In fact - “We are going to Uber” has become kind of a shorthand for “we plan to drink”.
Most colleges I know of include drug and alcohol education as part of their freshman orientation or pre-orientation activities. My son wasn’t able to register for classes until he had watched a series of videos and passed an on-line test. They’re not unaware of the dangers of drugs and excessive drinking.
I do like the fact that kids can usually get an Uber these days. It removes one of the excuses for taking a car after drinking.
The student newspaper has been pretty good at publishing updates. There are some indications that the remaining victim will “survive the ordeal”. Also, thanks for the student body response:
http://wesleyanargus.com/2015/02/26/four-students-arrested-suspended-wesleyan-molly-mdma/
I forgot about that @Sue22. My D had that as well the summer before freshman year
I wonder why the campus paper doesn’t name the four.
I guess for the same reasons the Vanderbilt paper didn’t name the roommate who stood by and did nothing while a woman was raped or the student football player who plead guilty to a misdemeanor in connection with the cover up. I think it’s a dumb policy.
@MidwestDad3 & @intParent With respect to the impact on Wesleyan applications and decisions, if you were a student or more likely a parent, who exactly one month today were to be told whether your son or daughter has been admitted to Wesleyan and just 30 days prior you had read and worried about this latest incident, don’t you think you would be somewhat more worried and concerned about attending Wesleyan University than you had before and when you applied in December, I know I would.
This time last year ds had applied and was accepted April 1, at Wesfest were faced the reality of attending Wesleyan, my point is that as a parent you worry and this certainly doesn’t help, as intparent suggested this will play havoc with determining yield and thus determining how many students to offer acceptance to.
Yield would likely drop (fewer accepting offers) but the University will likely offer acceptance to more students in order to fill places, I suspect some 2450+ students will be offered acceptance for 745 places, thus yield will drop to close to 30%, most students these days apply to 8-10 schools, do you think they will accept Wesleyans offer at the same rate they did in years past, I think not. This will lead to lower selectivity (acceptance LY @23.7%, will likely drop to 25%+) and thus lower rankings in USNWR and others, it compounds the deteriorating regard with which the school was held and I take no glee in suggesting such, its just what happens
Yield management is tricky in the best of time for colleges, and there is no playbook for this… I guess they could contact other institutions that have had tough events and get some data from them. Offer too many acceptances, and you don’t have enough housing. Too few, and you don’t bring in enough tuition…
I find discussions of yield interesting. Looking at Wesleyan’s CDS for 2014-15 … they took 70 kids off the WL so their yield estimate was off a bit last year already. If I were Wesleyan, I’d accept about 150 more (because I do think yield will be affected because of this incident) and then fill the rest of the class off the WL.
From the 2014-15 CDS:
Number of qualified applicants offered a place on waiting list 1,955
Number accepting a place on the waiting list 893
Number of wait-listed students admitted 70
I’m really surprised that Wesleyan takes this many kids off the WL.
As has been mentioned, incidents that we don’t want to hear about, may occur at virtually any college.
Scrutinizing Wesleyan as being at fault in some way, reminds me of those who interrogate other parents who have a child involved in a similar incident. They may do it under the auspices of being * concerned*, but my impression is that they feel the parents made a mistake & by identifying the mistake, they can remove the risk for their own child.
Alcohol of course, is the main risky substance available on or off campus, although MDMA seems to have joined the ranks of drugs that are frequently available.
This link was posted in an old thread discussing the alcohol overdose death of a former student on CC, and I think it’s worth sharing.
http://lizditz.typepad.com/i_speak_of_dreams/2004/10/alcohol_overdos.html
I join others at being dismayed at the articles that refer to the victims having been exposed to a " bad batch", because that implies " a good batch", would not hold the same risk.
Most of this situation does not reflect on Wesleyan uniquely. As others have said, you’d be hard pressed to find any college (maybe Brigham Young or something) where there wouldn’t be a at least a dozen students trying Molly or some similar drug on a weekend night. These were mostly just ordinary college students, who were misled and made an error in judgment. There is no indication the victims were particularly wild, worldly, decadent or anything like that. In fact, they were likely a bit too naive. Many of us did at least a similar amount of experimentation in our youth and have grown up to have respectable careers and families.
What I found somewhat impressive were the resources and attitudes of some of the suspects. The one guy allegedly had a whole pharmaceutical factory in his dorm room. To me this speaks more about Wesleyan than the actual ODs. There are a portion of way too clever kids who lack common sense and the appropriate sense of responsibility. And the entitlement of one suspect allegedly saying that she doesn’t believe in prescriptions for medication (so she had a right to sell xanax or something like that), can definitely be found there. But these are just a few kids, and honestly, I think they should be disciplined and maybe shouldn’t be there (regardless of their GPAs). I’m guessing, with warrants, you could find similar entrepreneurs lurking at many other schools.
DS just graduated and this was not his experience in the least. He and most of his friends, who were not connected with that scene, were surprised at the extent of this. I have to add that the physical sciences at Wes are excellent, prepared him well for graduate school, and may be unparalleled as far as available resources at LACs. None of that (why he went there) has changed. And this incident simply does not reflect the daily life of most of the students there. If this incident influences prospective families, I think that is more of an emotional reaction than anything else.
@Youdon’tsay
Actually, the WL number for Wesleyan’s biggest rival, Amherst, was 61 and that school is half Wesleyan’s size:
Yes, all interesting. I see the WL numbers as one indicator of whether a school is “on the rise” or perhaps losing a bit of its luster. Rice, larger than both Wesleyan and Amherst, only took four kids off the WL. Carleton, much smaller than Wesleyan, took nine. Just one more data point I look at when advising clients.
doughmom, thank you for that perspective. I was torn between DS’ and my impressions of Wesleyan last week and the very different impression given by these recent events. What I keep coming back to is the thought of these students, doing major drug dealing from their dorm rooms, and apparently believing that they were perfectly safe from consequences. From Sunday morning, when the victims were rushed to hospitals, until Tuesday night, when the arrests were made, is a long time to keep large stocks of drugs around. They must have felt invulnerable. Why?
^^^ This.
That’s what concerns me about a possible “culture.” As I posted earlier, it seems they may have thought that they would be protected by friends/customers who never have “snitched” before and wouldn’t this time either.
Having said that, some level of drugs and drinking go on everywhere, and you just have to trust that you’ve done a good enough job with your kids that they won’t take too many risks. Good luck on your decision, NYMom!
I think again @Circuitrider you may be delusional, if you think Wesleyan is Amherst’s biggest rival (if only), USNWR #15 LAC rivals are more likely Bates, Grinnell and Smith & Colgate all fine colleges nonetheless. Top 20 this year?
Johnwesley, thank you for reminding us of the Fourth Amendment and its impact of the expectation of privacy of students in a dorm, and the recent changes brought by the SCOTUS decisions. However, should one not think that convincing a judge to issue a warrant or the “forces” to act on probable cause might be quite easy?
@xiggi is that new? I thought colleges could go into dorms pretty much anytime.
@Englishman Circuitrider suggested that Amherst was Wesleyan’s biggest rival, not the other way around. You have it backwards.
We all know who Amherst’s biggest rival is, also starts with a “W” 