what’s happening and a response to the circumstance,” Cornell said. “In that sense, it demands authenticity and truth, hopefully some wit, but at the core, authentic-ness.”The comedic improvisation most students are familiar with, by groups like CHiPS, is different than improvisation used in Hohn’s teaching, Cornell said.“It involves similar skills, but in an acting class, improv tests relationships,” Cornell explained. “It’s not for entertainment; it’s a rehearsal — a tool used for investigating.”Hohn teaches the improvisation skills he learned in the theater.“One of the first things I tell students is just to come in and try to be honest,” Hohn said. “Don’t worry about being funny or clever or anything like that. If you just be yourself, you can be funny or clever.”Angela Czahor, a 2009 Duke graduate, had tried to take Hohn’s “Communication, Improv, and Business” class multiple times.“I’m actually glad I didn’t get in until my senior year,” Czahor wrote in an e-mail. “The practice and theory was fresh in my mind during job search and recruitment.”Czahor says Hohn’s class was a mix of the expected and unexpected exercises, all of which helped her communication skills to improve.“Every conversation is different and can veer off into many directions based on what the customer says,” she said. “Greg’s class helped me prepare for that.”Heidi Schultz, area chairwoman for the management and corporate communication department of the business school, said the classes help develop fun conversation skills.“Our students get a lot of experience with analytical, hard skills,” she said. “This class allows them to develop those other skills focused on communication.”After developing the applied improv for 10 years, Hohn says he feels fortunate about the development and influence of his career.Professors at other schools have asked about starting their own programs, Hohn said.“They ask, ‘How did you do it?’ I stuck to it and I got lucky, I suppose,” he said. “I just try to live the improviser’s life.”Contact the Arts Editor at artsdesk@unc.edu.
On the other side of the world, dancing is far from just a hobby.Traditional dances in many Asian countries celebrate harvest, history, celebration and courtship.Despite the barriers that keep Eastern and Western cultures apart, dance is a way to bridge the Pacific and bring Asian culture to UNC.Here’s a look at a few of the ways students have gotten involved in some of the University’s Asian dance groups.Indian danceJunior Priya Bose was born in India but moved to America at a young age. She grew up with Indian dance.“My mom always tried to incorporate something Indian into our life,” she said.Bose trained for 10 years in bharata natyam, one of the oldest dance forms in India, until “dance graduation.”“Graduation is basically the most important part of bharata natyam,” she explained. “You have to graduate and show that you are competent in your dance style.”At UNC, Bose joined Chalkaa, a dance fusion team with foundations in popular Indian dance.Dancers fuse various Indian styles with elements from modern American dance to form an original type of performance.Chinese danceSophomore Sijie Chen came to the U.S. from China with more than a decade of formal training in ballet, traditional and modern Chinese dance.“My mom, she was a music teacher. She played the piano, and I would dance along,” Chen said. “She saw that I had talent and sent me to dancing classes.”In high school, Chen was active in school events and talent shows. In college, however, she has only performed once.As a member of the Asian Students Association, Chen choreographed and performed a dance she called “Phoenix,” after the Chinese symbol for good luck.“In the dance, I was expressing the grace of the bird and the passion, how they struggle through different things,” she said.Chen said folk dancing for women stresses use of the arms and the waist to show flexibility.“Gracefulness and showing the beauty of the feminine side is really important to folk dancing,” she said. Japanese danceKamikazi is another of UNC’s competition dance groups, focusing more on hip-hop styles with a base in Japanese culture. The group, which began in 1996, was the first co-ed dance group at the University.“At first, the group was mostly Asian students and was tightly in conjunction with the ASA,” said freshman dancer Jade Palmer. “Then it began to branch out. We still have deeply Asian roots, but the team is really diverse.”Kamikazi members promote diversity through their choice of dances without limiting their style.“We encourage all different types of dancers and dances,” said junior Alex Li, the group’s director.The main focus of Kamikazi isn’t competition — it’s camaraderie.“We hang out and dance outside of practice for fun, study together and give each other support in other endeavors,” Palmer said. “It’s the most supported I’ve felt since I started dancing.”Contact the Arts Editor at artsdesk@unc.edu.
