Alcohol at Smith??

Colleges and Universities A-Z Smith College
1

<p>Hi. I'm a high school junior currently researching colleges, and Smith is on my visit list.</p>

<p>I have a question about the drinking scene at Smith. I often hear that there is far less drinking at all women's schools than at co-ed schools, Smith being no exception. On the other hand, I've heard from other sources that there is just as much drinking at Smith as there are at Co-ed colleges. Can someone please clarify what the situation is really like?</p>

<p>And, while we're at it, what about recreational drug use? </p>

<p>thanks.</p>

2

<p>My guess is that there is much less binge drinking, but a similar percentage of students who drink (and therefore a substantial amount of underage drinking). Serving alcohol at official events (senior wine and cheeses, house parties, etc.) requires a TON of red tape, so there is a fair number of small, informal gatherings in people's rooms where alcohol is served (obviously, people caught serving alcohol to minors or cramming too many people into their room get in trouble, but they don't ususally get caught). </p>

<p>As for drug use? I've never used any sort of illegal drug or tobacco, before or during my time at Smith. I'm certainly not the only one (there are 113 members of the "Am I the only one who's never smoked pot?" facebook group, and I'm sure a lot more than that could join), and I've never felt any pressure to use drugs. But they are here, especially pot, and you can probably find just about any type of drug if you looked for it (I knew of a girl a few years older than me who was arrested for possession of cocaine).</p>

3

<p>Statistically, there is less heavy drinking at Smith than the national averages. So that would mean less than the "average coed school", whatever that is. </p>

<p>However, there is a wide range of heavy drinker percentages at various coed schools, so you really have to frame that question about specific schools. There are coed colleges with similar percentages of heavy drinkers as Smith.</p>

<p>It's a question worth asking. With just a handful of exceptions, there will be plenty of drinking on college campuses. However, there are big differences and schools with more frequent heavy drinking tend to have more negative disruption for moderate and non-drinkers.</p>

4

<p>"However, there is a wide range of heavy drinker percentages at various coed schools, so you really have to frame that question about specific schools. There are coed colleges with similar percentages of heavy drinkers as Smith."</p>

<p>That's a good point. Do you know about Smith's alcohol use compared to that of other 7-sisters schools? Or perhaps to schools in the 5-college area?</p>

5

<p>I'll defer to Mini; however, my impression is that all of the Seven Sister schools are towards the low end of drinking rates.</p>

<p>Amherst is significantly higher based on the attention paid to problem drinking by the administration, underground fraternities, reported alcohol poisonings, etc. However, I have never seen a published survey and it wouldn't suprise me if Amherst is somewhere around the national average -- part of its student body has heavy-drinking demographics, but part does not (lots of diversity). I don't know if we even need to talk about ZooMASS; it has historically been a very heavy drinking campus.</p>

6

<p>{{my impression is that all of the Seven Sister schools }}}</p>

<p>Only 5 sisters now. Vassar and Radcliffe got married.</p>

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<p>Radcliffe got married. Vassar left the Pleiades.</p>

8

<p>Binge drinking rates at Smith are a bit under half the national average. Amherst is a little above the national average from the last data I saw, Williams a bit above that. (Williams, somewhat uniquely, also has data on heavy drinking, i.e. those who drink every day, and it is pretty astounding.) UMass is well above the national average. I have no data on Mt. Holyoke or Wellesley or Bryn Mawr, but I expect they are similar to Smith's.</p>

<p>Most of the coed schools with similar binge drinking percentages to Smith's have relatively high numbers of commuter students.</p>

9

<p>{{Williams, somewhat uniquely, also has data on heavy drinking, i.e. those who drink every day,}}</p>

<p>Why does Williams consider those who drink everyday “heavy drinkers?”</p>

<p>I know of many individuals who have a beer, cocktail or glass of wine in the evening.</p>

10

<p><cough, cough=""> I don't think they mean a glass of wine with dinner each day. Probably more like drinking to get drunk is the standard here. Although, why, I could not tell you. It should only take one night of trying to sleep with the ceiling going in circles and the toilet bowl as your best friend to put an end to that.</cough,></p>

11

<p>"Why does Williams consider those who drink everyday “heavy drinkers?”"</p>

<p>Defined as multiple drinks, five or more days per week, over the period of at least one month. </p>

<p>Experimental data indicate that the usually available college binge drinking data signficantly underestimates prevalence, in 3 distinct ways. It was found that drinkers who have more than 3 drinkers in an episode on average underestimate the number of drinks by one. When asked to pour a standard drink, the average drink poured by a college student is 1.75X the standard. And the number of students who binge only once in a two-week period is very small. So a student who says he had only 4 drinks (and was only asked if he binge drank once in a two week period), actually had, on average 8.75 drinks (half had more), likely on multiple occasions, in the past two weeks, and is NOT classified as a binge drinker. This is why Williams was interested in the "heavy drinker" data, as the standard questionnaire was/is not capturing what campus culture is actually like.</p>

