My S19 has Bucknell on his list, but isn’t excited about it like he is other schools. He got a Greek life rules vibe, which isn’t his thing. I was on Bucknell’s website just poking around and found some stats on drinking. 14% of students don’t drink and 38% of first year students don’t drink regularly. I find it fascinating that these numbers are presented as a positive. I get it , college kids drink, but I find these numbers to be disconcerting. Any insight? Do you think these numbers reflect most campuses? Thanks
Leigh- we found two relevant factors:
1- What is there to do on campus for the kids who don’t drink-- robust activities, plays, concerts, fun events; what is there to do in the surrounding city/'community- arts, sports events, etc.
2- Forget the percentages- look at what that means in terms of raw numbers. At a campus with 15,000 students, 10% of non-drinking students is 1,500 kids looking for fun and relaxation and something cool to do on a Saturday night. That’s a big number supporting a lot of poetry slams, jazz performances, etc. At a campus with 1200 students, 10% non-drinkers means 120 kids looking for something fun- so if their idea of fun isn’t your kid idea of fun (and 12 of those kids might be away or visiting friends) you’re down to a pretty small number.
HTH.
https://www.bucknell.edu/FraternitiesAndSororities says that 60% of eligible students are in fraternities and sororities, which is very high compared to other colleges.
Drinking is huge on many U.S. college campuses… and has been so for years. (Think about Kavanaugh’s stories!)
Yes, the drinking culture may be more visible and more integral to the majority culture on a campus with fraternities, which certainly can be a consideration for a prospective student. There are a lot of colleges without fraternities to consider, so if Bucknell, with its fairly high percentage of kids in frats, felt like a poor fit to your son, he can and should look elsewhere.
But even a college without fraternities- e.g., Williams or Vassar- will have plenty of kids experimenting with drinking while at college.
But that does not mean that college has to be uncomfortable for nondrinkers.
First, you can always find people who do not drink. They exist on every campus.
Second, no one cares if you drink or don’t drink. If you are a good listener and a nice person, people will enjoy being with you and will not care whether the cup in your hand holds alcohol, soda or water.
I am 48 and have spent my whole life as a nondrinker. I honestly can say no one ever cared. And peer pressure only exists in one’s own mind— no one ever persisted in pushing me to drink after my initial, firm but polite, “No, thanks.” Sometimes people ask why I don’t drink because they are curious, but there is no hostility to it.
But yes, especially during freshman year, kids who are away from home for the first time may drink. First, it is new freedom away from the restrictions of home. Second, being around a lot of new people makes everyone feel at least a little anxious and awkward; some people choose to numb those feelings with alcohol.
Sometimes the culture around alcohol can be a bit shocking. Someone in your dorm may vomit or fall asleep on the bathroom floor, or someone may have to be transferred to the hospital because they drank a dangerous amount.
As a parent, if you keep an open and nonjudgmental approach, you can be a sounding board for your kid to talk out his reactions to all of this. As you listen, he can sort it all out in his own mind, process his experiences and reactions, and make his own decisions about his own actions.
But your kid should pay attention to his feelings about college “fit” as well. He has to narrow the list somehow, and ruling out colleges where he felt less comfortable, for any reason, is one way to do so.
My son never drank in high school. No, really, he didn’t. He never went to any parties. He was an athlete with many friends but the Saturday night house party wasn’t his idea of a good time. No one really cared at school. He certainly didn’t care if they cared anyway.
Now he’s finishing up his first semester of his Freshman year. I knew he wouldn’t go greek. What I didn’t know is that he’d join two VERY different clubs…and that one of those clubs would function very similarly to a fraternity in the way they approach their weekends.
I know he has a couple of beers on weekends, at social events, because we talk about it. He’s an interesting person. You can’t peer pressure him into anything. He’s also a bit of a control freak when it comes to his body and his situational awareness. I trust him to have a “couple of beers” and have it really mean two. He didn’t go into the year thinking he’d be drinking beer. What he found, though, is that a lot of students do drink. He also recognized that nursing 2 beers at a party meant he got to be at some fun parties…with fun people…and it’s really paid off socially for him. He’s a totally different person, ALREADY, than he was in high school, and the change is for the better. The three hours per weekend he spends at parties have opened up a world of new friendships and social experiences the other 165 hours per week.
Every person is different, but I’d hate for a student to miss out on attending a good school because he/she thought the greek culture was too prevalent. Everyone finds their circle of friends eventually. Drinking is part of campus life wherever you attend.
I really appreciate such great insight. It makes me feel much more at ease. Blossom, you are correct about forgetting percentages. TheGreyKing - thanks for sharing your story and sound advice.
If it is any help, we took Bucknell off of my non drinker, non Greek-interested DS list. I have various notes that Greek life is strong there. Plenty of other options for him for a better fit, nothing against the school or Greek life.
I have no idea what average or “good” drinking numbers are, but I remember in our LMU orientation they were deep into a study of student drinking and one fascinating finding was that parents tend to underestimate how much college students are drinking, and college students tend to over estimate how much and how many of their fellow students are drinking.
Time2Shine - sounds like my kid exactly! Especially the situational awareness and not being peer pressured. At this point I seriously cannot ever imagine a beer in his hand, but if it did happen it would be as you describe and I believe he would communicate that with me. A few of the colleges he is applying to have a robust greek life, but Bucknell was the only one that he questioned.