Using a variety of pipes, colored glass and flame, local artists are turning clear glass into colorful works of arts.Dmitri Resnik, his sister, Sally Resnik Rockriver, and Jonathan Davis each call glass art a career, earning their living producing aesthetic pieces.They use different methods, working with either a furnace or flamework, to create functional and nonfunctional works.FlameworkLocal farmer and glass artist Davis works with a torch to create his pieces, a technique called flameworking.Davis has a studio in Pittsboro where he creates his art and teaches classes. Though he works with torches, he doesn’t teach or make pipes.He says the art of flamework just fell into his lap. After dabbling in classes at a variety of universities and community colleges, Davis landed a job when a friend opened a glass blowing studio in Durham and asked him to help out.“I’d never wanted to do glass art, I didn’t have a particular draw to glass,” he said. Davis makes wine and champagne glasses, though they are too delicate to be used, and is developing skills to sculpt the human form.Sculpture versus functionRockriver creates innovative abstract sculptures with glass.Her favorite pieces are those that remind her of other planets, as well as earthly geological formations. Often, she grows rock formations within her glass vessels, an art form she calls geochemical sculpture.Rockriver graduated from UNC with a degree in art before teaching ceramic art at Minnesota State University Moorhead. She took a class there in glass blowing and pursued more formal training in working glass in a furnace before returning to Chapel Hill.“I enjoy making things that do and say what I want to make,” Rockriver said. “My work is definitely nonfunctional.”To her, however, it’s the process that matters most. “I like the act of making all of my work, but that doesn’t mean I necessarily like everything I make,” she said.Rockriver’s brother, Resnik, also pursues this rare trade. Resnik traveled to New Orleans to pursue a music career in rhythm and blues once he graduated from UNC.He then added visual arts to his musical career after making a paperweight in his sister’s glass studio and studying at the New Orleans School of GlassWorks & Printmaking Studio.Resnik prefers to create functional pieces, including usable vases, bottles and paperweights.“I try to make traditional forms with basic color application,” he said.He wants to make his art accessible to a larger group of consumers by combining aesthetics and practicality.“Not everyone can buy a $2,500 sculpture for their coffee table,” Resnik said. “But anyone can buy a $50 bottle or a $20 paperweight.”PipesFor college students, the most familiar form of glass art usually is its most controversial — a pipe.Davis compared pipe-making to graffiti art as an underground art form that is mainly misunderstood.“Some people appreciate it, some people get it,” Davis said. “It’s funny how these things morph into what is publicly acceptable.”Pipes are made through flamework, not through furnace work. All the artists agreed it is a taboo art form.“When I studied in school, the teachers asked, ‘You’re not going to take these skills and just make bongs, are you?’” Resnik said. “There are way too many people out there making pipes.”Contact the Arts Editor at arts@unc.edu.
Junior Cody Hughes will be defending his title against 23 other UNC students tonight as they vie for one of several opening spots for comedian Lewis Black — an opportunity Hughes has won for the past two years.
Scholars of art history, English and performance communication at first seem to have little in common to chat about.
It has historically been a woman’s job to heal the soul and spirit.With the Sonja Haynes Stone Center’s newest exhibit, “La Sombra y el Espíritu: Women’s Healing Rituals in the Diaspora,” the tradition continues.The exhibit, consisting of photographic self-portraits by UNC alumna Wendy Phillips and oil paintings by Lucía Méndez, brings together two separate projects that explore the role of women’s healing rituals in Hispanic communities. Both display strong women and empowering figures.Artists usually submit works to the center, which are reviewed and chosen by a committee. But this project was different.“This semester, we don’t have an arching theme, but we’re tying in to the performing arts theme of the diaspora idea,” said Ursula Littlejohn, the program coordinator at the Stone Center.This school year, UNC is linking film, lectures and theater with the theme of diaspora, a migration of people from their homelands.Joseph Jordan, director of the Stone Center, knew both of the artists and realized their works could be combined to demonstrate the diaspora theme.For Phillips, a black woman who studied in Mexico when working on this project, her experience with the artwork was extremely personal.“I had been doing family history research and because of the circumstances of the slave trade, I got to a point where I just couldn’t find any more information about my ancestors,” she said. “I just hit a wall.”While in Mexico, Phillips heard about nearby communities of people of African descent and began working on a documentary project. These communities inspired Phillips’ new photography project.“Wendy roamed to find her place, to find her calling,” Jordan said.Her collection is divided into two parts: La Limpia and La Sombra. La Limpia is a cleansing set, composed of Phillips’ self-portraits taken in her garden. La Sombra, meaning the soul or the shadow, is a collection interpreting an embodiment of the soul devoid of the body and is made up of smaller prints.Méndez was not at the exhibit’s opening Thursday, but her presence could be felt through her bold, bright illustrations of the healing woman.Freshman Chelsey Robertson joined classmates in attending the event for extra credit.“I think it is really cool, and I’m anxious to hear more about them, what they’re all about,” Robertson said about the works.Though they work in different mediums, both artists speak to the migratory theme.“It allows us to continue to delve into diaspora,” Jordan said at the event. “Not only what it means, but how it makes meaning in our lives.”Contact the Arts Editor at arts@unc.edu.
