Dr, Jason Littleton, MD

By Dr. Jason Littleton, MD – Health Columnist

Living healthy is really an innate desire we all have, but for some, it may at times seem out of reach.  Others may be bogged down by the wealth of health information available nowadays.  Or you may already have a plan of action and have just reached a plateau.  I understand.  So to help with this and to enhance those who’s health is running on all cylinders, I want to briefly discuss a simple plan to help anyone’s life be one that is simplified, integrated, and most importantly, energized!

An easy way to begin is by using an acronym I developed called M.E.D.S, which stands for Move, Eat, Drink, Sleep.  This Rx is your key to living an elite integrated healthy life!  Here are few ideas to incorporate in your new health Rx!

1) Move

Movement is essential to life to ensure strong bones, strong muscles, and a strong heart!  One of my favorite recommendations to share with people is how they can integrate their beloved sport with their overall fitness and health.  For example, I am an avid golfer.  My close friends know I dream of ways I can escape to the golf coarse, play and be competitive.  Well, in my case, I like to use golfing as my motivator to stay in shape, eat right, and feel my best so I can keep a competitive edge.

You can do the same.  If you like to run, then consider entering a marathon or running with friends.  Or you can simply work on beating your best time.  Whatever it is, challenge yourself because without the challenge, you cannot improve and be your best—you’ll plateau and be unmotivated!

But what if you don’t have a sport that you love?  Than experiment! Try different sporting activities.  Learn something new about yourself!  This keeps life interesting! Consider, going to your local gym, YMCA, or sports club and see what get’s your body moving!  Whatever you chose, be sure to connect your sporting activity with your health and life!  Make your activities relevant!

2) Eat

Eating is a favorite pastime of mine.  I love to eat!  I’m sure you do too!  One of my secrets that I love to share is the importance of snacks throughout the day.  Healthy snacking is the key and integrating them between breakfast and lunch, lunch and dinner, and dinner and bedtime is paramount to maximizing your energy, keeping your blood sugars even-keeled, and naturally treating your body for better health!

But the key is incorporating SuperFoods into your life.  Foods like leafy greens and blueberries, green tea and flaxseed oil.  Other foods that I encourage people to try are items such as soy, shiitake mushrooms, almonds, Kiwi, raspberries, and wheatgrass juice!  This is just a list of SuperFood ideas to try, foods that will provide energy as well as boost your immune system, detoxify, and provide excellent antioxidants.  Try them!

An easy way to start is incorporating SuperFoods, is with a fruit/nut combination of blueberries and almonds and eating them between meals.   Be creative!

3) Drink

Taking in good fluids is vital to life.  Integrating them better is more often the challenge than not.  We all know we need to drink water but often don’t.  Or we do drink water but in excess.  There’s a balance.

Consider drinking on average 1.5 to 2 L of fluid a day, a combination of water and organic juices.  If you have medical conditions, such as renal or heart failure, drinking less fluid is pertinent to avoid fluid retention and improper functioning of your organs.

It’s best to drink water (a solvent) in-between meals so it does not dilute your food (a solute).  You’ll have better digestion this way and incorporate more essential nutrients and minerals that your body works on extracting by the digestion process.  With your meals, consider drinking organic juices.   Though juice has water in it, your body will treat orange juice, for example, as a solute or food, and instead see the orange juice as an orange for it to chemically breakdown.  This means more energy and health for you!

Try different healthy fruit juices that will boost your life.  If you have a juicer—use it!  Let your juice be a natural medicine to enrich and support your health!

4) Sleep

Restoration is a must.  I work with clients who either get too little sleep or don’t want to sleep much at all.  The former, are the clientele that often seek medical attention for a remedy to get their energy back.

Sleeping is essential to life.  I have written much about this topic in my book ‘WellSpring: The Energy Secrets To Do The Good Life’ (available in soft cover and audio/tablet download at DrJasonMD.com).  Here, I just want to give you a couple of pointers.

Most patients and clients I talk to have difficulty sleeping because of racing thoughts.  I get it.  We’ve all had them.  And I don’t mean to make light of this subject, because this is a concern for a lot of people, but what I’ve found, is that they don’t go away unless you deal with them.  Some of these thoughts are concerns that we have often left to linger.  We need to face them down!  Whether during our day or before we go to bed, dealing with our thoughts is important to maintain a healthy cognitive life.  Even if we do not have the answer, write the possible solutions in a journal!  Recording works and is proven to be therapy for sleeping disorders, as well as many health conditions.  But just being proactive towards our thoughts, in this manner, can buy us Z’s to get more restorative sleep.

