Drinking in college has been an issue for countless universities over the years, and this year at DU is no exception.Between Aug. 31 and Sept. 11 alone there were 15 reported incidents to campus safety about students being sent to detox. There were also three hospitalizations of students who were declared to be dangerously intoxicated due to their blood alcohol content.
This frightening combination left authority figures questioning how do they go about reducing those numbers in the future. The answer is simple: loosen up on enforcing the regulations a bit.
Now, that may seem counterintuitive, but that is how we are going to solve this issue. The stricter the school is about drinking, the more students are going to rebel. It’s like when your parents tell you not to do something, you only want to do more just because they said not to.
Understandably, the school has an obligation to abide by federal and state laws, but that doesn’t mean they should actively go about trying to punish people. This includes not allowing glass bottles in the room that resemble alcohol containers even if they are empty and current occupants are not intoxicated, searching through personal belongings to catch students when they do not appear intoxicated, etc.
By being so strict about enforcing the regulations, the school is simply prolonging the amount of time students will engage in excessive drinking behavior. Granted, the Aug. 31-Sept. 11 numbers are high, but you also have to realize that those were during the first few days of school. Those students are brand new to DU and college life, probably living independently for the first time. They’re bound to go a little crazy at first, but they’ll settle down at some point.
The current way of going about the alcohol regulation policies clearly isn’t working, so maybe it is time to get a little creative.
Use the upperclassmen to help solve the issue. Make a committee. Have a peer monitoring system. Make it so that its not always the establishment vs. students, so this way the University doesn’t always appear to be the bad guy.
But students also have to be smart. Be in control, and never be belligerently drunk, because at that point the school does have to intervene. When you go out drinking, make sure you are with people you trust. Have a designated driver, know how much you drank, and know your limits.
Being so against alcohol makes students fearful of the school and the consequences they’ll face if caught. They are going to go behind authority’s back and perhaps even engage in binge drinking.
According to JAMA network, a shocking 44 percent of the college students who took their survey were binge drinkers. 19 percent, one fifth of those people, were frequent binge drinkers.
We don’t want our Pios to be part of that statistic. Let’s work together to change what college drinking should be like.