There’s a difference between a campus with a lot of fraternities where the frats are an alternative to university housing and a social club for its members… and a campus where everything revolves around the frats because there is nothing to do in town or on campus. I think that’s where you need to dig. What happens on a normal weekend? Are there four kids showing up at breakfast in the dining hall on Sunday morning because the rest of the campus is too hung over to line up for waffles??? Do professors try not to schedule labs at 8 am Friday morning because too many kids skip due to Thursday night “pre-gaming”?
Kids drink a beer, don’t drink a beer- you’re focused on the wrong thing IMHO. It’s the prevailing vibe on campus which is what you’re trying to suss out.
The Bucknell track coach does not allow his athletes to join fraternities/sororities due to the excessive party culture there. There isn’t a lot to do in lewisburg, so the non drinker will need to find some balance for a social existence.
I found at pretty much any college there will always be people drinking. Just like there will always be kids playing video games and wasting time.
I think the key is preparing them for what they will encounter and try to have them understand the consequences.
I am probably more worried about my D19 going off and getting hooked on Adderall or something like that than drinking too much.
Our dd made the same decision as @TS0104’s son. Non drinker, not interested in Greek system, and it seemed too small and too rural to have lots going on outside frats/sororities.
A school has slightly more than 1 in 3 that does not drink regularly; yes I’d suggest that this is a number that is better than most campuses. It also indicates as many have said above that there will be plenty of people interested in doing something else besides drinking.
My daughter is a non drinker and ended up at a small LAC in upstate NY. We had heard of it’s big party reputation but were assured that there were plenty of kids that didn’t drink and many other alternatives. We should have paid more attention to the reputation we were hearing about and less attention to what the school was telling us during visits. Unfortunately for her, her dorm was party central and she was finding it very difficult to find anyone who just wanted to hang out. Also, all those “alternative activities” that were mentioned during visits were laughable. On top of that, there wasn’t anything to do off campus. She thought the woodsy area would be great for her since she is outdoorsy, but it just became too limiting. She ended up transferring to another so called party school which was much bigger and she knew some people who went there who were non drinkers and told her that there really were people to hang out with and things to do. She is there now and thriving. Her roommates are drinkers and she’s ok with that because there are other people to hang out with on the weekends and the school provides a lot of events if you seek them out. Also the area, though somewhat rural, has much more to do. So, anyways, trust your gut and eliminate schools that don’t don’t feel right. It will hopefully save you a lot of hassle and heartbreak in the end.
A different perspective:
Freshman Reception
Every October, several thousand first-year students stream to the Technical University of Munich campuses for their first round of classes. At the Freshman Reception, President Herrmann traditionally makes a point of greeting first-semester students in person during an evening celebration featuring free live music.
Welcome event with live music and free beer from the on-campus “Bayerische Staatsbrauerei Weihenstephan” the oldest brewery in the world.
One of mine cannot drink due to a health issue/meds, and hung out with people drinking anyway. Mainly small gatherings, where she would read the paper and relax among friends. I think a kid who avoids environments with alcohol entirely may miss out.
I don’t drink myself but raised my kids to think of alcohol as a benign substance. It actually is. What is harmful is abuse, not use. That’s my view anyway. The exception would be for anyone who had a problem at one time and needs to stay away.
Those Bucknell stats sound fine, maybe even on the low side, but I agree with the person who said it is the vibe that may be important , not the numbers 
2 of my older kids are very much non-drinkers and just really don’t like the party culture. Both ended up on large public campuses with big Greek reputations. Both decided that in terms of finding friends that bigger was better. My Dd, in particular, said she felt claustrophobic and suffocated on small campuses and unable to find peers with similar interests. (She had a nightmare overnight that totally turned her off small campuses. Fair or not, she was adamant.)
On their large campuses, there were/are so many different groups/clubs/activities that finding a large pool of non-partying kids was not/has not been a problem. Both had/have wonderful friends and plenty of non-drinking/non-partying activities to do. On a smaller campus, I am not sure they would have found as many students with similar interests. Those friendships were/are incredibly important to them. (I have another kid who is far more of a loner where it wouldn’t have mattered so much one way or the other.)
We know lots of kids who have gone to Bucknell. Parties, especially at frats, are a big part of the social scene. And realistically, if you are at Bucknell, your social life is going to be on campus. So if the vibe feels wrong, I would strongly suggest moving on in your search.
With that said, alcohol is prevalent on most college campuses. I think it’s more about how kids hang out and to what extent drinking to excess (or pre-gaming) are part of the culture that might matter more.
If you read the recent reports, rules and revisions to greek life it’s not all drinking and partying anymore. Schools have moved to a dry rush period and dry pledgeships. Parties need to have sober monitors, including officers. So not being a drinker shouldn’t prohibit you from participating.
There are several non-drinkers in my son’s fraternity. It isn’t all partying and drinking. It depends on the frat and the campus. They have a dry house. He will have to be sober at all parties he attends next year to monitor things. (He will be president). So if they do like parties but don’t drink there are plenty of opportunities. At the larger universities there are also so many things to be involved with that don’t have any drinking or others that drink. My son and his gf are in the campus ministries and enjoy that a lot. There are opportunities for everyone. Like was said above the smaller the pool pay more attention to the percentages.