If you haven’t heard of the infamous Freshman 15 by now, you will soon enough. The Freshman 15 is the phenomenon where college freshmen tend to gain weight due to changes in diet such as late night snacking, all-you-can-eat dining centers, little exercise and increased alcohol consumption.  

The Freshman 15 doesn’t happen to everyone, and it affects men and women differently. When students do gain weight, oftentimes they return to their original weight by the time they graduate because they learn how to budget their time, schedule meals and eat little snacks. If you’re hoping to avoid that altogether, here are a few tips that are easier to maintain and can make a big difference in your first year at college:

• Eat three meals a day. Studies show that when people skip breakfast altogether, they tend to overeat later in the day and have too big of meals and cause unbalanced eating schedules.

• Learn to snack. This doesn’t mean late night binge-eating or snacking with fruit snacks. Learn to stock your dorm room with easily transportable and easy-to-prepare foods like granola bars, fruits, vegetables and other filling and healthy choices.

• Develop good sleeping habits. One of the most common and unhealthy things that students do is forming irregular sleep habits and staying up all night. This not only confuses your internal clock, but it can also greatly affect your eating habits. Your body is used to being in sleep mode from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m., so when you stay up studying and not eating you’re going to interfere with your eating schedule and cause problems later.

• Learn the realities of alcohol. With the average 12 oz. beer having about 150 calories in it, you can see why alcohol use and abuse plays such a big part in freshman weight gain. Not only does alcohol have extra calories itself, but drinking can also lead to late night eating, which can add up more calories.