At first, there seems to be little in common between the UNC glee clubs and the club made famous by the FOX television show.There are no pop culture songs and there are no flashy dance moves; instead, there are formal choral arrangements and a much more classic repertoire.But between both stands the common thread of a love for music.“Singing, I think, is a really good example of what arts should achieve, an expression of our higher selves,” said senior Colin Richardson, president of the UNC men’s glee club. “It covers the full breadth of human emotions. I feel like I’m allowed to be more expressive of my joys and sorrows.”On Sunday, the men and women’s glee clubs performed their fall concert, where there were no dances or pop songs. “We aren’t a show choir,” said Isabella Archer, president of the UNC women’s glee club.In May 2009, FOX premiered its television show, “Glee,” which immediately gained a huge cult following.Dan Huff, director of the UNC men’s glee club since 1992, said he refuses to watch the show.“It doesn’t have any sense of the music,” he said. “It takes a bunch of misfits who all love music and makes them stars. That’s not the point of a glee club.”Though not all glee participants are quite as against the show as Huff, none feel that it is an accurate depiction.“The interest in the show is the personal relationship,” said Sue Klausmeyer, director of the UNC women’s glee club. “Our purpose is to produce choral excellence.”The show has had a larger effect on the community’s awareness of what glee club is more than it has had on the membership or musical selections chosen.“Whenever I say, ‘I’m president of the glee club,’ people ask, ‘Is it like the show?’” Richardson said.Archer calls “Glee” her guilty pleasure.“I think ‘Glee’ is a good thing. It’s raised awareness about the club and about singing,” she said. “I’m glad our club doesn’t have that much drama, but it is fun to watch.”Although Klausmeyer has never watched the show, her passion for glee clubs is apparent. “The thing I love about choral music is that the voice is such a personal thing,” Klausmeyer said. “You are the instrument. Every breath you take turns into tones.”The main misconception that club members said they wished to set straight is that they aren’t a motley crew of misfits.“TV ‘Glee’ is so dorky,” Archer said. “In high school or university, glee doesn’t hold that connotation. It’s not a dorkfest.” Contact the Features Editor at features@unc.edu.
West Coast natives Max Rose and Colby Isabel met at UNC with a common goal — to surf.Modeling after the surf club at UNC-Wilmington, the freshmen proposed a similar organization at UNC-Chapel Hill with the goal of breathing new life into the surf community.The club’s main purpose is to put together trips for members to travel to North Carolina’s beaches, sometimes to compete but mainly to spend time together surfing.“I’d heard of a surf club at UNC, but no one was really doing anything,” said Isabel, a business major originally from Los Angeles.“I figured this would be a good time to start it anew.”The two created a Facebook group, their main outlet for generating interest. In the first hour, the group gained about 60 members.“Basically, we invited everyone we know, and it kind of exploded,” Isabel said.Isabel said he enjoys surfing due to its uniqueness.“I love fast-paced sports, where you have to push the limit,” Isabel said.“You can express yourself. I get to have my own style.”Rose, a biology and psychology double major from Seattle, said he hopes the club will attract both advanced and novice surfers.“It’s definitely not just for advanced people. It’s there to get people into the sport, to get them interested,” he said. “It’s a great way to bond and spend time.”Senior Sarah King, a French and political science double major and surf club member, agrees with Rose.“It’s a great way to connect with other students who share my enthusiasm for the sport,” she said.The club currently has about 84 members.But beaches are not easy to come by around Chapel Hill. The trips can’t be regularly scheduled, however, due to the volatility of surfing conditions.“Surfing’s not like skiing or snowboarding, where, if there’s snow in the mountains, you can go,” Rose said. “It’s a lot more weather dependent.”He said he hopes that trips can be as regular as once a month during the fall and winter.On campus, when they aren’t surfing, club members hope to raise awareness and money for the Surfrider Foundation, a nonprofit organization dedicated to protecting the oceans and shores of the world.The UNC surf club’s funds would be donated directly to conservation and protection through Surfrider.“As a surfer, (the ocean lines are) one of the things that you’re interested in or care about,” Isabel said. “You can’t surf with crap on the beaches. That’s not a good environment at all.”And, to the club’s founders, environment is what surfing is all about.“When I go surfing, I don’t have to worry about anything else — work, school, anything like that,” Rose said. “It’s getting into this nature, kind of, just feeling alive.”Contact the Features Editor at features@unc.edu.
