<p>As far as I can tell, whitmanalum is correct: alcohol IS rampant at Whitman. However, as far as I can tell alcohol is rampant at nearly EVERY college – every college my daughter visited, and every college attended by her friends and other classmates in her graduating class. To think otherwise is to bury your head in the sand. </p>
<p>No matter how well you know your child, and how open and honest your relationship is – you really don’t know for sure if and how much your child is drinking at college. I’ve talked to many parents of friends of my daughter who don’t think their kids drink at all – and I’ve seen the photos that show otherwise. I think it’s natural for kids to downplay this to parents…</p>
<p>If prior to college a student has not been exposed to a social scene that involved drinking and/or not had the opportunity to start to work out for themselves how they are going to manage the presence of alcohol, they are going to have to start working it out fast at college – starting the night of the day the parents leave the campus. </p>
<p>Some kids are just going to be OK with this – whether or not they drink, they will figure it out (and if they do drink, they won’t get themselves into serious trouble more than once). Other kids – again whether they drink or not – are going to really struggle with it. For the OP, it sounds like it has tainted his entire experience at Whitman, which is unfortunate. But I don’t think it’s Whitman. At a bigger school, maybe you could insulate yourself from it more than at a smaller school. But it is everywhere. And what’s the saying: Wherever you go, there you are.</p>