<p>also: some schools with very strict alcohol policies can have a binge problem with "pregaming" when kids have 4-5 shots to catch a buzz before going to a no-alcohol event.</p>
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However, note that if you room with a white male at Swarthmore in your first year, it is 40-45% or more likely that he will binge drink at least once every two weeks, and likely more often.
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<p>That may be true on an overall basis; however, it assumes that you fail to express any preferences on your freshman housing questionairre.</p>
<p>There are specific questions that are used as primary matching criteria and those include: </p>
<p>a) prefer a substance-free roommate
b) prefer my room to be a quiet place for study</p>
<p>These, and other similar questions, could be easily amplified with an explicit statement in the "additional things we should know" box.</p>
<p>I'm also not positive that Swarthmore strictly follows the national trends on binge drinking by class. I've not seen binge drinking rates by class, but the percentage of students who haven't drunk in the last year or the last month is highest for freshmen and lowest for seniors. The same trend holds for the number of drinking occaisions in the past 12 months. The following data were from a Spring semester COFHE survey.</p>
<p>No alcohol in previous 30 days:</p>
<p>Freshmen 43%
Sophmore 35%
Junior 30%
Senior 22%</p>
<p>Number of drinking occasions in previous 12 months:</p>
<p>Freshmen: 14 times
Sophmore: 25 times
Junior: 25 times
Senior: 31 times
Senior 22%</p>
<p>Michigan State U is also a huge drinking school</p>
<p>"That may be true on an overall basis; however, it assumes that you fail to express any preferences on your freshman housing questionairre."</p>
<p>That would be true everywhere. And it's possible they house all the binge drinkers together, though doesn't seem to have worked out that way at other schools.</p>
<p>Are you suggesting that white male Swarthmoreans increase even further in their binge drinking behavior as they get closer to graduation? (it's quite possible that once they get used to the place, they binge more, as opposed to having learned to binge in high school.)</p>
<p>(Best way to avoid it is to be a Black female rooming with another Black female. I'm not suggesting anyone do that. Best way to avoid lots of binge drinking, if that's a big deal to you, is to pick your school carefully, trying to choose one where the majority of drinkers are moderate drinkers, such as Swarthmore. They aren't that common, though. And don't let anyone tell you that "all the schools are the same" - the differences are huge, and even 10% differences in binge drinking rates will likely be noticeable in campus culture, when drinking surpasses the tipping point.)</p>
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<p>white male Swarthmoreans increase even further in their binge drinking behavior as they get closer to graduation?</p>
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<p>This was anecdotally true of white males I knew, but bear in mind that the study's binge drinking definition is different from the colloquial definition. In my experience, the freshmen and sophomores do more of the public vomiting, passing out, loud obnoxious behavior, etc. (i.e., colloquial bingeing), even though the senior guys "binge" drink by the study's definition more often; they know their limits better and they hold it better, so they can have 5-6 drinks in an evening without the "drunken" behavior that irritates other students.</p>
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Are you suggesting that white male Swarthmoreans increase even further in their binge drinking behavior as they get closer to graduation?
