The Student Health Center is butting in to help students quit smoking.Large Zip-loc bags filled with smoking cessation aids are being distributed by the center.

The “Quit Kits” are free and available to any student who is considering kicking the habit.

“What we see it as is a positive influence to get students to think about quitting,” said Cyndra Krogen, a health education assistant with the health center.

The campus organization Students Taking Action Against Nicotine Dependence assembles and pays for the kits.

STAND is funded through a grant from the American Lung Association.

Krogen said the idea came from a world conference on tobacco health she attended in November. A nurse practitioner from the Virginia Commonwealth University had used the kits with great success.

Since the health center started giving out the kits a month ago, Krogen estimates 20 to 25 have been given out.

Sunflower seeds, breath mints, gum and honey sticks are some of the items in the kit that help in ceasing smoking. The snacks help curb cravings.

The non-edible items in the kit, like small straws, coffees stirrers, and toothpicks, are meant to occupy your mouth.

The kit also has a cost of smoking calculator that tabulates how much money smokers invest in cigarettes over time. A person who smokes a pack a day spends $1,643 in a year.

Other items in the kit are a relaxation tape, a smoker?s help line phone number, and literature to help students analyze their smoking behavior.

Krogen?s business card is included in the kit as well. Students can contact her for free one-on-one smoking cessation counseling. She said the sessions focus on identifying why the student smokes, whether for stress, appetite suppression or social aspects.

She said she likes to target social smokers because that?s how people get started and hooked on cigarettes.

“Even one session gives the information they need to know that this is a real complex problem,” she said.

The Core Institute?s 2002 Alcohol and Drug Survey found that 7 percent of students have smoked a cigarette everyday over the last year, Krogen said.

She said she does not like to judge the smokers she sees and seldom reviews the health consequences because those are common knowledge.

“I want them to quit but I want them to feel comfortable with who they are,” she said.

Graduate student Jim Nederostek said he does not smoke too often, but wants to get one of the kits for himself.

“I don?t know if it would work too well, but it?s worth a shot,” he said.