April designated Alcohol Awareness month
April is Alcohol Awareness Month but Eastern wants students to drink responsibly all year long.
“We work year-round to promote healthy choices,” said Rachel Fisher, Eastern’s Health Communication and Marketing Specialist. “A major goal of the HERC is to reduce alcohol consumption rates and alcohol-relates harm.”
Last month, Eastern was honored for outstanding alcohol-abuse prevention efforts along with nine other institutions and organizations nation-wide.
“I accepted it on behalf of the HERC,” said Dan Nadler, vice president for student affairs. “It would have never happened without them.”
The award is being displayed at the Heath Education Resource Center.
“This award recognizes the level of dedication, enthusiasm, effectiveness, and commitment that Eastern has to addressing and reducing the negative academic, social and health consequences related to excessive drinking,” Fisher said.
The programs
Eastern offers many programs to make sure students are aware of alcohol consequences and side effects. Two of these programs are AlcoholEdu and e-Chug.
AlcoholEdu is a program that incoming students take prior to arriving at Eastern.
The program is an online instructional course.
In order to pass the first assessment students must receive 70 percent or higher to continue. The first part must be completed before the first day of classes and after 40 days after the first day of classes they must take another quiz to see if thoughts have changed since they started school.
The school received a grant for this program and has an annual contract with the program for approximately $12,000 a year. Last summer every student who took the online assessment cost Eastern about $1 each. This program is available to all students. Eastern is the first school to open this monologue to parents.
“By doing this it creates conversation between the university, parents, and students,” said Nadler.
AlcoholEdu was started in summer of 2006 and was implemented by Nadler.
When Nadler came to Eastern, he noticed a few concerns with alcohol use and education at Eastern.
Nadler knew he wanted to become more proactive with alcohol education.
“AlcoholEdu is the beginning of our dialogue concerning alcohol education, prevention, and awareness,” Nadler said.
Cindy Fischer, a sophomore family and consumer sciences major, thought Alcohol Edu was more of a refresher for her knowledge on alcohol.
“I knew most of the stuff the program discussed, but maybe if they had more realistic scenarios it would be more affective,” said Fischer.
E-Chug is apart of 71 universities around the country and this assessment is designed to receive feedback to reduce drinking among college students.
When students enter the site students enter info about their own drinking habits and family history. When info is submitted, the e-Chug program calculates and compares the user’s responses to national and local norms.
“Our motivation is for educational opportunity to pursue,” said Nadler.
Drinking rules on campus
When students violated drinking rules in the residence halls, the university has a series of consequences depending on the offense.
A referral for first offence and minor violations sometimes requires students to attend a Crawl class. This is a program for first time offenders who violate the Student Conduct Code with substance usage in residence halls. The program costs $35.
To prevent these violations the HERC puts together programs such as 6 pack to prevent violations and incidents from happening. Residence Assistants also speak to members on the floor in the beginning of the year, Nadler said.
These programs have reduced incidents involving alcohol by 50 percent, Nadler said.
“These programs are effective to turn students around and continue with academic and social strength,” said Nadler.
Drinking at other schools
Other universities use other programs and ways to prevent and show awareness of alcohol.
Kerri Calvert, Promotion coordinator of Illinois State University said ISU uses “toilet talks” which are flyers placed behind bathroom stall doors and on bulletin boards to discuss drinking prevention and education with students.
“This is definitely an issue and we are trying a convenient effort from different angles,” said Calvert.
Donna Schoenfeld, Northern Illinois University Director of Health Enhancement said NIU has made a variety of programs for alcohol prevention because not all students absorb information the same way.
“Starting this fall, my department will be introducing BASICS to NIU,” said Schoenfeld. “This is a 2-session educational opportunity for students to meet with health educators and participate one-on-one self assessment about their drinking behavior.”
This program is not intended to be replaced or replace counseling for those with serious issues but rather to reach students who need to be aware of alcohol issues, Schoenfeld said.
According to the Marine Institute, More than 1,700 college students in the U.S. are killed each year as a result of alcohol-related injuries
Nadler said he doesn’t think Eastern has had a student death due to alcohol.
Brittni Garcia can be reached at 581-7942 or at bmgarcia@eiu.edu.