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<p>No. I don't have any data to suggest one way or the other. The only data I've seen by class is the percentages of each class that haven't drunk in the last year, the percentages that haven't drunk in the last month, and the average number of times, on average, each class has consumed alcohol in the previous year.</p>
<p>If I had to guess, I would assume that the binge drinking rate decreases with age. At Swarthmore, the center of binge drinking is among the varsity sports teams and specifically those teams that constitute the core of the two fraternities. As I understand it, active membership in the fraternities tends to decline over time, i.e. freshmen join and then become inactive as they tire of that scene and become more engaged in their upper-level classes. </p>
<p>They definitely do not house all of the partiers in a single dorm, anymore. In fact, for the last several years they go out of their way to assign entire floors of freshmen in what has traditionally been the most "social" dorm to those indicating a preference for substance-free. This has had the effect of reducing the critical mass required for a kids-gone-wild dorm and has, by all reports, been pretty effective -- to the point where the "party dorm" designation has apparently switched to a diffferent location.</p>
<p>To some extent, the presence of free campus-wide parties with alcohol pulls the drinking out of the dorms.</p>
<p>That's pretty much what I assumed, and in a school that is below the tipping point, spreading out the binge drinkers - while not particularly effective in reducing their numbers - is a good way to preserve a less alcohol-driven campus culture. But it still means 40-45% white male first-years binge drinking a minimum of every two weeks, and likely more often than that. So if they've spread them around, you'd definitely be around them. </p>
<p>All of which is to say that if this is a big issue for someone, s/he should choose schools carefully, and consider substance-free housing. To my way of thinking, for most students that isn't the main issue, which is the extent to which campus culture as a whole is alcohol-driven.</p>
<p>What would you suggest for a student who may choose to drink socially once in a while, but is not interested in throwing up or passing out or watching others do so, and would prefer a quieter dorm environment? Would substance-free still be appropriate, or is there usually an "honor code" type agreement (along the lines of "I will never touch a drink") associated with it?</p>
<p>Many of the substance-free dorms only apply to behavior in the dorm, and that students are free to go drink elsewhere (provided they don't exhibit drunken behavior around the dorm). There are some students, however, who are in recovery, and the idea is not to have substances around them. </p>
<p>There are some campuses where there are traditional patterns of heavy drinkers, and less heavy ones, though you usually have to learn that once there, and it may not help you if you are first year and all first years are housed together. The two examples that I know of personally are that the "Odd Quad" at Williams used to have less drinking (though now that there are freshman there, I really wouldn't know), and the Quad at Smith (a low-alcohol volume school as these things go) has traditionally had more and Green Street less (they don't segregate first-years.)</p>
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What would you suggest for a student who may choose to drink socially once in a while, but is not interested in throwing up or passing out or watching others do so, and would prefer a quieter dorm environment?
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<p>I would suggest paying particular attention to the drinking cultures at the schools you consider and choose schools with relatively low binge drinking rates.</p>
<p>As for your question about "substance-free" dorm rules, it varies by school. When Swarthmore agreed to offer a substance-free dorm, the Deans refused to do so unless those who applied to live in it agreed to maintain a substance-free lifestyle on campus, period. </p>
<p>Why? Because, if people who live in sub-free dorms are drinkers, all they are doing is shifting the problems associated with campus drinking to other dorms. That defeats the whole point of the residents of a dorm self-enforcing an adult, responsible living environment. If you want to drink, why should the residents of some other dorm bear the brunt of your behavior?</p>
<p>interesteddad, that's what I thought. I was just curious if there tends to be any space for a relaxed and responsible attitude to drinking, without being overly zealous in either direction.</p>
<p>FWIW, I do plan to apply to Swarthmore when the time comes. :)</p>
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But it still means 40-45% white male first-years binge drinking a minimum of every two weeks.
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<p>I would not necessarily assume that the national white male trends necessarily apply to the same degree at Swarthmore. Especially since December 2000.</p>
<p>I say that for three reasons:</p>
<p>First, you have very few locations where white male freshmen achieve any kind of critical mass in a dorm. Worst case, white freshmen males make up no more than about 25% of a hall. Thus, it is fairly rare for the white male freshmen "ethos" to take hold and establish an accepted social behavior of drunkenness. Kids who come in trying to figure out what is "expected college behavior" are more likely to find that "expected college behavior" does not include getting drunk and puking several nights a week.</p>
<p>Second, with no football team and no ice hockey team, you have removed the 80 to 100 white males most likely to be binge drinkers from the equation. 80-100 in a total male population of under 750 is a very significant number.</p>
<p>Third, and let me phrase this delicately -- of the universe of academically-qualified high school seniors, the type of white male student most likely to be at the center of binge-drinking is the least likely type of student to select Swarthmore.</p>
<p>I do think that white males make up a disproportionately high percentage of those who do frequently binge drink at Swarthmore. But, that group is very readily identifiable, doing the bulk of their drinking in defined locations outside of the dorms, and, to a degree, dismissed by the dominant social culture of the school. Once you are outside of that easily definable group, I would not be surprised if the drinking rates are roughly comparable for male and female students at Swarthmore.</p>
<p>Is U of Maryland at College Park as bad as I hear it is or is it an exaggeration? Concerned parent</p>
<p>It is well-known that drinking behavior is generally underreported on surveys, regardless of age, and can be influenced by the perceived norm. Keep this in mind when evaluating the results of studies based on self-reported behaviors.</p>