A Nick at a Time
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| It’s all fun and games until someone goes to the hospital. |
“…the freshman party thing, where you just roam in packs, looking for whatever’s going on…ears perked, listening for noise that might hint at a frat party.”
So College freshman Marty Borowsky described the social scene during New Student Orientation. This scene arises out of three defining characteristics of the freshman experience.
First, complete and total freedom - the freedom “…of not having anyone to supervise you all the time,” as College freshman Colin Dampier put it. This is a marked change from the homes most students come from, where, as College freshman Trixie Canivel said, “…you had the luxury of having people help you with some stuff. You didn’t have to be responsible.”
Second, the need to make new social connections. Freshmen come in not knowing anyone - which is one reason freshmen go to these parties in the first place. To meet people.
Third, easy access to alcohol and a virtual lack of consequences for using it.
Put all of this together and you get an environment where it is very easy for freshmen to make bad choices concerning alcohol.
When bad choices are made, little is done to help them. While resources are available to those who seek them out, authority figures rarely exercise it in an effectual manner. “Even if you do get written up, you really don’t get in any trouble. You just get a talking-to,” Dampier says.
While such a policy emphasizes freshmen’s maturity, it does not have their best interest in mind. Students are cast into an environment where they are free to make choices that may really mess up their lives, and those who struggle are often left to struggle alone. You can teach someone to swim by throwing them into a river, but there are more compassionate ways to do so.
Penn should stop turning a blind eye to the situation during NSO, and it should recognize that discipline is necessary to teach healthy limits.
The 2005 Alcohol Response Team considered “…whether the UPPD should be asked to crack down on underage drinking,” but decided not to risk alienating students and the police. The mindset that the University can ask (read: tell) the police force what and what not to enforce is alarming to me, but that’s another blog. This perspective should be reconsidered.
In addition, to mean anything, being written up should result in more than a slap on the wrist. A policy without discipline is impotent.
If the University cares about its students’ wellbeing, it should take a more active role in deterring unhealthy behavior.
A Nick at a Time appears every Tuesday and Thursday.
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September 25th, 2007 at 2:03 am
I disagree completely. Having the freedom to go a little crazy helps students who haven’t found their limits before discover what they can and cannot handle. The police should be there to help those who push themselves past their own limit, not to punish them. It would be a waste of time and money to enforce an underage drinking policy any more than Penn already does, because 90% of those caught or disciplined will be out there the next weekend, making the same choices. It’s a personal decision, not one worth regulating.
September 25th, 2007 at 2:07 pm
- -N, that is ridiculous. A person should be encouraged to “find their limits” by crossing them? What if instead of self-destructive behavior (overboard on the alcohol) it was destructive behaviour towards others? Should a person predisposed to violence be put into a riot situation to “find their limits”? Why is this reasoning accepted so widely? Why don’t we encourage them to find their sexual limits? “Go on, go ahead, Johnny. … OK, so, that time, you got an STD. Now, what have we learned?”
And why is there this entitlement? The public intoxication laws don’t seem to apply to these people. Personally, I’d like to be able to walk home at night without witnessing people urinating on the side of buildings (I’ve seen this twice so far just this school year).
I’d like to live on a campus where a girl didn’t have to get accompanied home at night - not because of violence from outside the University but for fear of harassment from bands of students, mostly underaged, drunk with substance and with attitude.
September 26th, 2007 at 3:29 pm
Nick , first let me say that your heart is in the right place . But Penn cannot regulate NSO because these freshman need to learn to regulate themselves . If they fail , well, hopefully they’ll just flunk out- not end up in the E.R. I have friends that work at the neighboring hospitals . When NSO week rolls around or, Fling weekend comes , they gear up for what they call ” Stupid Penn Tricks ” which could be anything from alcohol poisoning to falling down and breaking teeth . In a perfect world college kids would all know their limits , but obviously this isnt the case …. still it’s not the University’s place to set those limits .
September 27th, 2007 at 12:13 pm
vintage movies, including the many non-classic vintage movies, can also be a happy viewing.