College students today drink more frequently and drink larger amounts than students of past years. Although many see it as a right of passage, or a way to fit in and spend time with friends, the number to fatalities and other tragic incidents like rape are also increasing as these kids drink more.

            Drinking among regular college men is up nearly half in the past three years and women binge drinking is up over one third. As for fraternity and sorority students, the drinking has raised about 83% due to alcohol being more readily available, and the pressure from fellow students. Students at Wisconsin-Madison were interviewed and with shocking results. At an off-campus party kids were quoted, “This is my tenth beer of the night, and I usually drink about 17 or 18.” Other girls were encouraged by classmates to, “CHUG, CHUG, CHUG!” as they raced to see who could drink their cups of beer the fastest. Encouragement and competition like this happens everyday, and usually with students who are under the legal age of 21.

            Such parties do not always result in death or assault, but drinking in college as been related to these kids’ academics and careers after the years of partying. Binge drinking costs students on average a third of a point in their grade point averages, according to a 2002 study by Bucknell University economist Amy Wolaver. The same study found that alcohol had a negative impact on earnings immediately after graduation, especially for women, amounting to a $1,600 drop in annual earnings in their first year of work. Women drinkers have found that their salaries and job choices following college have decreased since their abused minds are not able to keep up with today’s growing work force.

               The drinking problem in fraternities and sororities is a lot worse than many parents know it. These members are likelier than non-members to drink (88 vs. 67 percent), binge drink (64 vs. 37 percent), drink and drive (33 vs. 21 percent), as well as more likely to use illegal drugs such as marijuana, heroine, and abuse prescription drugs. The other problem in Greek houses is the hazing and initiation that takes place every year. Lynn "Gordie" Bailey Jr. wanted to fit in. A freshman at the University of Colorado at Boulder, the 18-year-old from Dallas felt lost on the huge campus as many students do after they leave their close-knit group of high school buddies. After he and 26 other pledges were encouraged to drink 10 bottles of whiskey and wine at a September initiation celebration, Bailey collapsed in the Chi Psi house. The punishment for passing out with his shoes on was to have the other brothers of the house draw on his body with permanent markers. They drew crude images, and racial slurs everywhere. No one noticed, until the morning, that he was not waking up, his breathing had stopped, and the paramedics were never even called in time to save him. Despite several well-publicized tragedies, alcohol abuse--particularly on fraternity row--shows no sign of decline. CU was rated America's No. 1 party school by The Princeton Review recently, but these deaths do not only occur on big party campuses.

               In September 1997, freshman Scott Krueger died of alcohol poisoning at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). He had not ever been much of a drinker, and had talked to his sister earlier that night, but at 1 A.M. his parents received a telephone call that their son was in critical condition, after downing the equivalent of 15 shots in an hour. As the family rushed to the Boston area, they prayed that he would be awake, but found him in a coma, with vomit dried in his hair, and a ventilator and IV keeping him alive for as long as they could. Scott died after 60 hours as a result of binge drinking.  Binge drinking is medically defined as frequently downing five or more drinks at a time. This was MIT’s first death caused by alcohol consumption, but they have intensified their campaign to curb alcohol abuses on campus.

               There are many other heart-breaking stories of young kids dying of alcohol overdose on college campuses across the country. There was Leslie Baltz, a University of Virginia senior, who died after she drank too much and fell down a flight of stairs. Lorraine Hanna, a freshman at Indiana University of Pennsylvania, was left alone to sleep off her night of New Year's Eve partying. This is common of many students to be left alone to recover from the drinking by them after they pass out. Later that day her twin sister found her dead with a blood-alcohol content of 0.429 percent. Driving with blood-alcohol content of 0.1 percent and above is illegal in all states. In Missouri the legal limit is .08.

               According to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), 1,400 college students die each year from alcohol-related causes. 500,000 students suffer nonfatal injuries. 400,000 students have unprotected sex. More than 100,000 students are too intoxicated to know whether they consented to sexual intercourse. 1.2–1.5 percent of students attempt suicide because of alcohol or other drug use. More than 150,000 students develop a health problem related to alcohol. 11 percent of students damage property.