Another tip I love to tell people is to kick the T.V. out of the bedroom!  Don’t let your favorite news station, comedian on late night, or movie go to sleep with you.  Because guess what?  They don’t want to sleep!  They want to stay up! Instead, make your bedroom a sanctuary for rest and intimacy and you’ll find that every time you step foot in your room, you won’t be thinking of your favorite television show, you’ll be thinking restorative thoughts!

Friends, integrate these tips into your life!  Consider it!  It’s a healthy simple framework that you can apply to any health plan that you may be on or are considering to start!  This is an integral way to have a healthier life and more energy to accomplish your dreams!

For more health information and tips, go to DrJasonMD.com and follow me on Twitter (@DrJasonMD), Instagram (@DrJasonMD), Facebook (DrJason Littleton), and my other social media platforms.  See you soon!

Sunbathers headed to the beach this summer will find new sunscreen labels on store shelves that are designed to make the products more effective and easier to use. But despite those long-awaited changes, many sunscreens continue to carry SPF ratings that some experts consider misleading and potentially dangerous, according to a consumer watchdog group.

A survey of 1,400 sunscreen products by the Environmental Working Group finds that most products meet new federal requirements put in place last December. The rules from the Food and Drug Administration ban terms like “waterproof,” which regulators consider misleading, and require that sunscreens filter out both ultraviolet A and B rays. Previously some products only blocked UVB rays, which cause most sunburn, while providing little protection against UVA rays that pose the greatest risk of skin cancer and wrinkles.

STORY: New sunscreen labels: How to read the fine print

Despite that broader protection, one in seven products reviewed by the watchdog group boasted sun protection factor, or SPF, ratings above 50, which have long been viewed with skepticism by experts. In part, that’s because SPF numbers like 100 or 150 can give users a false sense of security, leading them to stay in the sun long after the lotion has stopped protecting their skin.

Many consumers assume that SPF 100 is twice as effective as SPF 50, but dermatologists say the difference between the two is actually negligible. Where an SPF 50 product might protect against 97% of sunburn-causing rays, an SPF 100 product might block 98.5% of those rays.

“The high SPF numbers are just a gimmick,” says Marianne Berwick, professor of epidemiology at the University of New Mexico. “Most people really don’t need more than an SPF 30 and they should reapply it every couple of hours.” Berwick says sunscreen should be used in combination with hats, clothing and shade, which provide better protection against ultraviolet radiation.

Some dermatologists say there may be some rationale for using higher SPF sunscreens, since users often don’t apply enough of the lotion to get its full effect.

“The challenge is that beyond 50 the increase in UV protection is relatively small,” says Dr. Henry Lim, chair of dermatology at the Henry Ford Hospital in Detroit.

The SPF number indicates the amount of sun exposure needed to cause sunburn on sunscreen-protected skin compared with unprotected skin. For example, a SPF rating of 30 means it would take the person 30 times longer to burn wearing sunscreen than with exposed skin.

There is a popular misconception that the SPF figure relates to a certain number of hours spent in the sun. However this is incorrect, since the level of exposure varies by geography, time of day and skin complexion.

The FDA itself said in 2011 that “labeling a product with a specific SPF value higher than 50 would be misleading to the consumer.” At the time the agency proposed capping all SPF values at 50 because “there is not sufficient data to show that products with SPF values higher than 50 provide greater protection for users.” But regulators have faced pushback from companies, including Johnson & Johnson, which argue that higher SPF products provide measurable benefits.

As a result, the FDA says it is still reviewing studies and comments submitted by outside parties, and there is no deadline for the agency to finalize an SPF cap.

It took the agency decades to put in place last year’s sunscreen changes. FDA first announced its intent to draft sunscreen rules in 1978 and published them in 1999. The agency then delayed finalizing the regulations for years until it could address concerns from both industry and consumers.

The FDA is also reviewing the safety of effectiveness of spray-on products, which use different formulations from other sun-protection solutions. Among other concerns, the agency is looking at whether the sprays can be harmful when inhaled.

The survey by the Environmental Working Group found that one in four sunscreens sold in the U.S. is a spray product.

