The Truth Behind the Bus There are many controversial issues concerning the bus service provided by Buena Vista University. BVU Rides, commonly known as the “Drunk Bus,” receives great reviews from the students using it at Buena Vista. However, members of the Storm Lake community are not as appreciative of this service. It is important, nonetheless, that people learn facts about BVU Rides in order to make an educated judgment. According to Behind the Arch, an essay compiled by students of Buena Vista University about the drinking issues within the university, citizens of Storm Lake feel that the “Drunk Bus” endorses drinking and drunkenness. The bus does in fact give students a chance to drink without being worried about a way back to their rooms. Some students who would not normally drink because of not having a ride are now able to drink without worrying about a designated driver. The bus system does facilitate ways for students to be able to drink. However, not only is the bus system sending a message to students that they can drink and not be worried about a way back to campus, but it also sends many other positive messages. The Storm Lake Community Believes: Getting Rid of the Bus will make a Statement that Drinking is not Acceptable and will Encourage Students to Abstain from Drinking One factor that Storm Lake citizens need to consider is that no matter what, there will be college students who drink. Not only are some of the students that use this service of age to drink, but it is likely that eliminating BVU Rides will not deter college students of any age from drinking. With there being a good chance of students out drinking, there has to be a way to get them back to their dorms. If Buena Vista were to take away the BVU Rides program, students who drink would not have a safe ride home. This would leave some students thinking that their only way of getting home would be to drive while under the influence. BVU Rides Allows Students to Get Drunk and Become Irresponsible Safety is a major concern when it comes to drinking. Drinkers are often reminded of this with billboards and commercial ads that tell them to “drink responsibly.” The Storm Lake community is also concerned about safety for themselves and students when it comes to student drinking.
Residents of the town of Longmeadow are very aware that “Longmeadow teens are outperforming teens nationwide” in their consumption of alcohol. Committees have been formed within the community to eliminate the under-aged drinking problem. Many students interviewed at Longmeadow high school say that once they have adapted to a “party lifestyle”, or a lifestyle when one drinks every weekend or more, a breathalyzer is not going to end that habit. A school dance could be a fun place to meet with friends to socialize, hang out and dace, but many people feel that they cannot enjoy themselves as much with out drinking. One LHS student says “ I’d have more fun at a house party drinking that I would at an alcohol-free school function.” This idea may not be morally or legally correct, but it keeps many students from attending school dances. This is where the problem with the breathalyzer begins. Kids who want to drink will go to unsupervised environments rather than to a place where there are adults who could handle a serious situation should one ever occur. It is not legal for kids to drink because they are not capable of dealing with serious situations. The problem of stopping kids from drinking in Longmeadow is much too large for anyone to deal with, but drunken kids should have a safe place to go where they can be watched over.
...s would mean seniors could provide alcohol to freshmen, as young as 14- to 15-years-old. I believe this would get out of hand because if kids that young can have and keep alcohol in their possession, that means they could provide it to even younger kids. I wouldn’t want my young cousins to begin drinking at 12 or 13 years old, when legally they shouldn’t start until 21.
With all of these specials offered and a lot of students excited to go enjoy them, the BVU Rides bus is relied heavily on by students heading to the bar. BVU Rides offers free rides from the college campus to Malarkys, the main bar college students go to, every fifteen minutes, from 10:30 p.m. to 2:00 a.m. The bus allows anyone to ride, but the bus only follows a predetermined route, with stops only at the bar and the college. Despite the fact that this is a good way for students to get to and from the bar, some members of the community think the BVU Rides is a program offered by the community that is not needed. Here are some of their ideas and our responses rebutting the citizens’ thoughts:
We've all heard it before: "Too much of anything is bad for us." The amount of binge drinking occurring on American college campuses today proves that college students do not heed this warning. Binge drinking, or drinking for the purpose of getting drunk, harms both drinkers and non-drinkers alike. As today's college students come dangerously close to being swept away in the sea of papers, exams, jobs, and interviews, they use bingeing as the lifeboat that allows them to escape the stress. It allows them to forget their worries, fit in with the crowd, and live on the edge in a fast-paced world that normally does not leave time for such activities. Teetering on the brink of adulthood, yet still trapped in childhood makes drinking decisions difficult for many college students. A desire to get away from our usual lives because of societal regulations and conformity, psychological and emotional problems, and the stress of everyday life causes college binge drinking.
The issue at hand is that Duquesne University students are displeased with the transportation services available to them specifically the SGA Loop Bus. I believe Matt Liberatore speaks for the majority of students when he commented (about the Loop Bus) saying, “It is not as effective as it should be. They’re inconsistent, and aren’t enough prevalent as they should be.” Problems were evident from the beginning of its existence. The Loop Bus is a free service to students of Duquesne University that runs Friday and Saturday beginning at 5:00 in the evening and ending as early as 12:30 and as late as 2:30am. This leads to many cases of being stranded in unfamiliar places throughout the city. Matt also commented on how was inconvenienced during his freshman and sophomore years where he remembers waiting hours until another bus would come because the previous was too small.
