Students busted at prom

[mini]

<p>Re: college abstinence rules vs. lack of rules.</p>

<p>I haven’t seen Earlham numbers since 1999, so if you have later, please PM. I know from folks there that binge drinking has dropped significantly since then, but that’s not my point.</p>

<p>There are numbers and there are numbers. Binge drinking is one indicator. However, frequent binge drinking and/or heavy (near daily) drinking are better indicators of campus cultures. I know some of the researchers attached to the UOklahoma “dry campus” initiative. One of the things they found when they went “dry” was a smallish initial drop in binge drinking, but very large declines in frequent bingeing and/or heavy drinking. The reason was simple: folks had to make a great effort to go off campus and get it. They might do it once in two weeks, but they were much less likely to do it nearly daily, unless they were already alcohol-dependent. The preliminary results in the UMass experiment seem to be the same. In both cases, of course, there is much more evaluation to do, but it is not surprising that proximity and ease of availability impact behavior, as most of the high school surveys show. So, yes, admissions offices can have impacts, but there is actually plenty that can be done if a college chooses. </p>

<p>I happen not to favor enforced “dry campus” approaches, but not because they don’t work. There are several dozen other initiatives short of dry that have proven effective.</p>

<p>Conyat - I’ll check in with the website person re: the prevention toolkit on Tuesday.</p>

<p>1of42 - lots of interesting “issues”. Actually, we know from “experimental” data that binge drinking is higher on college campuses than reported. First, we know that the average student reports one fewer drink than s/he actually had. Second, because when asked to pour a drink, the average student pours one 1.8x the standard. So a person who reports four drinks (and is classified as a non-binger) on average would have had 5 X 1.8 drinks or 9 drinks, or, put another way, is likely to have a BAC higher than 0.16. Half will have more.</p>

<p>The “problem drinker” standard for youth is indeed problematic, and evolving. The idea is to try to arrive at a percentage that reflects both number of episodes and overall volume in a single algorithm, as predictive of future “problems” done the road. For youth, this algorithm seems to work, but I would note that in the case I am the reporter, not the researcher.</p>

<p>Alcohol dependence (and abuse) is defined in the DSM-IV - The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of the American Psychological Association, Fourth Edition. It combines both physical characteristics (tolerance, withdrawal, urge to drink more) with psychosocial ones. I can bore you for hours with discussion concerning each individual item included in the diagnosis (I do that at work), but overall, it seems to work pretty well. They are working on the DSM-V now.</p>

<p>I think 20 years from now, we will look at some of our current discussions as somewhat silly. The science is indeed telling us that genetic predispositions toward alcohol and drug addiction are extremely strong. We have already isolated 7 allele pairs for alcohol alone, and there are probably more. So for people, drinking alcohol is more like an allergic person eating peanuts. It will almost certainly land them in trouble, usually serious, down the road. For others, it is more a matter of keeping them safe, protecting them from acute alcohol poisoning, unprotected sex and rape, driving, balconies. For some people, the only amount of alcohol that is safe is none; for others, it is a different story. Science will be able to answer which are which pretty soon, sooner than you think, and sooner than we will be able to deal with confidentiality and privacy issues.</p>

<p>But on the other hand, if parents will just look through their own families trees they will usually have a pretty good idea of what they need to tell their own kids. One size fits all definitely doesn’t cut it - but how we go about cutting is going to make for an interesting world indeed.</p>

[mini]

<p>Just a little more on why the researcher (Buzz Campbell) chose the definition of youth “problem drinker” he did. Quite simply really. He was trying to approximate the percentage of lifetime alcohol dependence in the adult population (which is slightly over 15%). Youth (in this case 8th, 10th, and 12th graders combined) defined as “problem drinkers” came in at 18.1%. Now I don’t know about you, but I would likely say that an 8th grader who drank 6+ days a month, or who got blitzed at least twice, could well be characterized as a “problem drinker”. At any rate, the data he ran was to look for correlations between the behavior and other sequelae (such as “low school commitment”, etc.)</p>

[interesteddad]

<p>Mini:</p>

<p>Earlham did a small sample survey in February 2002 after 20 students had been transported to the hospital for alcohol poisoning between Feb 01 and Feb 02. They found a 30% binge drinking rate:</p>

<p><a href=“http://word.cs.earlham.edu/issues/XVII/030802/news40.html[/url]”>http://word.cs.earlham.edu/issues/XVII/030802/news40.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>Another small sample survey was done in 2006, which showed similar results:</p>

<p>

In response to the report, the Earlham Word conducted an informal survey on Friday afternoon in the campus mailroom, where 150 randomly selected students were questioned about alcohol use on campus with questions used in the Indiana survey. Over two-thirds of the students surveyed reported that they had consumed alcohol in the past thirty days, but only a third reported having participated in binge drinking in the past two weeks.