“People like the sprays because they are quick to put on and cover a lot of area,” said Dr. Darrell Rigel, a dermatologist in New York. “The downside is that you usually have to apply two coats.”

More than 76,000 men and women in the U.S. will be diagnosed with melanoma this year and 9,480 are expected to die from the aggressive form of skin cancer, according to the National Cancer Institute. The disease, which is often linked to ultraviolet exposure, is usually curable when detected early.

The loans that gave college students the funds they needed to move forward in life are now holding them back.

Mary Knauff would like to start saving money, for retirement or for some future spending.

But because of about $28,000 in student loans, which she’s paid down to about $17,000, the 2010 Xavier University graduate will continue living paycheck to paycheck.

“It’s sort of disheartening,” said Knauff, 25. “I knew going in that I was going to a private school. Especially when you’re trying to get started, when loans take up a third of your living expenses, it’s frustrating.”

That delay in buying cars and condos, in starting families and savings accounts, reveals the true cost of student debt, to graduates such as Knauff and to the larger economy.

Even as Americans held overall consumer debt to a 9 percent increase from 2004 to this year, student debt tripled to $986 billion after adjusting for inflation, according to an Enquirer analysis of Federal Reserve Bank of New York data.

It’s now 8.8 percent of all consumer debt, up from 3.1 percent in 2004.

A system that pushes students to borrow whatever they need to get through college has come under increasing scrutiny as college gets more expensive and a new generation of students is hamstrung by larger and larger debt loads.

“You may be unable to save, unable to put away money for retirement,” said Rohit Chopra, student loan ombudsman at the federal Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, in an interview. “Many borrowers are telling us their dreams of owning a home or starting a small business may be out of reach.”

The fallout ranges far beyond students and their families. With spending, debt and tuition all escalating, experts fear the inflation of a “college bubble” that could pose dangers for the national economy, much like the Internet bubble in 2000 and the housing bubble in 2009.

For thousands of college graduates, Knauff’s story is typical.

These aren’t the horror stories of graduates with $100,000 or more in debt from an elite college, running up bills they’ll never be able to pay.

Instead, students near the average debt of $26,600, for the 65 percent of graduates who take out student loans, put off spending or saving. That dampens growth in the local economy, but it also defers and sometimes destroys their own dreams of a career or a lifestyle.

In 1993, only 46 percent borrowed an average $9,350, according to the Project on Student Debt.

Of those carrying student debt, about 40 percent say they have postponed contributions to retirement plans or delayed car purchases, 29 percent have put off buying a house and 15 percent have postponed marriage, according to a new survey from the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants.

Six in 10 respondents said they regretted their choice of college financing. The current spiral in student loans is feeding an ever-growing cycle of more spending, higher tuition — and even more loans.

Experts say that could threaten the system of higher education that was built over generations, even causing some smaller or financially weaker colleges to fold.

But the impact on young people spreads quickly throughout the economy.

“We look to those younger generations to sort of sustain growth in the economy,” said Amy Crews Cutts, chief economist at the credit reporting agency Equifax, noting the high unemployment rate for Americans younger than 25. “But they sort of over-invested in something that’s clearly not paying off.”

The warning signs are emerging, according to the New York Fed:

• More than 40 percent of 25-year-olds carry student debt, up from about 26 percent in 2004.

• About 17 percent of loans were delinquent at the end of last year, compared with less than 10 percent in 2004. When only loans in repayment are considered, about one-third are delinquent.

• Nearly half of borrowers have seen payments deferred, so they haven’t even started repaying – or defaulting.

• The quarterly movement of borrowers to delinquency from repayment has accelerated to nearly 9 percent, up from 6.5 percent in 2005.

Congress and the Obama administration are considering reforms to the student-loan marketplace, hoping to both relieve the stress on college graduates and the strains on the larger economy.

“We’ve done some good things, but the problem is that it’s still too much debt,” said U.S. Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio.

Brown said legislation to keep interest rates on federal subsidized loans from doubling to 6.8 percent is important, as is pouring new money into the federal Pell Grant program for low-income Americans.

He’s also sponsoring a bill that would allow students to convert private bank loans – often with substantially higher interest rates – to lower-rate federal loans.

So how much debt is too much?

Experts say they advise students not to borrow more than their expected first-year salary. Given the expected benefits of a college degree, that’s a wise investment, they say.

“It makes no sense to say, ‘I don’t have the money now. I can’t afford to go to college,’ ” said Sandy Baum, policy analyst for the College Board.

