STAFF EDITORIAL: Alcohol at Penn, a year later

Over the last year, Penn's new alcohol policy has not created a safer, healthier environment for students on this campus. Principally, we've seen the University enact a new alcohol policy designed to crack down on campus drinking while providing a significant increase in non-alcoholic social options. The objectives of the policy, we were told, were to create a safe and healthy environment for students and change the culture of drinking at Penn. Clearly, while we hope the policy will be successful in the long term, we cannot judge the ultimate potential of the alcohol policy based on a few months of implementation. But it is ironic that even as the policy is intended to bring the student body to a point of greater health and safety, actions taken so far have brought us neither. The crux of the matter is that the new alcohol policy has students neither drinking less nor more safely. Granted, for reasons of legal liability more than policy, the era of the open Animal House-style fraternity party is all but over. But Penn's policies have hastened this process -- with very worrisome results -- as monitored frat parties tend to be safer then unmonitored and unregulated off-campus venues. Greek houses are still holding smaller, unofficial parties -- hard alcohol and all -- without registering them with the University. The greater consequence -- and the source of our greatest initial concerns -- is that the party scene is shifting more toward unsupervised private rooms and off-campus residences. Though we are fortunate not to have seen an increase in alcohol-related hospitalizations, the increasing tendency to drink in unregulated environments bodes ill for student safety in the future. The administration has taken some steps in the name of student health and safety. Policies that limit parental notification of alcohol offenses and allow students to bring inebriated friends to the emergency room without fear of discipline are key in this regard. Furthermore, Penn's educational initiatives -- including the Alcohol 101 CD-ROM distributed to all incoming freshmen -- are well-intentioned and welcomed. The explosion in non-alcoholic social options is also a good thing for this campus. The college houses in particular offer dry programming, from movie nights to rooftop dances, almost every night of the week. But these events have been, for the most part, poorly attended. The key to attracting college-aged students to non-alcoholic social events lies in appealing to a student's sense of what a college campus should be. The Foundation and 4040 music venues are strong steps in that direction. Encouraging exploration of the City of Philadelphia -- beyond what is planned for this fall's New Student Orientation -- should also help show students that there is more to do than drink on a Friday night. Over time, we hope that these myriad opportunities alter the drinking culture on campus -- not to prevent students from drinking, but to create an environment where alcohol is not the dominant focus of social activity. But in the end, while progress can be made at providing alternatives to drinking, the fact is that students who want to drink will drink and parties will be held in violation of official policy. No one can reasonably pretend otherwise -- or hope to legislate those facts away.