<p>At any rate, they found that roughly half the students were binge drinkers, using the standard definition (which left out all those "4-drink drinkers"), higher for males, among white students, and among athletes. 30% were "heavy drinkers".</p>

<p>Make of the data what you will; it's just data. Using the same questionnaire, the prevalence of binge drinking among Smith students is roughly 40% of that at Williams, and around 42% of that at Amherst. (The Smith data would include Smithies who do their drinking at Amherst or UMass, and, theoretically vice versa.)</p>

12

<p>Here's the latest in a continuing series:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.williamsrecord.com/wr/?section=news&view=article&id=7596%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.williamsrecord.com/wr/?section=news&view=article&id=7596&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

13

<p>walk well away from windowsills............this is so Monty Python.</p>

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<p>Must have been quite the Thursday night at Williams! Here's the campus security log for the night of the bonfires:</p>

<hr>

<p>Thursday 2-16-06 </p>

<p>10:29 p.m., Gladden: Beer pong activity on the fifth floor was broken up. </p>

<p>Friday 2-17-06 </p>

<p>1:56 a.m., Greylock quad: Officers were notified of a burning bicycle. They arrived to find a fire with a bicycle on top of other burning debris. </p>

<p>6:02 a.m., Schow Atrium: Officers responded to a call regarding an intoxicated person found unconscious and unresponsive on top of the bathroom sink. Village Ambulance responded to the scene.</p>

<hr>

<p>Hazmat: I don't know about Monty Python, but this is at least the third newspaper article in the last two years indicating a lack of proper toilet training among Williams students. Hard to know what to make of it, really.</p>

15

<p>Forgive this post - it comes from an old fuddy-duddy, Smithie father, Williams alum (and one who enjoyed his drugs, even if not alcohol, in his time), chemical dependency professional and state alcohol/drug abuse treatment planner:</p>

<p>Williams, while the worst we saw among the LACs in this regard (and continue to read about) is by no means the worst among American colleges and universities in terms of the impact of alcohol on campus life generally speaking. It is, after all, my alma mater as well as part of my professional work. It is just one I know about and have followed. And (another caveat coming), any generalization has to be tempered with the fact that even among the northeast coed LACs, the differences from campus to campus can be very, very great, not only in the prevalence of heavy/binge drinking, but its impact on campus culture (because there is nothing else in Williamstown, it sticks out like a sore thumb, but the available data show massive differences with the campus culture at, say, coed Haverford or Swarthmore.)</p>

<p>But anyway: I can remember in the dark ages when I was there, and Williams was all male, plenty of students got wasted, and rolled naked in the snow, and played pranks on each other, and occasionally vomited, etc., etc., etc. We weren't all "good and virtuous" back in the days before running water. </p>

<p>But I wonder how much of the associated "strange" behavior (public defecation out of windows and the painting of walls with feces just for starters), something that is frankly beyond my ken, is associated with the college being coed? Kind of like marking the territory? A statement of perverted masculinity? Burning other people's laundry? Is it done for some kind of strange effect? (I'm assuming, as all the articles in the campus paper seem to indicate, that males are overwhelmingly the perpetrators.) I mean if students want to poison themselves and end up in the emergency room, that's awful, but why publicly destroy your own space? Am I too old to appreciate the fun? If anyone can explain it to me, I'd really like to know. I really DON'T get it (and, supposedly, I am paid to.)</p>

<p>My d. was appalled at her Thursday night visit there two years ago, and if she ever read this (which I'm sure she won't), would be pinching herself in making a wise decision. (And I don't particular mind if she has a drink or two now and again, though knowing her, it isn't likely to be a common occurrence.)</p>

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<p>I don't think that's an adequate explanation. Being much younger than you, I went to Williams when it was coed. I recall doing some silly stuff, but not along those lines.</p>

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<p>Oh, I know it isn't adequate, but I am wondering whether it is "contributing". I can't imagine men doing this in an all-male environment (though I have difficulty imagining it at all.)</p>

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<p>I can't imagine men doing this in an all-male environment }}}</p>

<p>The penal system if full of men more than willing to, and do, destroy their surroundings and defecate on walls, guards or to throw in the hallways. I’m not advocating an apology between Williams and a prison but, darn, the town and college is small and confining. :) I spent a great deal of time there having my roadbike built at the Spoke and visiting the area. After being there for a day, going back to Amherst and NoHo felt as if I was returning to a metropolis by comparison.</p>

19

<p>I’m not advocating an apology between Williams}}</p>

<p>opps< anology between williams etc.</p>