While colleges are used to being ranked constantly on academics, social life and other factors, a new study by Trojan Brand Condoms is assessing colleges in a whole new way.
The study, titled "University Sexual Health Report Card," ranked 139 colleges on the basis of their sexual health awareness programs, health services facilities and contraception availability, among other factors. Of the students surveyed, 66 percent stated that "their health centers are 'doing a good job,'" while 53 percent said their centers "could improve overall."
While the study did not assess Tufts, it brings up a variety of issues that are relevant to Tufts' sexual health programs, according to Medical Director of Health Services Margaret Higham. She said that Tufts' services fit with the national trend: good, but not perfect.
"I think we do a really great job here at Health Services, but there are always ways to improve," Higham said.
Though the Tufts Health Services program is likely as comprehensive as programs at most similar schools, she explained, it may lack some of the services offered at schools with larger health-related budgets. Higham said that one flaw in Health Services is the amount of sexual health coverage given by the Tufts University Student Health plan.
"Here at Tufts, we do not offer free STD [and] STI testing - it's so expensive and we'd have to increase the health fee so much," Higham said. "We try to keep the costs as low as possible."
While testing is important, however, Higham said that sexual health awareness is one of the biggest goals of Tufts Health Services. Often, she said, students underestimate the threats they face.
However, some students believe that the biggest threat to sexual health on the Tufts campus may not pertain so much to the lack of available services as it may to the lack of knowledge surrounding personal sexual health.
"The area that's really lacking in terms of sexual health awareness is knowledge concerning some of the viral STIs - especially HPV and herpes. There's still this pervasive knowledge that if you've been 'tested,' that you are, in fact, 'clean,'" Higham said.
In reality, she said, students may simply have STIs that are hard to detect.
"You can assume that if you're sexually active, you probably have HPV," she said. "Fifty to 75 percent of sexually active young adults have some form of the virus."
Awareness about the HPV virus has become increasingly public in recent years, she said, which has brought the need for preventative measures to the forefront. Sophomore Sigrid Fostvedt, a member of Tufts Feminist Alliance, said improvements in awareness and treatment have brought sexual health a long way in recent years.
"HPV is a legitimate concern today, especially for women, and it's great that there's now a vaccine for it," she said. "It's about time that people finally start to become aware of an issue so integral to sexual health."
With the broadening concern regarding HPV and other STIs comes an increased willingness across the student body to address the issues at hand, according to senior Andrea Northup, who is president of the group Public Health At Tufts (PHAT). She said that at "In the SACK," a sexual health awareness program during freshman orientation, students were surprisingly open about sexual health.
"Because a lot of people come from such different backgrounds ... so many people had had experience with sexual health issues, and were willing to talk about it," she said. "Whereas where I come from, there isn't as much of an open dialogue [about those issues]."
Tufts' small size and community dynamic tends to cultivate a fairly open dialogue regarding sexual issues among students as well.
"There's definitely a percentage of people who speak openly about their sexual experiences," sophomore Matthew Horder said.
One result of Tufts students' openness about sexual health is the increasing awareness and use of various contraceptive options, Higham said.
"The most common form of contraceptive at Tufts is birth control," she said. "In terms of generic versus name-brand pills, students will always go with what's cheapest."
Higham said there has also been increasing awareness of emergency contraception offered by Health Servies.
"A lot more students know about emergency contraception than they used to," Higham said. "On a weekend, there will be at least several students in to obtain emergency contraception. It can sometimes be a daily occurrence; it's very common."
And as always, students are taking advantage of the free condoms available at Health Services.
"Even some of the delivery people will have their hand in that bowl [of free condoms]," said Higham.
Northup said Tufts students , however, are hardly the exception to the rule. According to her, they probably have similar mindsets to students at schools of comparable size and type.
"Tufts is pretty typical in terms of sexual health awareness; there is no one aspect of the community that is especially behind or particularly advanced," Northup said.
But according to junior Morissa Sobelson, co-chair of the Tufts Student Health Advisory Board (SHAB), there is still much room for improvement when it comes to students' attitudes about sexual health.
"For college students in general, I think there's a sense that we are invincible [to issues of sexual health]," Sobelson said. "Everyone is at risk regardless of their socio-economic backgrounds, and the idea that privilege makes us immune is a real fallacy."
