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By Luke Glaser

Students are returning back to campus in droves, bringing new clothes, preparing for new classes, buying new books and preparing for the challenge of New Year’s resolutions.

New Year’s resolutions are traditionally a promise to change with the hope that this year will be better than the last. Resolutions can be as varying and diverse as they many people that make them.

Psychology junior Natasha Barnes was Googling something on New Year’s when she came up with her resolution. “I’m going to think two minutes before I Google something,” she said. “I feel like I’m too dependent on technology.”

Resolutions range from the obvious to the eclectic. According to Usa.gov, the most popular ones include quitting smoking, drinking less and exercising more.

Megan Jaspersen, the director of the Underground Fitness Center, said staff members are preparing for the New Year’s onslaught.

“We have a lot more traffic with New Year’s resolutions and spring break,” Jaspersen said. “We offer group exercise classes and free personal training. People like to take advantage of that.”

Others, like Arts and Sciences adviser Charlotte Anderson opt to take roads less traveled with their resolutions.

“I’m going to eat more tuna,” Anderson said. “I’m vegetarian, so it’s difficult to eat out. I feel like tuna are prepared in a way that’s a little more humane.”

Even some of UK’s most famous faces have made New Year’s resolutions.

“President Capilouto’s New Year’s resolution is for new dorms and academic buildings,” said UK spokesman Jay Blanton in an email to the Kernel, in keeping with the ideas Capilouto has expressed on bettering UK’s campus.

Men’s basketball head coach John Calipari’s resolutions reflect on cultivating friendships, appreciating what you have and, of course, a better basketball team.

“My No. 1 goal for the next four months for this basketball team is to make them truly care about one another, more than they care for themselves, on and off the court,” Calipari said on his website, coachcal.com. “Become true friends.”
The general idea behind New Year’s resolutions is to make a change for the better.

“It’s arbitrary,” math and economics sophomore Drake Jackson said. “It’s a nice tradition. What better time to focus on self?”

“I have the ‘why not’ attitude,” said Kaitie McGregor, a UK employee whose resolution is to take more pictures. “It’s an attempt to try to set an interesting goal for myself for the year.”

While making resolutions is a popular tradition, keeping them is something entirely else. According to professor Richard Wiseman of the University of Hertfordshire, 88 percent of all resolutions end in failure.

Jaspersen is used to seeing resolved students come and go.

“Some people stick with it. The first month to two months is the heaviest,” she said. “Then it starts to slow down.”

Success or failure, better or worse, exercising or tuna, UK’s population is back for 2012 and looking to be better through resolutions.

“It helps me improve as an individual,” Anderson said. “You’re striving to do better in the new year.”