Tony Aretz, president of the College of Mount St. Joseph, compares it to another common transaction.

“It’s equivalent to buying a new car,” Aretz said. “I tell people, ‘Take that money and invest it in yourself.’”

Graduates and students interviewed by The Cincinnati Enquirer say they were advised to borrow “whatever it takes,” and few ever suggested they limit their debt.

“Nobody ever told me that,” said Ashley Anderson, who graduated from the University of Cincinnati in 2010 and is paying more than $600 a month.

The impact on spending hits less than a year after graduation, once the loan payments start.

“In the grand scheme of reality, I should feel kind of lucky that I was able to pay for half of it,” said Susan Osgood, who just graduated from UC last month.

“But at the same time, I think it’s absolutely going to affect the decisions I make, at least until I figure out what I’ll pay each month.”

What’s needed is counseling so that students understand how much they should borrow, said Bob King, president of the Kentucky Council for Postsecondary Education, the group overseeing public universities in the commonwealth.

He recalls that one member of his own family financed an overseas trip on student loans.

“For many of our students, we know that for the first time in their life, having access to what feels like free money causes them to make bad decisions,” King said. “There’s nothing they’ve done in high school that has prepared them for that.”

Many students also don’t know that student-loan debt is one of the few consumer debts that can’t be discharged in most bankruptcies.

Even if students are only borrowing what they need, they say it’s difficult to keep up. That includes books, which can run $1,500 a year or more, and other costs beyond tuition and housing.

Those young people acknowledge that they need more information.

“In hindsight, I’d go back and apply for a lot more scholarships,” said Anderson, the first person in her family to graduate from college. “Right off the bat, my family fell into the middle-class, where we didn’t qualify for (need-based) aid. We went in completely blind.”

Anderson already has paid off about $10,000 in debt. She held a job all the way through college and lives with her parents in Dent.

“I live at home, just to be able to live at all,” she said.

College prepared for state funding shift

Terra State Community College officials are preparing for a proposed shift in how the school is funded by the state, as the college looks to boost the number of students completing courses, degrees and certifications in the coming years.

President Jerome Webster said that Terra State had already taken steps in an anticipated transition from enrollment-based to student success-based funding, formed on Gov. John Kasich’s proposed 2014-15 biennial budget.

The Ohio Higher Education Funding Commission developed a funding formula that emphasized course completion, as opposed to enrollment, that the governor has embraced in his proposed budget.

Webster said that Terra had already made strides to increase student success on its campus and respond to a need for students complete coursework and more efficiently pursue their education.

“I think we’ve been a little bit ahead of the curve,” Webster said.

In the first year of Kasich’s proposed budget, funding for community colleges would become 50 percent enrollment-based and 50 percent student performance-based, Webster said.

Webster said that in the first year of the biennial budget, Terra expects that its state funding would be relatively flat with a 1.9 percent targeted increase in revenues.

He said the success of a community college under the proposed funding formula would be based on success points awarded by the state when a student completes a certification or degree, or moves from a developmental to college-level course.

Success would also be rated on factors such as how many Terra students transferred to four-year universities.

“The greater the points, the more funding you get,” Webster said.

Webster said the commission would still need to determine how the funding model would be developed in the second year of the budget, when funding would shift to being 100 percent student success based.

The Terra president said for community colleges, one issue is many students never intend to complete a degree or credential at that school, but are taking classes either for professional development or to transfer credits to another four-year school.

The state looking at factors like course completion, in terms of determining community college funding, is big for colleges like Terra in that regard, Webster said.

He and Treasurer Randy McCullough said Terra is looking at ways, such as the development of academic plans for every student, to ensure that students “get done” with their education.

“We just want more people to graduate,” McCullough said.

Rep. Rex Damschroder, R-Fremont, declined to comment on the proposed community college funding changes. Damschroder said the Ohio Senate was looking at the budget and proposed funding changes from the amended House Bill 59.

“It’s a dynamic process,” Damschroder said Thursday.

Webster said in the fall of 2010, Terra instituted its first Survey of Entering Student Engagement survey for new students and put together an orientation program in the 2011 spring semester.

Terra has also put in place mandatory meetings with academic advisers and worked to fine tune incoming student assessments to see if it can get students on a quicker path to enrolling in college level courses, Webster said.

The college is also looking at cohort scheduling, with an emphasis on students working closely together with academic peers, and exploring whether it can make work-based experience a reality for students in every Terra degree program.

