Task force aims to prevent high-risk drinking

Updated 10:00 AM September 13, 2004

Task force aims to prevent high-risk drinking

By Joel Seguine
Office of the Vice President for Communications

With the fall term underway, one of the major concerns on the minds of University administrators is high-risk drinking among students, especially in the initial weeks of the semester. Many incoming students are away from home for the first time, facing a new kind of freedom and its accompanying responsibilities.

In an effort to address the problems associated with high-risk drinking, specifically during the first six weeks of the term, the University has developed several new alcohol education programs. The health and safety of students are of foremost importance, as well as the academic consequences and the legal issues surrounding underage drinking.

Leading these efforts is Patrice Flax, coordinator of the University's Alcohol and Other Drug Prevention Program, who chairs the Campus/Community Task Force on Alcohol Misuse and Excessive Use. Dr. Robert Winfield, director of the University Health Service, is the facilitator of the task force.

Flax says there are a number of new strategies in place for this fall. One is a new online education program available to students, called MyStudentBody.com, which promotes responsible alcohol use through interactive multi-media and Internet technologies. Another is an intervention effort called Brief Alcohol Screening and Intervention of College Students (BASICS).

"It is aimed at students who drink heavily and who have experienced or are at risk for problems such as poor class attendance, accidents, sexual assault and violent behavior," Flax says.

Besides the new and continuing education programs to help meet these goals, there will be a media campaign that includes informing students about the consequences of risky and underage drinking. It also will seek to debunk myths, such as the belief by some students that if their grades are good, it doesn't matter if they drink. Flax says the consequences of risky drinking also show up in other ways, such as difficulty with interpersonal relationships or health issues.

Flax says that many of the ideas for education programs have come from the various subcommittees of the task force, which have met four times since the group convened in April.

"We had four goals that together would involve the entire University community in changing the drinking culture among students," Flax says. "We also are beginning a dialogue with representatives from the Ann Arbor community about the negative consequences that can result from high-risk and underage drinking."

In its charge from Vice President for Student Affairs E. Royster Harper made in late spring, the task force was asked to identify and carry out strategies "that lead to the reduction in the excessive and underage consumption of alcohol and the reduction of secondary consequences among [U-M] students within the first six weeks of the fall semester."

Harper also asked the group to recommend future options and next steps to the Senior Leadership Team in the Division of Student Affairs sometime in November or December. Members of the task force include students and staff from across campus, as well as members of the Ann Arbor community.

"We really need to change the culture that says risky drinking is OK," Harper says. "We want to help our students understand the negative consequences of their behavior, including the impacts on their health and academic performance."

For more information about these and other alcohol education programs, contact Flax at (734) 763-7808 or pflax@umich.edu.

Task force aims to prevent high-risk drinking

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