Perhaps you've noticed some of State College's finest standing on the borough's most highly trafficked areas handing out business-card sized neon fliers.

Well for those who haven't, the yellow and green cards -- one for men and one for women -- are part of the police department's Source Investigation Project (SIP). The State College police were given a grant from the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board (PLCB) to begin the project with the objective of curbing underage drinking and DUIs.

The small size of the cards belies the big message their script carries: "We're not trying to stop you from drinking ... we're trying to stop you from drinking so much that bad things happen to you."

It seems the police department is steering its underage drinking policy in a different and more positive direction than in years past. Rather than setting out to save the world from the dangers of underage drinking, the police have conceded that minors do consume alcohol, and there is little that can be done about it. The issue for police is curbing dangerous behaviors that often occur when minors drink. Will these cards achieve the ideal goal of underage drinking all together? Not likely.

But it is encouraging that the department has chosen to adopt a more realistically grounded approach than sporadic crackdowns, which don't necessarily influence the future behavior of most of the students who do binge drink.

Further, the police officers seem less intimidating and more friendly. A softer image of the police force from the student point of view is a positive advancement. If the police have a friendlier image, then students might be more inclined to seek out their help, when otherwise they might avoid seeking police intervention, fearing punishment.This measure seems to have the effect of telling students to call for help, not intentionally hide from it.

Additionally, the SIP card program will, at the very least, educate students on the dangers associated with drinking irresponsibly. Granted, some students may deny to receive the cards outright, while others may toss them in a trash bin, but for those students who sacrifice five minutes to read the card, perhaps some misfortune can be prevented.

Who can deny the worth of a program if at least one sexual assault is prevented?

On the whole, the positive development is that the police have decided to emerge from the inefficient methods that they employed before to this practical slant. The police have moved toward compromise, and that compromise is admirable.

Now it is up to students to respond.

They could compromise to some degree too by using a little more discretion in their weekend activities.