</p>

<p><a href=“http://word.cs.earlham.edu/issues/XXI/092206/news58.html[/url]”>http://word.cs.earlham.edu/issues/XXI/092206/news58.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

<p>As far as I know, Earlham has always been “dry”. Most colleges (and certainly most Quaker colleges) were dry until the 1960s. My guess is that Earlham never changed its policy.</p>

<p>The one downside of the “dry” approach is that it may tend to bump up the alcohol poisonings as kids try to do all their drinking for the night in the 30 minutes before they leave for a party.</p>

<p>In any case, half of Earlham’s 30% to 33% binge drinkers are probably the “party once-a-week on Saturday night” crowd that really isn’t the group that disrupts campus life like the frequent bingers. So, what ever they are doing is obviously working pretty well for them.</p>

<p>On the other hand, there is a degree of hypocrisy in a “dry” campus policy where two-thirds of the students drink.</p>

[boysx3]

<p>The weekend before our high school’s prom, over 100 students at a neighboring school’s prom had alcohol violations–some kids came drunk after pre-partying, some had flasks, and some limousine drivers notified authorities of teenagers who brought alcohol with them, resulting in all of the limousines being searched.</p>

<p>The following week, our high school principal had EVERY student who came to prom breathalyzed–the school purchased four breathalyzer sets and the administration will use them at school events for now on.</p>

<p>What happened? There were more tv cameras at the prom than prom-going kids. A lot of kids never bothered going to the actual prom—they just went directly from a pre-party to the post-party.</p>

<p>Maybe the time for traditional proms has passed and the schools should come up with another tradition that would be meaningful but less problematic.</p>

[kelsmom]

<p>boysx3, you bring up an interesting point. </p>

<p>In our lawsuit-happy society, the schools simply can’t win. If the behavior that attracted attention had been ignored and those same kids had gone out after prom, jumped in a swimming pool, and broken their necks … the parents might have sued the school for allowing their kids to be at prom after drinking (this happened after my 5 year reunion eons ago, so it’s not so far-fetched a scenario). Basically, the schools have to protect themselves, so they establish rules such as no alcohol consumption at school-sponsored events. If they choose to ignore kids who appear as if they might have been drinking, they become negligent. If something happens, they will most likely be sued. If the schools can’t even be allowed to make sure the participants are adhering to the rules, then they just might need to rethink the whole idea of even having such events.</p>

<p>As for the little darlings … You might think it’s okay for a kid to split a beer before prom. However, it is ILLEGAL for the kid to do so if he’s under 21. Plain & simple. If he gets caught, he pays the price (unless he’s Lindsay Lohan, but that’s another story …). That’s the way it goes. And the parents should take the opportunity to let their kids know that that is how the law works. In a couple years, the judge isn’t going to care that Little Johnny’s mommy thinks the law is unfair (or that LJ didn’t KNOW the law would actually be enforced). It comes down to personal responsibility. If you break the rules, you suffer the consequences. </p>

<p>BTW, these kids were only juniors, even though it was senior prom. Not that it makes much difference … but they were a bit younger than some might think, and graduation wouldn’t be affected.</p>

[mladyd]

<p>Suspension is fair and expected. Whatever the parents decide (loss of driving privileges, restrictions, etc) is also fair and expected. Anything beyond that (IE: police records or info sent to colleges) is ridiculous. I’m thankful all my mistakes haven’t followed me around for the rest of my life. And the kids who always ‘play by the rules’ generate their own rewards and don’t need others to be further penalized so they can benefit even more. The world doesn’t work like that.</p>

[citygirlsmom]

<p>I agree, police records, etc are unnecessary</p>

<p>At our school, when you get suspended or detention for any length of time, that can really affect grades, because papers due on those days can be zeros…harsh, yeah…but it is very effective deterant, because it is a direct consequence of the behavior and you are given plenty of notice about what punishments could be</p>

<p>it is tough at the end of the year for a school to have any leverage, so they are often more strict to set examples</p>

[kelsmom]

<p>The law is the law, though. If the judge doesn’t think a record is necessary in this case, then that is up to the judge. We aren’t talking about playing by the rules … we are talking about following the law.</p>

<p>Just because we might not like the law doesn’t mean we don’t have to follow it …</p>

[Opie_ofMaybery2]

<p>I have to wonder how many kids went in on “E”, or shrooms, or a little weed?</p>

<p>Could the zero tolerance on spirits be pushing kids into less detectable forms of intoxication? </p>

<p>As with many things people decide they need to crack down hard on, the ripple effect creates an untented activity in compensation. </p>

<p>Please don’t make this an “either with us or for with the terrorist’s” arguement in rebuttal. That’s just so lame anymore.</p>

<p>I’m against overindulgence of anything, but you also have to be aware of the unintended outcomes of social experiments. Could the crackdown on beer raise the consumption of pills? Which carries more risk to the individual?</p>