“We’ve made changes rapidly based on what we’ve seen at other places,” Webster said, adding that the size of the community college helped in terms of giving Terra flexibility with changes larger schools in the region don’t have.

Webster said Terra is looking at the proposed state funding formula as it continues to feel the impact of funding changes on the federal level, particularly with the Pell Grant program.

As of July 1 last year, Pell Grant recipients were limited to six years at full-time status.

In the 2012-13 school year, 78 percent of Terra State students who applied and were eligible for financial aid were eligible to receive a Pell Grant.

The school is tentatively expected to receive an increase in Pell Grant funding in the 2013-14 school year (from $88,223 to $112,266), but less students are eligible to apply.

Joe Spencer, Terra’s director of financial aid, told the Terra board in June 2012 that 151 Terra students were no longer eligible for Pell Grants because of the new rules.

Webster said Pell Grant changes affect rural community colleges more than urban ones.

Trish Brown has been named President of TPE MultiMedia and will continue to serve as Founder of TippingPointEducation.com & Publisher of TPEPost.com

For more than two years, Adam Zientarski has been the General Manager of the TPEPost.com and now he is taking on a much bigger role with TPE MultiMedia. Zientarski will oversee web development for clients and most of the administrative duties for all TPE entities as one of two partners Trish Brown has brought on.

Jeffery A. Taylor has been named Creative Director of TPE MultiMedia. Taylor has been the Art director of TPEPost.com and TippingPointEducation.com as well as president of Jeffery A Taylor Studios for more than two years. He will also serve as a partner in TPE MultiMedia Detroit and Los Angeles.

Having owned a failed sub shop in Santa Monica, I would say I know my way around a good sandwich. The most important thing I’ve learned about the art of shoving protein between two slices of carbohydrates is that less is more. You don’t need reductions, foams, endangered lettuce varietals or trendy entrails to make the perfect sandwich, and I’m always elated when I don’t have to do an online search to find out what an ingredient on a menu is.

After 12 years of enthusiastic exploration, here are my 10 favorite sandwiches (not in any particular order):

Bay Cities Italian Deli – Godmother
Probably the most popular sandwich in all of LA, and yet this is the last place I ever have a desire to visit. Waiting an hour in a super crowded hotbox to pick up lunch can (almost) kill an appetite, but luckily the gratuitous Italian sub with your choice of hot or sweet peppers on homemade bread makes it all worth it. Best to call in your order ahead of time and don’t let your sammie sit too long. The Italian dressing has a tendency to turn this into a knife-and-fork meal.

Capriotti’s – Bobbie
I love this sandwich so much, I can’t bring myself to order anything else when I visit. It’s Thanksgiving encompassed, and they don’t skimp on everyone’s favorite part (the stuffing). The turkey is freshly shaved and not slimy, flavorless lunchmeat. Topped off with cranberry sauce and mayo, the Bobbie is a great way to celebrate gluttony any time of the year.

All About the Bread – Meatball
The owner used to be part of the Bay Cities tribe but escaped to do his own thing with magnificent results. Take everything you like about Bay Cities but without the crowds and with slightly more manageable bread. These light, crusty (yet doesn’t rip your veneers out) rolls graciously support the girth of expertly seasoned and sauced meatballs that you don’t have to wait an hour to consume. They also do a stand-up version of a Godmother.

Fat Sal’s – Fat Mona
While any sandwich at this UCLA haunt will be worth your while, their breakfast one really knocked it out of the park for me. It’s fried eggs and every type of morning meat imaginable surrounded by simple hoagie rolls. They’re known for their over-the-top creations (the “Fat Cookout” contains hot dogs, hamburgers and potato salad!) which the hard studying/hard partying students nearby seem to appreciate. Hangover food at its finest.

Langer’s – #19
Langer’s famous Pastrami sandwiches have been keeping Angelenos fat and happy since 1947. With consistent lines out the door, the wait is worth the reward of what I believe to be the best pastrami sandwich I’ve ever had. Forget Johnnie’s, the meat here is thicker with less fat and goes perfectly with the cole slaw and Swiss cheese. I’ve tried other sandwiches here but no need to go beyond the perfection that is #19.