               Students do not always drink to fit in or to be initiated. In fact, many drink ‘to get drunk.” In 1993 39 percent of students drank to get drunk, and is 1997, that number was up to 52 percent. Students do not necessarily use drinking as a socializing forum, but rather being drunk. It is apart of today’s instant-gratification lifestyle where the faster and easier it is to get along with others, the better it is. These kids do it all the time. 12 million students drink the equivalent of six million gallons of beer a week. Half of binge drinkers are ‘frequent’ binge drinkers, meaning they have binged drank two or three times in the past two weeks. 

               Many kids who enter college think of it as a place where they are free from their parents, and can do whatever they want without them knowing it. The problem with this thought is that many students do not know their own limits since they have not been exposed to so much alcohol while living at home as a young teenager. Some say the national drinking age should be lowered to 18 to raise awareness and lower the excitement of first drinking once older. Others say that his age drop will just increase the problem since more kids will start drinking earlier.   

               Colleges are turning from campuses of higher learning to a place where drinking is accepted and sometimes encouraged. Though it is not supported by staff, the pressure from fellow students raises the number of drinkers once on campus. At the beginning of college, the typical freshman class is comprised of 50 percent abstainers and 30 percent binge drinkers. Three months later, by the end of their first semester, it looks drastically different, with 20 percent abstaining and 60 percent binge drinking. 

               An unnamed friend of mine who goes to Washington University has witnessed the same thing as many of these studies. He was interviewed as he began pledging for an unnamed fraternity. He drinks on the weekends either at frat parties, in clubs around the city, or just in his dorm room with other college mates. He is able to buy his own alcohol and sometimes supplies alcohol for other kids in his dorm and others because he and a few friends all have fake IDs. Although a few have had their fake license taken away, he has never had any trouble buying from local grocers. On an average night of buying the other kids’ drinks, the bill will be around three hundred dollars, and the amount each student buys seems excessive. He told me, “Though its only one or two kids coming to me to buy a case or a couple of bottles, I know they really go back to the dorms and share it with all their other friends.” Though he is only a freshman in his second semester he has been drinking for quite a long time, and knows his limits. He says many other kids do not. “I haven’t heard of anyone going to the hospital or dieing this year, but I do know a few ‘girls’ that smash a wine cooler, start puking, and make lots of drama out of their first time drinking. Sure, most of them don’t know how to drink, but no one here is stupid enough to overdo it and have terrible repercussions.” As I informed him of Scott Krueger of MIT he was a bit shocked that a kid of his intelligence would drink so much, but thought it was normal of the frats to make such kids get their “drank on” so heavily. 

               My friend starts pledging this week and as he wears a plaid skirt and has four different packs of cigarettes for older fraternity brothers (even though he does not smoke himself) he gets excited as he tells me of the upcoming ritual. “They pick the most badass senior, someone challenges him to a different drinking contest of some sort each night, and both need to accomplish it if the younger wants to really join.” His challenge does not deal with drinking, but he says “A lot of these kids are going to get into some heavy shit, and be really messed up this entire week.” He survived his pledge week and still gets great grades. He does have the same mentality as the average binge drinker, that he does not need to go to every class, and he has dropped a couple that do not help him in his major. Even though he skips a class or two a week he still keeps up with all of the homework and does exceptionally well on the tests. With his high intelligence, career choice, and a personality that fits his business major perfectly, the suspicion that he will have trouble with salary and finding a job after his four years is highly false. After giving him the definition of a frequent binger drinker I asked him if he was one. His only response was, “C’mon, Joe, I think you know the answer to that one.” The smirk on his face and sarcastic tone was a definite ‘yes’ to a question I already knew the answer to, and was the main reason why I interviewed him. He asked not to be named because he did not want to get in trouble, nor did he want to be the one blamed for supporting drinking because although he does it, he says not everyone should take the same measures he does in his college life. “If kids don’t drink before they get to college, it’s no big deal. Just next door is one of the dry dorms, and there are more kids in there than there are in here.” 

               Many studies have shown the negative effects of drinking on campus but none show the social benefits of drinking. When asked about the benefits of drinking he responded, “It makes these nerdy girls prettier, me more charming, and meeting new people a lot easier. I don’t really see a problem with it all until someone dies or gets really hurt.” Though the stats show that binge drinking is up in the past ten years, they do not take in any numbers outside of college. Though it may not be as big of a deal we should not base all of our focus on the college life, but more on the younger teenager, and life after college. Alcoholism is not always started in late teens but the death caused by these drunks is a devastating number that can only be controlled by the students’ awareness and their own will to act.