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By Kathrine Schmidt
April 23, 2007
Waltham - The latest statistics are, well, sobering.
Forty-nine percent of full-time college students binge drink and/or use illegal drugs, according to a study released in mid-March by the National Center on Addiction and Substance Abuse at Columbia University.
But colleges and universities, including Waltham's Bentley College, are developing innovative ways to fight back.
Bentley, along with six other winners, was recognized for its comprehensive alcohol prevention programs with a Prevention Excellence Award from Outside the Classroom, a Boston-based company that makes a software program, AlcoholEdu, to discourage dangerous drinking. Winners were selected from a pool of Outside the Classroom customers.
"Bentley implemented a truly comprehensive prevention program," Erika Tower, director of communications and marketing for Outside the Classroom, said in an e-mail. "Not only did they implement AlcoholEdu as a required program for all first-year students, but they also created a new campus organization called SAFE: Students for Alcohol-Free Events; conducted educational training in residence halls, with members of Greek life, and with athletic teams; and changed their class schedule to reduce high-risk drinking on their campus (among other things)."
Outside the Classroom also appreciated the prevention program's presence on campus.
"Bentley had a strong communications plan for their prevention program, collaborating with faculty and staff to ensure requirements and opportunities were reinforced and informing parents and students about the programs," Tower wrote. "Bentley also gathered organizational support for its programs from all levels of the College - up to and including the Board of Trustees."
"We were thrilled," said Jessica Greher, coordinator of Alcohol and Other Drug Prevention Programs at Bentley. "We really excited that we're receiving recognition for work we've been doing."
The approach, she said, was chiefly on reducing harm. "When you're thinking about the campus as a whole, can we stop all students from drinking? No," Greher said, but offices can educate students to make drinking less damaging.
The office also helps integrate alcohol abuse prevention programming on campus.
"We also work a lot with different student organizations and residence life doing floor programs," she said.
They also put on guest lectures for nutrition classes, and give programming for theme weeks like National Wellness Week and National Alcohol Screening day, in which 200 students were screened this year. And class schedules have been switched to cut the drinking weekend shorter.
"We had spoken with the academic side of the house to increase classes being offered on Fridays to avoid students drinking on Thursdays," Greher said. But the success was hard to measure. "It's hard to tell: Some students might just choose to not take classes on Fridays," she said.
When students do run into trouble with alcohol, Greher said, Bentley uses a program called Basic Alcohol Screening Intervention. The program, which consists of one-on-one consultations, she says, "help us to investigate their choices, and evaluate areas of risks so they make better decisions."
AlcoholEdu is part of Bentley's strategy, and was made mandatory for incoming freshmen for this past academic year. "It doesn't tell students what to think, but gives the students the information they need to make healthy and safe decisions" through surveys and interactive tests. All first-year students, whether they drink or not, complete the program's detailed initial survey on arriving on-campus and another after 45 days.
The surveys are personalized to each student's preferences (i.e. for a female who does not choose to drink, or a male that does) and are confidential and anonymous. For students who don't drink, the educators said, it can help educate how to deal with the use of alcohol in their midst.
More than 500 colleges and universities in the U.S. use the software, she said.
"We know there's no silver bullet (for alcohol abuse)," Tower said. "It's really important for schools to have a really comprehensive approach. Everything from peer counseling or mentoring to using other social marketing approaches (can be effective)."
Bentley students interviewed, however, had mixed feelings about whether the programs worked.
"I think they do what they want," said Eric Chan, a sophomore transfer, of Bentley students. "Of course (officals) try to prevent alcohol. But (among) me and my friends, I don't notice anybody responding to this programming."
Caitlin Shilalie, also a sophomore, thought the college did a good job.
"They really do promote alcohol awareness," she said. "I know they do each semester an alcohol awareness day where they have different events, they have golf cart driving with beer goggles and stuff. I think there's usually a pretty good turnout to the events."
The top winner in the Outside the Classroom Contest was the University of Alabama, which received Highest Honors. Other Prevention Excellence winners were St. Joseph's University, State University of New York at New Paltz, the University of Connecticut, the University of Central Florida, the University of Iowa, and University of Texas at San Antonio.
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