Three hours of studying – give or take a few minutes – awaited freshman Andrew Myers. And it was not even for class.\nMyers, along with the rest of the 7,000-student freshman class, is required to take an alcohol education course called AlcoholEdu. In the first year of the program, it has already been met with negative assessments from many students interviewed for this story. \nFreshman Aubrey Chase summed up the course in one word: pointless.\n“I didn’t think it was effective,” Chase said. “A lot of people are doing it because they have to and are not paying attention.”\nChase said she has heard friends turn on the video from the course’s Web site, which can be taken at anytime or place, but they just ignored the lesson and watched TV while it played.\nHowever, University officials supported the program with its emphasis on prevention. With this focus, Dee Owens, director of the Alcohol and Drug Information Center, said it is difficult to measure if the course is effective or not.\n“If you prevent something, how do you know it was you?” Owens said. “That’s why we follow up to see the effect. Why would you come to a university and not be educated? The course helps students not hurt themselves.” \nMonday was the deadline for all freshmen to complete the course. As of Monday, about 6, 722 students completed the three-hour lesson, with a few hundred left to complete it. Owens said students can still take the course late, barring in mind the consequences if they don’t do it soon. \n“We will know who doesn’t take it,” she said, adding that students will not be allowed to register for second-semester classes until it is completed.
Cause for concern\nThe online course’s goal is simple: to curb underage drinking for incoming freshmen and college-age students. \nLast year, on the first weekend freshmen were on campus, IU witnessed abnormally high numbers in the amount of alcohol-related citations. A high number of students went to the hospital for alcohol poisoning as well. \nAccording to reports on the IU Police Department Web site, IUPD made about 400 arrests and 1,000 disciplinary referrals in 2006 on campus for public intoxication, illegal consumption and false identification. \nThese numbers did not go unnoticed. Owens said she received multiple phone calls to her office from people who were concerned about the arrests. \n“It was quite disturbing,” she said of last year’s incidents. She said University administrators felt students were having fun, but without the information and prevention education. This program will now allow for the information to be given up front to the students. \n“It’s to let them (the freshmen) know what not to do,” Owens said. \nBecause this is the first year IU incorporated AlcoholEdu into requirements for incoming freshmen, Owens said it will take about four years before the University knows whether or not it is effective. Owens said the other universities using the AlcoholEdu program show improvement in research.
Prevention first\nIU Police Department Capt. Jerry Minger said the program is about stopping people before the problem occurs and preventing crimes from occurring. \n“It’s hard to say the people who benefit (from the course),” Minger said, explaining that the college lifestyle expects students to be independent and responsible in decision-making.\n“I’m afraid the ones we see at the police department and meet up with are not mature enough to handle the responsibility,” Minger said. \nWhether or not the program proves effective relies on the main component of the \ncourse: students. \nOwens said there will be a feedback section to ask students their overall thoughts on AlcoholEdu, but added that the benefits of education sometimes outweigh popularity with students.\n“I’ve sat through some stupid courses – if I wanted to get credit, I sucked it up,” she said. “I wouldn’t ask anyone to do anything I wouldn’t do myself.” \nOwens said there is a 75 percent pass rate, and students need to pass three quarters of the exam. If students fail portions of the course, they must go back and re-take the part they failed. \n“It’s not all or nothing,” Owens said. \nStudents give test failing grade\nGearing the course toward real-life scenarios rather than information would be helpful, Chase said. Questions or facts that could scare students may get them to listen, she said. \n“It’s boring,” Chase said. “I’ve learned a couple of things but not anything that will change my opinions.”\nBesides using fear to initiate change, Chase said that in order to get new students to listen to the program, it will have to be completely re-done in her opinion.\n“The fact that we can’t register for classes is ineffective,” she said.\nThe course covers the basics from health to safety and how alcohol affects the brain, freshman Tim Fuson said. What he disliked about the course was the short section on safety. \nHe disapproved of the brain portion of the course and said that it was too much information that students weren’t as concerned about. \n“It shouldn’t be pass or fail, you should just know,” said Fuson, who failed the course twice. “Anytime something is forced upon as something extra, it’s usually frowned upon. We’re already bombarded with so many things as incoming freshmen.”