Needles won’t be necessary to find out what color you bleed this Homecoming week.The Orange County Red Cross, along with FOX 50, is holding its second annual homecoming T-shirt competition between UNC, Duke, N.C. State and N.C. Central to see which university bleeds its colors the most. Each school has a shirt that is specific to its fans, and whichever school sells the most is named the winner. All proceeds go to the Red Cross.“Last year, UNC squashed the competition,” said Wilma Palmer, blood services coordinator for the Orange County Red Cross. “But really, every chapter wins, considering the extra funding we are receiving.”This year’s competition is different from its predecessor. In addition to the drive’s sponsors are volunteers from an English 102 class at UNC that focuses on business writing.Julie Fann, the teaching assistant for the class, and her students have created a business proposal detailing their plans to improve the T-shirt competition’s marketing techniques. The Red Cross and FOX 50 will be selling these T-shirts on the four universities’ campuses and online.“Doing something like this requires a lot of planning,” said Brett Barnard, a freshman in Fann’s class. “We’ve had to put everything into writing. It is a very realistic sense of what it’s like to be a part of a business.”Fann approached Palmer after designing a unit for the class about nonprofit organizations. Palmer suggested that Fann’s class get involved in the competition rather than create a new blood drive.“It seemed like an ideal opportunity for my students to improve an already existing program,” Fann said. “This allows them to do writing that matters.”Fann is hoping the project, which pairs the Christian fellowship group Chi Alpha, Fox 50 and the Orange County Red Cross with her class, will encourage her students to get involved in the community as well as show them that the skills learned in class are useful in everyday life.“They’ve really taken the project and run with it,” Fann said. “They had to actually practice being business people, which I’m sure was intimidating but also probably empowering.”Organizers have discussed a prize but have not yet decided on one.“A lot has been on the table, but none are clear winners,” Palmer said.Palmer said she hopes more T-shirts will be sold this year than the last.“The more the better,” Palmer said. “We want to get people pumped.”Contact the Features Editor at features@unc.edu.
Tiffany Kim Dixon has Southern California charm. But for one hour every Monday, the soothing voice and beaming smile are replaced by authoritative lessons on the eye-poke and other mixed martial arts elements.Dixon, a senior psychology major from San Diego, teaches self-defense at Rams Head Recreation Center as part of UNC’s Wun Hop Kuen Do Self-Defense Club.The classes showcase a combination of popular martial arts as methods of practical self-defense.“I love the art,” Dixon said. “I think it’s an excellent way to stay in shape and also gives me practical knowledge of how to defend myself.”Dixon studied martial arts for nine years before coming to UNC. She instructs students on positions like the “glass horse” and the “tiger stance” as a base for defending themselves against foes.“Usually the biggest factor is surprise when someone gets assaulted,” she said. “My main goal is to expose them to a situation. This gives them efficient and quick technique to get out of it.”Noah Seymore, a junior who regularly attends Dixon’s class, said he was a fencer in high school but dropped the sport so he could focus on mixed martial arts.“I thought this would be a more useful skill,” he said. “It’s better to know it and not need it than need it and not have it.”Each class begins with about 10 minutes of warm-up exercises, where students stretch, gallop and run around the room.When it comes time for the self-defense element, attendees bow first and then assume various positions. The poses, such as the “medium cat stance” and the “three-point stance,” are reminiscent of yoga.Dixon’s commanding words and hands-on demonstrations lead all activities.“You just have to encourage them to do it. You can’t learn martial arts if you don’t do it,” she said.After practicing their poses and doing several exercises that include kicking and punching, students spend the last 15 minutes of the class grapple sparring, in which one participant is pinned to a mat and must defend himself against an aggressor.“In a real-life situation, you’d have a lot more adrenaline and rage, and this is more controlled,” said J.J. McLaughlin, a freshman from Rocky Mount.“It’s more just taking the techniques we learn in class and putting it together.”McLaughlin said the class was his first martial arts experience, but he would recommend mixed martial arts to all people interested in understanding how to protect themselves.“It’s just really nice because most of the stuff is like street fighting,” he said.Contact the Features Editor at features@unc.edu.
