<p>Based on our visit & tour of Kenyon College in Ohio, I have to agree with interesteddad's Post #35 which was quoted in Post #79.</p>
<p>So- if you are a parent or student starting a college search, where do you look for this kind of information? It's not something that most schools post on their websites. For ex, I was surprised to see Macalester mentioned in the OP as a heavy-drinking school-- it's just not what I had envisioned. Other than perhaps religious campuses, it sounds like its found just about everywhere, though at some more arty or liberal campuses pot seems to be more the vice of choice.</p>
<p>I also think you need to look carefully at your child/student. Obviously some kids will handle themselves just fine in schools with a heavy drinking scene, and be confident and comfortable remaining outside the social norm. Others wont. I think a lot of kids don't arrive on campus planning to binge drink, but they get caught up in it.</p>
<p>mini stated:</p>
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Yes, lots of folks attend certain schools because they WANT to drink heavily (they began in high school or, the data indicates, earlier), and so let's make it easier for them to make informed choices.
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<p>As one who started WAY before HS (actually before old junior high) and ended up a full blown alcoholic, I knew that as long as I had money I could find booze (or beer or wine). This was true whether the legal drinking age was 18 or 21 and whether I was 15 or 20.</p>
<p>I didn't give it one moment's thought about the college party atmosphere when deciding where to apply because to a kid with a real need for booze it only takes 3 things, the kid, money and booze, the rest is inconsequential. For females boozers it doesn't even require money.</p>
<p>It is a false sense of security if a parent thinks "I have done my job because I didn't let Billy or Jane go to a college with a party reputation." So the idea of "outing" party schools is a waste of time IMO.</p>
<p>BTY-- I graduated Phi Kappa Phi. But, as mini points out I squandered a lot of college by being drunk.</p>
<p>If you really think the college can do what you couldn't do as a parent, I believe you are mistaken.</p>
<p>I have heard (and read on CC) that colleges are now stopping students on campus for being intoxicated. I have had friends who have had their kids "busted" by the school for intoxication while walking on campus and for having alcohol (and/or pot) in their rooms, whether it belonged to them or their roommate. Doesn't seem to stop anything since most kids think "it can't happen to me" or "dad or mom will get me out of it."</p>
<p>The one thing that I think a school could do that might have some marginal effect is require class attendance and fail students with over "X" absences. It might discourage the "amateur" from binging, but most of us hard-core types would just go hungover. </p>
<p>By the way, study hard-play hard is BS when the "play hard" is blackout drinking. Wake up folks, that kid who is blacking out has a very serious problem.</p>
<p>"^^ If that ever happens be ready to see BYU ranked #1 in the nation."</p>
<p>Making binge drinking rates 5% of the ranking formula wouldn't bring it up very far. No one is suggesting that USNews ought to ignore class size, reputation, and the like.</p>
<p>"If you really think the college can do what you couldn't do as a parent, I believe you are mistaken."</p>
<p>I agree with you when it comes to kids who have vulnerability to alcoholism. I'm mostly not worried that I'd send a kid to Drunken State and have her wind up an alcoholic. I'm worried about paying big dollars to Drunken State in order for the kid to cope with dorm hallways covered with vomit, social isolation/boredom, classes full of hung-over students who aren't contributing much, etc. It's quality of life, and quality of education, for the non-bingers that concerns me.</p>
<p>
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So- if you are a parent or student starting a college search, where do you look for this kind of information?
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</p>
<p>Almost every college of any consequence knows its own binge drinking rates from student surveys. It's a standard part of just about every standardized college survey.</p>
<p>You might find the answers by searching for binge drinking or alcohol poisoning on the college website and student newspaper. Many schools actually do publish their binge drinking rates. At others, you can get a sense from the newspapers. Big uproar over hospital transports? Emergency board meetings. Those are good clues. Or simply ask the Dean of Students.</p>
<p>
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It is a false sense of security if a parent thinks "I have done my job because I didn't let Billy or Jane go to a college with a party reputation." So the idea of "outing" party schools is a waste of time IMO.
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<p>That has nothing to do with it. It's a red herring. The reason to be interested is to find schools where you aren't paying $50,000 a year for your kid to have to wade through vomit to use the bathroom in the dorm three nights a week.</p>
<p>I thought this was interesting. Last year, a Swarthmore parent gave a chunk of money to the College with the stipulation that it be used for one purpose: to fund non-alcohol parties.</p>
<p>The result has been a series of weekly Thursday and Saturday night parties where alcohol is not served. They've apparently been seeing very nice turnouts -- 150 people or so.</p>
<p>Parrish</a> Parlor Parties Rise in Popularity :: The Daily Gazette</p>
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The parties, which offer unique themes and activities for people who attend, are held in the parlors of Parrish Hall on Thursday and Saturday nights from 9 to 12 p.m. All the parties are spearheaded by two students known as baristas, who are responsible for creating a theme, thinking up activities, setting up for the party and cleaning up afterwards.</p>
<p>Some of the recent themes have been World Series, Back-to-the-90s, and karaoke. This Thursday there will be a costume party for Halloween. Wilcox said that the parties cost about 200 to 250 dollars a week and the baristas are paid the same as a party associate, which is the highest pay rate.