Nong La – Banh Mi
I love a good Vietnamese sandwich but have little desire to journey to the San Gabriel Valley to appease my need for the unique and distinctive combo of lemongrass beef, pickled carrots and daikon, cilantro, jalapeno on crusty French bread. What sets Nong La apart (besides the high quality ingredients) is the necessary option of adding a fried egg.

Cole’s – Lamb French Dip
There are two LA institutions (both opened in 1908) that claim to be the originator of the French Dip. I don’t care who beat whom to the punch; Cole’s sandwich definitely outshines the more casual Philippe The Original. You’re going to spend more at Cole’s, but you’re also paying for vintage ambiance and slightly higher quality meat. Plus there’s a trendy speakeasy attached to the back of Cole’s, which makes the place more of a scene during the later hours.

Boo’s – Philly Cheesesteak
I made sure to take two Philly natives to Boo’s in order to give an accurate review on how good/authentic it really is. “Best in LA!” they both proclaimed, mouths chock full of freshly grilled, thinly sliced beef topped with fast-melting “Wiz.” They offer American and Provolone but I think the Cheez Whiz (“How they do it in Philly”) is the way to go. The only thing I’m informed that they’re missing is Tastykakes and Water Ice, whatever those things are.

Plan Check – Southern Fry
The only upscale joint on my list, this trendy West LA hotspot is always bustling with foodies gorging themselves on either one of my favorite burgers in town or the absolutely mouth-watering fried chicken sandwich. Nothing is amiss here, the chicken is high quality Jidori (both white and dark meat) covered in just the right amount of crispy batter as to not overwhelm. The scant addition of pickles and slices of duck breast ham only accentuate the wonderment. The pillowy soft bun is a nice change from the dried out brioche that seem to be everywhere.

Joan’s on Third – Short Rib Grilled Cheese
No sandwich list is complete without a grilled cheese! Decadent, buttery and cheesy, this artery-clogging delight helps take away some of Joan’s pretentious yet completely warranted vibe. Chow down on your grilled cheese while the D-Lister with the reality show and yipping Puggle picks at her sophisticated salad and watches in horror.

With a few exceptions, I’ve been to every major burger establishment in the LA area, whether it’s made some kind of Top Burgers list or someone has just run up to me shouting “You’ve got to try this burger, idiot!”

I have purposely not included Pie ‘n Burger and Apple Pan because I feel they are they are a bit overhyped and not necessarily deserving. I know I may be in the minority here, and I’m willing to accept the consequences.

So, without further ado, my top 5 burgers in LA:

This is an OLD school joint in WeHo, been around since 1950. Burgers are really simple, with a thick patty, and not healthy in the slightest. Owners are super, crazy friendly and draw pictures of you on your to-go bag while you wait..

The pastrami burger is the thing to order! It’s an enormous and juicy monstrosity. Split in two for easy sharing… if you’re into that. Featuring more of a fast-food vibe, Tops is located in Pasadena and has been fattening folks up since 1952.

Japanese style, trendy burger joint in Hollywood. Burgers feature thinner patties and include unique Japanese ingredients. The combinations may seem daring but everything works. More importantly, they offer a full bar.

The hot spot on Sawtelle! Come here for some over-the-top, gourmet burger action. Just this side of being too much of a good thing. If you’ve already tried the burger, come back for the smoky fried chicken!

While they don’t serve a traditional burger, FO just blows away all the competition. The blue cheese/bacon/onion spread sets them apart (and you couldn’t substitute it if you tried). If you ask for ketchup here, you will be executed, but what a way to go.

It seems that million-dollar homes are a dime a dozen these days. OK, maybe we’re exaggerating, but with a growing number of people joining the millionaires club based on a Credit Suisse report, we wouldn’t be surprised to see more prime real estate popping up. Which had us wondering, which states boast the largest number of million-dollar homes?

According to data provided by the Point2 Real Estate Group, they’re exactly where you’d expect them to be. Click through to see the top ten states with the highest concentration of pricy homes.

Two Vermont professors are part of a movement that seeks to leverage technological advancements to measure global happiness.

It’s been defined by everyone from Plato to The Beatles. It’s mentioned in the Declaration of Independence. Most of us are in search of it.

Now two professors are tracking your happiness using a device called a hedonometer, which records and charts the global psyche in real time based on the millions of words posted to Twitter each day.

Although some critics are skeptical about applying quantitative methods to so elusive an emotion, the researchers, along with a national organization and several clubs across college campuses, suggest the hedonometer’s findings could be helpful to policy makers.