Hidden behind walls of ivy and tucked between the quaint houses of Rosemary Street, La Residence Restaurant & Bar is a beacon of nostalgia.Inside, Frank Sinatra croons, wooden floors creak and imitation lanterns hang, bouncing light off the golden yellow walls and wrapping patrons with intimate comfort.Stepping into La Residence for the first time feels like stepping into the house of an old friend, which is what the family that owns the restaurant strives for.“We’ve always tried to maintain a home environment,” said owner Frances Gualtieri, a 1973 UNC graduate who bought the restaurant from former business partners Moreton Neal and Bill Neal in 1992.La Residence, commonly known as La Rez, started as a catering business in the 1970s. The Neals opened the first La Rez in Pittsboro in 1976, becoming the “only fine dining restaurant between Washington and Atlanta,” Gualtieri said. La Residence moved to Chapel Hill two years later to escape Chatham County’s dry law.“The alcohol was a big factor in the move,” Gualtieri said with a laugh. “But a majority of our clientele lived in the Triangle area, so Chapel Hill was a more ideal location.”In 1986, Gualtieri and her husband became partners with the Neals, expanding the family business.“Our careers were so far apart, we wanted a family business to give our family jobs,” Gualtieri said.Working together has only strengthened the relationship of the Gualtieri family. Three Gualtieri children work at the restaurant. “We have our hard times,” said Dieter Gualtieri, the eldest son and La Residence’s general manager. “With your mom as your boss, you can only imagine. But it has definitely made our family stronger. Not many people can say they see their mom every day.”The Gualtieri sons grew up in the restaurant, washing dishes, bussing tables and bartending. Now, two work as managers and the third is in college.The restaurant also provided jobs for extended family and friends, which only made the business more enjoyable for Frances Gualtieri.“I always know there’s someone here to do things my way,” Frances said. “I know my family values are being extended even when I’m not here.”Dieter Gualtieri said La Rez adapts to the college culture.“We adapt to meet the market,” he said. “We fit it — not the other way around.”Frances said the restaurant does not pursue profit as its only goal. She said the restaurant works with its loyal customers to keep events within customers’ budgets.“I don’t need the money, really,” she says. “I love taking care of people.”Contact the Features Editor at features@unc.edu.
