College Drinking - Personal Essay

Gordie Bailey Jr. had been in college only one month before he overdosed on alcohol. Urged on by members of a frat house he was intent on joining, the 18-year old drank until he passed out, was dumped onto a coach and was found dead the next morning. The 2004 incident at the University of Colorado was one of approximately 1,700 alcohol-related deaths that occur among college students each year in the United States (“Lowering the drinking age” 1). All these deaths are caused in different ways, including traffic accidents, falls, suffocation, drowning and alcohol poisoning. There are also the poor sexual decisions, failing classes, committing crimes and or being a victim of a crime.

Do we need to address that college drinking is a problem? Yes, we need to address that college drinking is a problem. Looking at colleges all around the United States see that most of the colleges allow alcohol on campus and with this alcohol some type of consequence happens, other colleges who have their campuses under the dry campus have a better campus life with having no alcohol allowed on the campus. However, a dry campus rule doesn’t prevent students from using alcohol if they desire to since they can leave campus and go to a bar or a house down the street to an acquaintances’ home. Even though some campuses allow alcohol on campus and some do not allow alcohol on campus, students who drink will go and find away to get some alcohol into their system so they can see how good it feels to feel nothing to just act like they are dumb and don’t want to remember what they are doing or what they had done that day or the night before.

After reading the book My Freshman Year I see that even though college students might be of age, you can only drink in your dorm room and not out in the open social area where all of the students walk to wherever they are headed. But some students can handle their alcohol intake and be able to write a research paper between three and four-thirty in the morning. Some kids can do this, but others can’t exactly write a paper while drunk let alone stand up. After reading chapter four in the book, the international students notice, the Americans idea of drinking and partying. Saying “I don’t understand this party thing in the U.S. When you go out here, it’s get drunk or nothing. If people go out with people and drink, they have to get drunk. If they don’t get falling-down drunk, they think, “What’s the point of doing it?” I find it difficult to understand. It’s really a European thing. You socialize, have a few drinks together, and go home.” This is what the British student noticed about the American idea of partying and drinking (Nathan 77).

When does a typical student start drinking? The drinking could have started while they were in high school or because kids at college urged them on. Looking at the statistics, see that one third of all twelfth graders have been drunk is the past thirty