“Our work has told us something very important,” University of Vermont mathematics Professor Peter Dodds said. “People end up thinking the things they can measure are the important things.”

The hedonometer pulls from Twitter’s Gardenhose feed, a sampling of about 50 million messages tweeted each day, with the 10,000 most common words analyzed and given a happiness factor on a 9-point scale. The results are then posted to hedonometer.org, a website launched April 30.

“Twitter is not everything, but it provides a great test and a fairly good reflection of what people are doing,” Dodds said. “The instrument is a composite, so we will never just analyze one word for happiness.”

The hedonometer functions much as a thermometer, his colleague and fellow math professor Chris Danforth explained in an email. Taking the temperature of one molecule (in this case, a tweet) might not reveal a whole lot, but the aggregate picture can be meaningful.

Most recently, their data showed that the day of the Boston Marathon bombings was the saddest in five years.

The nature of the tweets on April 15 pushed the hedonometer to its lowest point ever, hedonometer.org showed. Dodds said the three most common phrases that day were “Boston bombings,” “thoughts and prayers” and “send donations.”

RELATED: Happiness clubs spread positive vibes on campus

“That’s really the narrative of what happened,” he said. “And if you think about how journalists are trying to handle Twitter at the moment, we see this tool as a very salient thing. Language is social technology.”

Dodds and Danforth said they hope their instrument— which will soon incorporate sources like the BBC and Google Trends and translate words from French, Spanish, Russian and Arabic— could complement indices like the Gross Domestic Product (GDP), which monitors prosperity.

Miles away in Montpelier, co-founders of Gross National Happiness (GNH) Linda Wheatley and Tom Barefoot agree.

“For years, ‘happiness’ was a taboo subject because you couldn’t measure it,” Barefoot said. “New technologies and neuroscience have given us a set of tools to measure internal states of well-being.”

GNH, a U.S. chapter of a similar organization that began in the United Kingdom, works with partner groups to promote the measure of happiness as an indicator for progress, just as the government in Bhutan has done since 1971.

GNH is creating a curriculum based on its research at the Chautauqua Institution in New York. The hope is that more institutions will use GNH survey results and data from the hedonometer to design programs focused on happiness, and find ways to boost it.

“The culture at any college is demanding,” Barefoot said. “I think creating happier communities, particularly on a campus where there’s already experimentation, is key.”

Millennials are getting on board with the happiness movement:

In 2009, Harvard doctoral student Matt Killingsworth created an app for the iPhone called Track Your Happiness with similar objectives to the hedonometer. In 2006, a Harvard course geared toward studying happiness, “Positive Psychology,” saw record enrollment.

Harvard is also home to the Happiness Project, a variation of a happiness club that has appeared at colleges nationwide including Northwestern University, Penn State and the University of Texas-Austin, USA TODAY reported in April.

Members contacted for this article largely agreed that the purpose of these clubs was simply to make people on campus happy. Northwestern senior Kyle Richardson, who leads his school’s Happiness Club, said he was interested in the hedonometer and GNH, but was skeptical about their methodology.

“Measuring student happiness at a university is a laudable goal, but I’m not sure it’s feasible,” Richardson said.

It appears that fewer students are choosing to enroll in college.

A report released by the National Student Clearinghouse Research Center Thursday revealed a 2.3 percent dip in students choosing to attend college during the spring of 2013. This year’s numbers represent a big leap from last spring, when enrollment only declined 0.3 percent from the previous year.

The decline in college enrollment can be attributed to the improving economy, which has allowed more students to return to the workforce, according to a press release from the organization.

“It’s reflective of good news for the economy and labor market,” Doug Shapiro, executive director of National Student Clearinghouse Research Center, told USA Today.

According to the survey, enrollment declined for every type of university besides four-year nonprofit universities, which had an enrollment increase of 0.5 percent since spring of last year. Four-year for-profit colleges experienced the biggest decline in enrollment, with 8.7 percent fewer students matriculating.

Meanwhile, two-year public colleges experienced an enrollment decline of 3.6 percent, and four-year public schools experienced an enrollment decline of 1.1 percent.

Enrollment declined across every part of the country, according to the data. Although fewer women enrolled in college than men this spring, females still made up more than 57 percent of spring 2013 enrollments, the news release notes.

The report was based on data collected from 95 percent of the nation’s Title IV colleges and universities. (Title IV allows institutions to grant students federal financial aid.