Water fountains are a thing of the past.
Auburn's "Hydration Station" initiative has pushed the installation of two new water-filling stations in an effort to conserve both water and plastic.
These filling stations provide students with a free alternative to buying costly water bottles. Instead, students can fill up old bottles with fresh water.
Kirby Turnage, SGA assistant vice president of auxiliary services, is the student voice behind the "Hydration Station" initiative.
With Bob Ritenbaugh, assistant vice president of auxiliary services, the two came up with this idea last semester.
Auxiliary services is a department of the University that provides "overall leadership, guidance, resource allocation and management, facilitation and strategic planning," according to its website.
With the help of Joe Lewis, project coordinator in maintenance and operations, Turnage and Ritenbaugh chose Halsey Taylor HYDROBOOST bottle-filling stations as a free-water alternative on campus.
Turnage said these stations will allow students to refill personal water bottles with free, chilled, hygienic and filtered water.
HYDROBOOST will also be a "green counter," which calculates the amount of plastic water bottles that have been saved by using the system.
Two filling stations will be in the Student Center. According to Turnage, these will serve as a pilot program with hopes of campus-wide expansion.
While getting the recommended 64 ounces of water per day may seem a bit excessive, the body is already a little dehydrated when the feeling of thirst occurs, said Douglas White, associate professor of nutrition and food science.
Thirst indicates several cups of body water have been lost.
"When you're dehydrated, minerals in your body are becoming concentrated," White said. "Drinking water loosens the minerals back up.
"A loss of five percent total body water causes dizziness, increased heart rate, headaches and confusion. Losing 10-12 percent causes the body to stop sweating to conserve water, but this stops the body's ability to cool off, and a loss of 20 or more can lead to shock or death."
White said water is the best source of hydration. Caffeinated and alcoholic beverages act as diuretics, which cause the body to rid itself of excess water.
As a result, drinking these beverage types could counteract daily water intake, meaning less net water than expected in a given day.
Rachel Self, senior in pre-physical therapy, served as one of the 2010 head parent counselors for Camp War Eagle.
"Before each session, staff would do their best to remind everyone to start drinking water early," Self said. "The earlier you start to hydrate, the better off you would be throughout the session. We tried to make it a point to stress no sodas or sweet tea during the sessions."
Most CWE sessions started on a Wednesday, so staff decided to coin the phase "All Water Wednesdays" to encourage the counselors to start drinking water early and stay hydrated throughout the day, Self said.
The healthy way to lose body water is sweating. When sweat evaporates, the body cools off naturally.
A humid climate like Alabama's makes sweat evaporation more difficult; therefore, it makes the cooling-off process slow down.
"The best way to stay cool is to wear appropriate clothing and find shade whenever possible," White said.
With local temperatures reaching the mid to upper 90s, drinking water before going outside is imperative, even if it is just for a short walk to class.
SGA thought it was necessary to promote an alternative to buying costly bottled water, Turnage said.
"(SGA and auxiliary services) will be collecting data behind the scenes to determine the long-term viability and value of such a program, but I hope to see these stations have a major presence on campus in the years to come," Turnage said.
The new stations will be installed Sept. 7.
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