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<p>The timing is interesting because students can go to one of these for a couple hours then head over to one of the all-campus parties with music and booze which usually get cranking up from 11:00 to 2:00 or so.</p>
<p>"This same school also had a 100% acceptance rate of their medical school applicants the year my H graduated. How many brownie points would you give Kenyon for this achievement?"</p>
<p>ABSOLUTELY ZERO for selling a misleading mythology. Firstly, if they have a 100% acceptance rate, it is ONLY because they have done a particularly heavy weed out of students who would have made absolutely wonderful doctors had they gone to a second-tier state university. When I was at Williams, they began with 110 premeds. 33 out of 35 got into med school. The rest went pfftt. At least 85 of them would have been fabulous doctors had they gone to their local state university. When you see a number like that 100%, you KNOW they are intentionally misleading, and you should therefore distrust all the other snakeoil as well.</p>
<p>Secondly, one has no idea whether there was any overlap at all between the 2, 4, or 30 future doctors (after all, what does this vaunted 100% represent?) and the binge drinkers or blackout sufferers. Might be high, might be low, but there is no information.</p>
<p>Thirdly, alcoholics are not stupid: they are simply alcoholic. My state medical association has an entire program that they fund dedicated to assisting alcoholic and drug-addicted physicians. As A7DAD so pointedly and personally pointed out, there is no contradiction between being Phi Beta Kappa and an alcoholic. </p>
<p>"If that ever happens be ready to see BYU ranked #1 in the nation."</p>
<p>And, in experienced educational quality, if that's the case, maybe they deserve it. (In my town, we repeatedly have students turn down Harvard for BYU.)</p>
<p>"By the way, study hard-play hard is BS when the "play hard" is blackout drinking. Wake up folks, that kid who is blacking out has a very serious problem."</p>
<p>10% of the student body at Duke, according to their medical center's study. Much higher among Middlebury freshmen, according to the president of the college. They, at least, are brave enough to admit they've got a problem.</p>
<p>Hanna, mini, I was only half kidding when I said BYU could be #1. </p>
<p>I know it is already pretty highly ranked, particularly in the 'revealed preference rankings', because quite a few students turn down Harvard for BYU.</p>
<p>Perhaps the USNWR formula could also be adjusted to institute a deduction for lack of sufficient religious diversity.</p>
<p>Drinking appears to have become a sport itself, rather than simply a part of the social scene. I find it sad and frustrating to hear (non-drinkers or occasional drinkers) students talk about how out of control the drinking is, and to hear administrators and professors at the same college claim things are not that bad. they really need to listen to the students who are seeing whats going on and then address the problem. these students shouldn't have to transfer out or be unhappy.</p>
<p>My son's a freshman at the University of Chicago. From what he tells me, there are plenty of parties people can go to where there's lots of drinking going on, and certain of the dorms (not his -- Burton-Judson -- but I won't name names!) have reputations as having much more partying than others. But I really don't get the impression that it's a heavy drinking school at all. He's been to a few parties himself where he's had two or three screwdrivers, never more. Only on Friday or Saturday nights. (I've told him about some of my own college experiences with drinking more than that at a time and getting violently ill -- we're about the same size -- and I don't think he wants to follow in my footsteps. And, fortunately, he hates the taste of beer as much as I do! Why screwdrivers? Because you don't taste the alcohol that much.)</p>
<p>In general, though, I get the feeling that there's way less drinking going on than there was when I was in college at an Ivy in the early 1970's. After all, the drinking age was 18, then. There were school-sanctioned parties, all the time, with free alcohol.</p>
<p>The biggest difference: in all my years in college (and law school too, for that matter), I don't think I ever went to a single party, in somebody's dorm room or anywhere else, where there wasn't pot (or dope, as we used to call it!) being smoked and passed around. My son hasn't seen or smelled it <em>at all.</em> Zero, anyplace. As he points out, people can't do it in their rooms because the smoke alarms are so sensitive, so anyone who smokes pot, he thinks, must do it off campus. As I said, a huge change.</p>
<p>The "where fun goes to die" thing is a joke. He has plenty of fun, and so do all his friends. It's just that their idea of fun doesn't involve binge drinking and vomiting in the hallways!</p>
<p>The expression 'where fun goes to die' is unfortunately more apt in those tragic instances where binge drinking has a fatal consequence.</p>
<p>
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When you see a number like that 100%, you KNOW they are intentionally misleading,
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<p>Mini, this statistic is not a myth, it came from my husband. He graduated from Kenyon, and every single applicant who applied to medical school that year, including him, got in. Looks like Kenyon did better than Williams that year, is that so hard to believe?</p>
