Editorial : Alcohol education needs SU focus

The effectiveness of AlcoholEdu, Syracuse University’s online alcohol education program, is unclear. Some students called the program useless and unpersuasive, though research reveals AlcoholEdu decreases dangerous and unhealthy drinking.

Whatever the case — effective or not — SU could certainly improve its alcohol education program by tailoring it to the university. More than 500 colleges implement AlcoholEdu. The program has to be broad to serve all these campuses. That broadness leaves out essential information specific to safety here on campus.

AlcoholEdu comes off as patronizing and juvenile. Some of the information seems cliché rather than genuinely helpful, and most mandatory high school health classes cover general information about drinking. Scare tactics would certainly turn many students off. But rather than test students on how to calculate their blood alcohol content, SU should teach students the relevant phone numbers, consequences and laws specific to Syracuse. SU’s alcohol education program should cover exactly what students need to know in the cases of illegal or dangerous drinking:

• Who they call if someone is dangerously drunk or illegally intoxicated and injured

• The punishments for underage drinking and if there is medical amnesty

• Syracuse laws against nuisance parties, open containers, and drinking and driving

• Statistics about the number and frequency of citations at SU

Students use or learn this information every week and effective alcohol education should include them.

Several poignant examples of dangerous drinking have occurred on this campus, most involving car accidents like the student hit in fall 2008. Offering these examples, not to scare but to bring home the reality of dangerous drinking, would leave a lasting impression more than AlcoholEdu’s theoretical examples.

SU has a wealth of film students between the S.I. Newhouse School of Public Communications and the College of Visual and Performing Arts. These students, in collaboration with the university, could easily put together an informational movie that makes better use of incoming students’ time. An SU-specific video would present incoming students with soon-to-be familiar places, people and scenarios that leave them smarter and, perhaps, even appreciative.