With the rec center closed for students, many students no longer have an important avenue to release stress, cope with anxiety, and stay healthy. For many of us, the gym not a supplementary hobby, but rather, an essential service to cope with mental health. As a result, many students like myself have turned to outside gyms - centennial sportsplex, take2 fitness, and many others in the surrounding area - to accommodate our athletic needs. If I were to estimate, there may be hundreds of students like me who regularly visit off campus gyms.

Not only are these gyms very expensive (upwards of or over $100 a month), but they also pose a health risk to the Vanderbilt community. On top of non-existent mask mandates, we are exposed from people coming from all over Davidson County and Tennessee. Each of us have consciously made the difficult decision that our physical and mental health outweighs the potential risk of off-campus covid exposure. The biggest risk of infection for many social circles stems not from socializing on campus or getting take-out from off campus restaurants, bur rather, from a number of us visiting off campus gyms.

I understand that opening the rec center is no easy task, and it would take extensive coordination between administration, student health, the maintenance crew, and individual students' responsibility. However, I strongly believe that we can mitigate the risk of outside infection for hundreds of students by providing an on campus option for students to workout. There are preventative measures that we can take such as enforcing mask mandates, providing bleach spray bottles for every person who enters the workout areas, and limiting access to the Vanderbilt community.

I have no doubt that Vanderbilt can provide a safer environment to workout than off-campus gyms.