<p>FWIW, I go to a school with a decent "party school" rep. I didn't drink in HS and don't drink now (college junior). Before I came here, I was truly, truly worried that I would be surrounded by non-stop drinking, partying, and people puking on my feet. Didn't happen. I got very involved on campus, filling my time with on-campus organizations where I might lots of people and got involved in activities, classes, etc. Second semester, I joined a sorority where I :eek: STILL don't drink. Though there's drinking in and out of Greek system here, I'd almost have to say, just based on observation, that my sorority sisters drink less than the average student just because we tend to be very involved in the house and in campus leadership roles and organizations. Most (maybe all?) of my friends drink, but I have never felt excluded or anythig because I don't.</p>
<p>Yes, I am sure - every single applicant who applied got in.</p>
<p>As I said, that is the one piece of truth inside a HUGE mythology - how many entering pre-med students at Kenyon went on to even apply? </p>
<p>It is despicable when schools spread this kind of dreck.</p>
<p>the 100% acceptance rate would be relevant if one knows what the starting numbers would be. If 100 start a program but 70 are weeded out, the top 30 all get accepted, you have 100% acceptance rate. D in ChemE program, 120 kids started, 40 have dropped already. School typically graduates 35-40 that 100% accepted to a MS programs, they are on their way to their statistic of 100% acceptance rate.</p>
<p>
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As I said, that is the one piece of truth inside a HUGE mythology - how many entering pre-med students at Kenyon went on to even apply?
[/quote]
</p>
<p>I don't know if Kenyon ever stated medical school placement statistics. But this is a fact stated by my husband. He doesn't know other year's placement, he only knows his year.
You can never know the number of entering pre-meds, since it is not a major, and no one declares that until junior year when they start prepping for medical school applications. So, the only reliable statistic is how many applied, and how many got in. My husband was a biology major, and his original intention was pre-vet but changed his mind and applied to medical school.</p>
<p>Berry College's med school acceptance rate was last reported as 100%. (Was that helpful?)</p>
<p>Ok, I haven't read every post, so I apologize if I'm repeating other ideas.</p>
<p>But, as the OP, I want to clarify that frankly, I don't care how well these kids who are drinking half the week do in their classes and whether they go on to medical school, drop out or whatever... I suspect the schools with huge numbers of drinkers adjust the grades to make sure that 80% of the students to not flunk out. Have to keep those tuition checks coming....And maybe these kids are bright enough to do well on MCATs and other standardized tests. And maybe they can do all their work in 3 days. Whatever. That isn't my point. </p>
<p>I'm sorry if I sound angry on this topic, but I am. It is an outrage that the adults who run these schools let this kind of behavior run rampant.</p>
<p>I am NOT naive. I grew up in the 60s. I know kids drink and take drugs and I get that. I realize that it has become part of the growing up experience for a lot of kids. I don't have a problem with that. </p>
<p>But schools do not have to let serious binge drinking happen all the time to the point where kids have to seek out alcohol free parties or dorms or try and find activities and basically WORK AROUND the alcohol.</p>
<p>My friend's son at Macalester told me that his roommate threw up in their dorm room 4 nights a week and the school would NOT do a thing about it and would NOT let him move. He could not find a spot in the alcohol free dorm this year but managed to snag a single as a compromise. </p>
<p>The Kenyon student? Brilliant kid who transferred out of there. LOVED the teachers and the school but hated the drinking. What a waste.</p>
<p>I have a dozen other examples, but off to work to earn the money to pay these bills!</p>
<p>So here we are arguing about the whether the med school statistics published by schools are "dreck" or valid numbers. Just add binge drinking and other drinking stats to the mix and we'll have a new definition of "dreck". I can't imagine the lengths administrators would go to in an effort to look good on this new measure, including guiding their students on how to answer survey questions.<br>
All this discussion on adding a new ranking measure is not very helpful IMO. How about some discussion on what actually WORKS in bringing down binge drinking rates? At my sons's state school, they hand out an ENORMOUS number of citations for underage drinking. Doesn't make a dent. No, it's not a minor infraction... you lose your license in this state. They also have required alcohol awareness programs, have tried social norms marketing (failed) and have clamped down on the greek system.
So let's say you are the president at Duke, where the blackout rate is so high. What do you do on campus to make a difference? I'm not being sarcastic here (which is my usual tendency). I really think college administrators could you some guidance about what proven strategies they could put in place...if there are any.</p>
<p>^^ As I pointed out, many of these students are NOT underage, so citations for that aren't much good. Add fake IDs to the mix.... The citations have to be for drunk and disorderly conduct. My kid has picked kids up off the middle of a city street on campus, drunk and bloody and taken them to the hospital. I am truly struggling to figure out what WOULD help this problem. </p>
<p>Complications- the grades are not adjusted in the slightest at this Ivy to account for drinking and to "help the stats". Good try.</p>