Alcohol Education
Prevention Plan
Some Key Foundations of the Plan:
Environmental Management emphasizes the importance of the social, legal, and economic environment in shaping health-related behaviors. Campus & Community Alliances bring together diverse individuals, agencies, and associations to collaborate and share responsibilities for developing communities and environments that encourage responsible, low-risk alcohol use.
Groups that address alcohol and other drug issues on and around campus include:
- Campus & Community Alcohol Abuse Prevention Coalition
- Off-Campus Safety Committee
- Residential Property Managers Initiative
- OSU Wellness Collaborative
- Task Force for the Prevention of Celebratory Riots
Nine Components of the Plan:
Assessment & Evaluation
Assessment & Evaluation helps us to define the problem and determine how successful current approaches are at decreasing alcohol and other drug abuse on and around campus.
Sources of assessment and evaluation data include:
- CORE Alcohol and Drug Survey
- American College Health Association Assessment
- Additional surveys and evaluations conducted by Student Affairs Assessment
- College Alcohol Risk Assessment
- Program evaluations conducted by Student Wellness Center
Policy Review
Policy Review insures that OSU's has clear and appropriate guidelines for alcohol use on campus that are widely disseminated and consistently enforced. An Alcohol Policy Review Committee oversees this task.
Moonlight Madness Late Night Programming
Moonlight Madness Late Night Programming provides fun, vibrant, alcohol and drug-free activities for OSU students on weekend nights. Each year, over 20,000 students attend 40-60 Late Night events.
Evaluation findings indicate that:
- Attendees include a mix of high-risk drinkers, low-risk drinkers, and non-drinkers.
- Students are pleased with the quality of events.
- A third of students who attend report that they drink less than normal due to attending Late Night events.
Source: Student Affairs Assessment
Responsible Hospitality Initiatives
Responsible Hospitality Initiatives educate and encourage commercial and private hosts to plan events in ways that reduce the physical, social, and legal risks associated with alcohol use.
The Party Smart Initiative:
- provides information to students regarding how they can be responsible party hosts and guests via flyers, literature drops, paid advertisements, a website, and workshops.
- provides 300+ Party Smart kits to students planning house parties each year.
Social Norms Marketing
Social Norms Marketing aims to correct students' misperceptions about the amount of alcohol their peers are consuming.
Extensive research has found that most college students overestimate the amount that their peers are drinking.
For example, 68% of OSU students believe that the average student on campus uses alcohol three times a week or more. In reality, only 28% of OSU students use alcohol this frequently
or
76% of students believe that the average students uses tobacco three times a week to everyday. Actually, less than 20% of students use tobacco this frequently.
Because individuals' behavior is, in part, formed by what they perceive to be normative behavior in their community, misperceptions regarding drinking norms are theorized to be one factor that leads to high-risk drinking on college campuses.
Messages such as, "The majority (70%) of OSU students have between 0 and 6 drinks per week", are disseminated to students via newspaper advertisements, posters, promotional items (cups, keychains, etc.), websites, bulletin board displays, media contacts, lectures, workshops, etc.
Source for OSU data: Student Affairs Assessment
Educational Programs
The goals of educational programming are:
to increase students' knowledge regarding the effects and the potential safety, health, social, academic, and legal consequences of alcohol and other drug misuse
- to increase awareness regarding the signs and symptoms of alcohol and other drug abuse and dependency
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- to assist students in evaluating their expectancies regarding and motivations for high-risk drinking and other drug use
- to define and encourage low-risk, responsible drinking
- to assist students in exploring alternatives to drinking
- to correct misperception regarding norms for alcohol use at OSU
- to provide information about alcohol and drug use specific to women
- to provide students with information about campus and community alcohol prevention, student assistance, and wellness resources
Educational activities include:
- Approximately 75 lectures and interactive workshops reaching over 4000 students each year
- 12+ information tables reaching 1200 students each year
- 5000+ 21st birthday letters each year
- 30+ bulletin board displays each year
- 1000s of posters posted each year
- 1000s of pamphlets distributed each year
- Website materials
Student Assistance
Student Assistance provides support services for students who experience physical, psychological, social, academic, and/or legal issues related to alcohol and other drug use.
Services include:
Faculty Involvement
Faculty can:
- incorporate alcohol and drug prevention education into the classroom
- serve as an important link to resources and services for students they believe are having difficulty with alcohol and other drugs
- provide expertise needed to develop effective alcohol and drug prevention programs
Faculty involvement has been promoted through:
- Mini-grants to support alcohol, tobacco, and other drug curriculum infusion and research projects
- Faculty-student luncheons focusing on alcohol and other drug issues
- Faculty participation in task forces and committees, such as the Alcohol Coalition and Late Night Review Committee
- Opportunities to infuse wellness curriculum into the classroom via Reality Bytes presentation and Don't Cancel That Class programs
Student Involvement
Students should be included in the process of planning, implementing, and evaluating alcohol and drug prevention strategies. Faculty, staff, and others should empower and encourage students to become advocates for responsible alcohol use and should support student-led prevention initiatives.
Student involvement is facilitated through:
- a peer education program
- student participation on committees, such as the Late Night Programming Review Committee
- a fellowship supporting student research in the area of alcohol and other drugs
Have questions? Need additional information? Contact the Student Wellness Center at 292-4527 or wellness@osu.edu
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