“The Short Bus: A Journey Beyond Normal” by Jonathan Mooney is the story of his journey around the U.S. in short bus nonetheless to meet with different children and their families who have faced challenges in school due to ADD, ADHD, Autism, and other learning disabilities. Jonathan Mooney himself faced the disability of Dyslexia and often had to deal with many challenges in school himself, but he appears to be one of the more fortunate ones, who was able to grow from his disability and ultimately get a degree in English. Needless to say, his book and journey lead the reader to question what really is “normal”, and how the views of this have caused the odds to be stacked against those who don’t fit the mold. Throughout, this story, for me personally however, this story gave several events that I found moving, and had the potential to influence my further work in education.
When teenagers leave the safety of home and enter college life, they can feel very out of place. In order for them to feel that they belong when joining a fraternity or sorority, they can be pressured into binge drinking and other types of behavior that they wouldn't normally do. By doing what the fraternity brothers or sorority sisters ask them to do, they think that they are proving themselves to be worthy of a place in the organization. This can be very dangerous for many reasons. "Results from a recent Harvard School of Public Health College Alcohol Study provide the first national picture in almost fifty years of just how widespread and harmful heavy episodic or "binge" drinking has become, not only for those students who abuse alcohol, but also for others in their immediate environment" (Wechsler, 178). Binge drinkers put themselves at high r...
Underage students drinking on college campuses has been a problem for countless years. Parents and professors look over the problem of students drinking and look at their college life in a positive way. They understand the students to be studying, making new friends, or working. Instead, an abundance of students are partying and drinking at these parties. The transformation from high school to college causes stress to the students. Therefore, instead of the students looking towards studying more, they start partying to solve their problems. Once they start partying, it gets harder for them to stop and they become depressed. Students drinking at college has become a provision for them, thinking it would help with their stress and problems rather than causing other predicaments.
The increasing penalties for getting caught as a drunk driver have increased over the years. The government has taken measures to educate teenagers about the dangers of drinking and driving and the many lives that could be lost. Schools such as Los Amigos High School have taken the responsibility to educate these teens towards the dangers of drinking and driving with the assistance of The National Every 15 Minutes Organization (www.every15minutes.com). This organization seeks to give students the opportunity to feel first hand the effects of drinking and driving with out the risk. Measures such as the ones taken through the Every 15 Minutes Organization would not be taken if the institutions and people had not sought to end prohibition and still try to protect the lives of those that they care about.
A growing number of students on college campuses are taking their life in their own hands each time they consume large quantities of alcohol in a short period of time. This popular method of drinking, called binge drinking, is a social stigma passed down from past generations. Students consider binge drinking a recreational way of life that is reninforced with alcoholic berverage "hangouts" located near college campuses. The fraternity and sorority houses are known for their wild parties. The peer-pressured initiations of thise elite groups of students are binge drinking oriented. Students do not realize the fun they perceive to have during these binge drinking bashes lead to alcohol dependency, serious health problems and ultimately death. For these reasons, college campuses should work towards an lcohol-free campus.
college students have found drinking at American universities has grown to become a defining part of college life despite the fact that a majority of college students cannot even legally drink. Lowering the drinking the drinking age could prove to be an effective step in changing the party hard way of life by encouraging responsible drinking and take the trill away from getting away with drinking. Students also binge drink to get as drunk as fast as possible. The dangers of this are obvious. If the age...
This is the most common form of alcohol consumption, especially in youth under the age of 21. Just within the last month there has been 85 plus alcohol related incidents, and over half involved freshman according to the University of Mississippi’s crime report. Instances such as these could have easily resulted in death, hence 1, 825 college students die each year from alcohol. Drinking is not only harmful to students bodies, but aslo academic performaces. A personal testimony came fromer freshamn here at Ole Miss stating how drinking during the begining of his collge career resulted in missing class, doing poorly on exams, and haveing a lower grade in classses overall. According to many freshman students here at the University of Mississippi, alcohol is the way to have fun at social events such as parties and other night activities on campus, the beverage itself is believed to help break the
Underage drinking is problematic in many communities. If you spent one day at any High School, in Love County, I can almost guarantee by the end of the day you would know which students drink, who supplies the liquor, and the location of the next party. Regrettably, underage drinking runs rampant in Love County and many other regions in the United States. “Alcohol use remains extremely widespread among today’s teenagers. Nearly three quarters of students (72%) have consumed alcohol (more than just a few sips) by the end of high school, and more than a thir...
As autumn begins thousands of young adults begin their higher education on universities and colleges dotting the country. These freshmen come to gain experience, to learn and as is tradition to drink and party at their leisure. Free from the prying eyes of their parents, these students take advantage of the "laissez-faire" attitude that schools have on alcohol consumption. However, these same policies on alcohol, or the lack thereof, lead to unwanted consequences for these naive young people. Banning all alcohol from college campuses might initially be met with critique from those same students. Nevertheless, it would help these future graduates concentrate more on receiving an education and spare them some problems that alcohol causes at
Most people do not realize that alcohol is a drug that claims the lives of youth in college campuses across the world. In my case, it took the encounter with the ORL staff at UCLA for me to come to understanding that I am putting myself and those around me in danger through my risky drinking habits. With hours of self-reflection and the help of a cosmopolitan article called The Deadly Drinking Mistakes Smart Girls Make, I have found that there are several risks associated with alcohol that can put me at a quarrel with death. Even so, drinking does not always need to be deadly, and by keeping in mind the well-being of my fellow bruins and the skills mentioned in the article, I can find a balance between drinking for fun and drinking till death.