HOUGHTON--Michigan Tech is actively taking a stand in the fight against the high risk behaviors associated with alcohol consumption. A variety of initiatives including a national ad campaign targeting binge drinking, the 21st Birthday program, and the TIPS program are just a few of the things in which MTU is involved.
The National Association of State Universities and Land-Grant Colleges, with funding provided by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Barnes and Noble, Inc., has launched a national ad campaign aimed at raising public awareness of the danger of binge drinking by young people. Binge drinking, as defined by the 1997 Harvard School of Public Health College Alcohol Study, is the consumption of five or more drinks in succession for men and four or more for women on at least one occasion. Frequent binge drinkers were those who drank to excess three or more times in the two-week period.
According to the Harvard survey of 14,321 students at 116 colleges and universities, almost 43 percent of students (approximately 3 million students nationally) met the widely accepted definition for binge drinkers.
"Drinking in excess is a problem in colleges and universities all over the country, but it is hard for me to use the term binge drinking in such a narrow definition," admits Steven Tyrell, associate dean of student affairs at Michigan Tech. "Every student has a different body shape, metabolism, and family background, so we cannot assume that a certain number of drinks will be excessive to all male students, while, for instance, just a couple of drinks could be dangerous to one student because of a history of alcoholism in the family."
"Instead, what we try to emphasize is reducing high risk behaviors--the point when behaviors are harmful--whether or not it involves alcohol," continued Tyrell. "We want to promote responsible decision-making not only for the person who drinks alcohol, but for others who suffer secondary effects of high risk behaviors, such as the friends who try to take care of him after leaving the bar."
Tyrell explained that Michigan Tech is effected just as much by the secondary effects of high risk behaviors as they are by the primary effects. "Watching over a friend who might be in danger is necessary, but also requires a lot of time. The watcher will inevitably lose sleep and may become apprehensive about future incidents, other roommates may be awakened by disruptive noise, incidents of sexual assault may occur, or deaths could be caused by drunk driving."
The brochures that are part of the ad campaign, which highlight campus programs that prevent drinking to get drunk, have been distributed on campus to residence hall coordinators to target the majority of first-year students who live there.
Another initiative that Tech is sponsoring is Training for Intervention Procedures (TIPS). TIPS facilitators are seven MTU students sponsored by the Office of Student Affairs who run two to four hour seminars on how to intervene with alcohol behaviors before they become high risk.
The training includes being able to spot warning signs of high risk behaviors and actions to take to reduce them. Tyrell emphasizes the need for friends watching over a drinker to understand that it requires more than merely worrying about a friend choking in his or her own vomit.
"The McCues recent presentation on our campus made it altogether clear that friends of their son Brad did not know what other signs to look for in determining if their son was in danger."
The McCues son, Brad McCue, died of alcohol poisoning last year while attending Michigan State University.
The 21st Birthday program sends out birthday cards to students on their 21st birthday. The card contains coupons for local businesses.
"The key to the 21st birthday cards is that the coupons are for food at local establishments or free movie tickets or video rentals," explained Tyrell. "This way, we are helping encouraging students to make responsible choices and to keep them for the future, instead of promoting behaviors that might lead to being in a high risk category."
10/25/99--MTN176