Give it a shot

Education-based prevention program worth a try

Considering all the recent attention to alcohol abuse at the University, the Office of Health Promotion and Education's new plan to prevent excessive drinking is worth a shot.

Actually, at a cost of $15 for the first offense, it's probably worth a couple shots.

And that's the point.

Starting this week, students caught violating any of the University's alcohol policies on campus will be referred to the Alcohol Intervention Program I.

It's a two-hour program that will cost the offender $15.

For a second or more serious offense, the offender will have to shell out $50 and attend a four-session program, the Alcohol Intervention Program II.

The programs are educational in nature and focus less on punishment than prevention.

All sorts of reasons have been given for why students drink excessively; no one has come up with a solid deterrent.

This plan, though not very inventive, is at least trying.

For its sake, OHPE was given only one week to develop the program.

In that one week, OHPE created a prevention-oriented program that will make students pay in money and time.

That sounds exactly like what many people have been saying all along: An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

But a pound of cure is certainly something to be desired, and it's not clear this program will measure up.

The problem's this: For students who are really frightened by a $15 fine and two hours of educational instruction, the program may be effective. But those students probably aren't drinking excessively in the first place.

The students who drink excessively -- even if they end up in AIP II, with the bigger fine and longer time commitment -- likely will not be helped by the program.

Those troubled, alcohol-drenched waters can run deep, and they won't recede in the face of $15 or $50 or two hours or four hours or any combination of the above.

But if no one even tries, the well will rest untouched, and the students who truly have a problem and drink excessively will go unnoticed.

OHPE's plan, then, is a noble attempt under tough time constraints. With more time to develop the program and some feedback from participants, it can grow even stronger.

To help those students for whom alcohol has become a danger, AIP I and II are definitely worth a shot.