North Carolina’s beloved soft drink brand, Cheerwine, is on the hunt for its first “Czar of Chillocity” at UNC. The chosen representative will pass out Cheerwine cans to students at campus events and persuade local retailers to carry the drink.UNC is the first school chosen to participate in this contest, which asks students to submit videos explaining why they should represent Cheerwine.It represents the beginning of a new grassroots marketing effort for the Salisbury-based brand of cherry soda. “UNC is such a popular school, a destination school, for so many students,” said Tom Barbitta, vice president of marketing for Cheerwine. “Chapel Hill fits the bill.”Barbitta said the chosen individual needs to have a laid-back energy similar to how the beverage is marketed. Other requirements include being an undergraduate student at UNC, in good academic standing and having no criminal record.“They’re going to be the voice and face of the brand in the greater Chapel Hill area — an extension of the brand itself,” he said. “We’re looking for someone who has a lot of energy, but is also really good at connecting with people in their own way.”If the campaign is successful, Barbitta said the contest will be expanded to other universities in the future. Announced at the end of August, Cheerwine’s hunt for a czar is open until Oct. 9. Those applying for the position must submit a video to cheerwineczar.com explaining why they would be the best representative. A panel of judges will choose 10 videos to be posted on the Web site for the public to vote on. The “Czar of Chillocity” will be named sometime after Dec. 1.The chosen representative will serve as the czar for all of 2010.Dana Kleber, a freshman from New Bern, said she thinks a czar is a good advertising tool, although she does not plan on applying.“It gives you one person to go to that everyone knows. Like, ‘Hey, there’s the Cheerwine guy’,” she said.Freshman Jenna Amoroso, originally from Long Island, N.Y., didn’t know what Cheerwine was but thinks the campaign effort will be effective.“I do think, in a big location where they can reach a lot of people, (free drinks) are good advertising,” she said. “Everyone likes free stuff, especially college kids.”The representative will be evaluated by the company on how well the czar interacts with people and helps the brand expand. Barbitta said he hopes the grassroots element of the campaign will appeal to local customers. By targeting consumers with close-to-home appeal, Cheerwine is hoping to revitalize its brand.“We aren’t at arms’ length on every street corner in America,” Barbitta said. “We are one of those brands that people have to discover.”Barbitta said he hopes engaging college students will lead to a successful campaign.“We are finding out as we talk to students that young consumers tend to gravitate toward smaller, independent companies,” he said. “We wanted to give young people a chance to participate in it, as they are as much a part of this as we are.”Contact the Features Editor at features@unc.edu.
Stephen Wiley, now a sophomore, was a skinny boy from Fuquay-Varina when he started at UNC. Armed with 105 meals and a few hundred flex dollars per semester, he conquered the freshman 15 — and then some.Rarely, stories of the dreaded freshman 15 turn out well. Some people cry because they can’t fit into their favorite shorts. Others let 15 pounds pass — then 20, then 50 — and are absolutely baffled as to their newfound lack of a healthy immune system.“During the school year, I gained about 35 pounds,” Wiley said. “But it was a healthy gain. I started out really skinny, like 120 pounds. Now I’m normal-sized.”It was not necessarily Wiley’s goal to gain weight and boost his “level of attractiveness,” as he said. The sophomore credits his gradual onslaught of weight to irregular meal times and a slowed metabolism (plus a routine Bandido’s Mexican Cafe lunch).“I would sometimes eat two dinners,” Wiley said. “Generally, I ate about four meals a day.”Because of the change in routine and environment, students are more likely to gain weight without notice during their freshman year than in following years, according to a study done by UNC graduates. Thus, the term “freshman 15” was born.“For many first-year college students, dietary intake is dramatically different from when they were in high school,” said Julie Francis in an e-mail, a clinical nutrition specialist at Campus Health Services. “All of a sudden, they have access to pizza, burgers, fries, ice cream, etc., whenever they want it.”Francis also said that eating in a comfortable environment is important.For many students who are used to eating at home, having all of their meals in a busy dining hall can be stressful.“Students should eat in an environment where they feel comfortable and are not rushed,” Francis said. “This is sometimes difficult to achieve in a college situation.”Wiley said he worked off unhealthy excess calories by exercising daily.“All I do is walk,” he says. “I only take the bus at 1:30 in the morning. Otherwise, I’m walking.”Penny Gordon-Larsen, associate professor of nutrition at the School of Public Health, said daily exercise should be used to avoid an unhealthy increase in weight for students — especially freshmen.“College students should be sure to work in daily exercise and to make healthy food choices,” she said in an e-mail.“Especially (eating) smaller portion sizes, choosing healthier snack choices and cutting out caloric beverages.”Now back in school and happy with the “bit of a belly” he said he has gained, Wiley has dropped his meal plan in an effort to keep a steady weight. Now he makes and eats most of his meals in his room.“I don’t put any blame on the dining halls,” Wiley said, adding that for him, it is easier to control his intake by making his own food without time constraints.So, instead of Bandido’s burritos, Wiley makes sandwiches — sometimes.“I still eat (at Bandido’s) a lot for lunch,” he said.“Just not every day.”Contact the Features Editor at features@unc.edu.