Students in Nutrition and Foods and Health Care Management enjoy a wide variety of experiences while at Appalachian. The required courses for the dietetics concentration prepare students to become a professional dietitian.  These courses range from introductory accounting to organic chemistry to quantity food preparation and medical nutrition therapy. For the Foodsystems Management concentration, students take business classes together with the food and management courses. Health Care Management students take such courses as Health Law, Economics, and Ethics. (See the Checklist link on the left. of the Academic Majors page)  Then the junior or senior internship is done in many local businesses and agencies (Some students do arrange rotations near home.) (See the internship links on the Academic Majors page.) 

Our professors are engaged in active research programs and regularly invite undergraduate students to participate with them. Projects range from childhood obesity studies to the effects of dietary supplements on athletic performance and on the risks of vascular diseases. (See the Research link on the left.)    Many activities outside classes are available starting with the very active Appalachian Student Dietetic Association. This group, comprised of most of the dietetic students, is active in the community with projects such as educating women of child-bearing age about the importance of folic acid in the prevention of neural tube defects such as spina bifida.  Money raised through the Folic Acid Ambassador program is used to sponsor participation of overweight adolescents in BLAST- a local adolescent wellness. The Future Health Care Executives provides students the opportunity to meet and hear form local health care executives and to become engaged in the local health care community. (See the Major Clubs link on the left) Volunteer opportunities are available in the local community. Not only are many clubs, including ASDA and FHE, active in the community, but an entire office on campus, Appalachian Community Together (ACT) houses and directs many volunteer opportunities and learning experiences in the local community, across the country and around the world. Many sports at the inter-collegiate, intramural, and club level, are also available. And, of course, in the heart of North Carolina Appalachian country are any number of outdoor activities year round including hiking, skiing, and biking. The Appalachian experience is a wide-ranging and active one.