San Diego’s Universities Move to Cut Drinking

The party scene at UC San Diego has largely dried up this year, the victim of new, tougher alcohol regulations that follow a trend both locally and nationally as college administrators try to moderate student drinking.

New rules at UCSD prohibit any alcohol use in public places other than the campus pub. Students 21 and over can drink only in their private dormitory rooms, and residence-hall advisers now actively enforce the law against underage drinking.

The athletic department will no longer cover part of its operating costs by accepting beer advertising on its calendars and schedules. And UCSD officials are attempting to find non-liquor companies to sponsor part or all of the intramural activities heavily subsidized by beer and wine makers.

The efforts by UCSD are similar to regulations already in place at San Diego State University and the University of San Diego to counter the image of college life as a “baptism of beer,” in the words of one former federal health official.

San Diego State has had stringent on-campus regulations for several years but only recently has begun to have an influence on drinking among the many fraternities and sororities on the campus periphery.

USD administrators this year decided not to open a pub planned downstairs in the new student center because they believe its operation would send the wrong message to students concerning the desirability of drinking.

“I think we feel that we have to have a pro-active, not a passive, policy concerning the welfare of our students when it comes to alcohol,” Joseph Watson, vice chancellor for undergraduate affairs at UCSD, said. “And that means both enforcing state law and emphasizing education so that students will make mature judgments” about alcohol.

“What we are doing mirrors what is going on nationally,” said Stephen Barnes, assistant vice president for student affairs at San Diego State. “There is a very acute interest on the part of colleges to mount campaigns about (alcohol and substance abuse) that emphasize the desirability of healthy life styles and wellness.”

In addition, many states have raised their drinking age to 21 from 18 and the national Mothers Against Drunk Driving organization has put the spotlight on alcohol-related road accidents.

Not that local deans believe they are going to stop student drinking.

Sister Mary Schmeling, who oversees the USD alcohol policies, worries that many area students may simply go off-campus--especially to Tijuana--to drink and perhaps put themselves in greater risk than if allowed to drink on campus. A recent ad in the Daily Aztec, the San Diego State newspaper, featured seven Tijuana nightspots offering special liquor prices for students under the heading, “Tijuana Nightlife At Its Best! . . . SDSU’s favorite fiesta hot spot.”

The USD administration, together with student organizations at the Catholic university, sponsors free cab rides back to campus--even from Tijuana--for students who believe they are too drunk to drive.

“Our goal (realistically) is to try to lessen the view of students that alcohol is the key to having a good weekend,” said UCSD’s Watson, who has devoted considerable attention to the subject during the last year. “Our society has seemed to emphasize drinking so a student probably sees (drinking) as quite normal.”

Even beer companies, which target college students in efforts to establish brand loyalty among them, are mounting programs to encourage more students to drink responsibly. Anheuser-Busch, whose Budweiser dominates beer-sponsored activities on college campuses, holds Alcohol Awareness nights to promote the designated driver system and the pitfalls of getting drunk.

‘Animal House’ Losing Appeal

“Things like (the movie) ‘Animal House’ and beer-chugging contests were common 10 years ago,” said Jim Dirker, marketing manager of Coast Distributing Co. in San Diego, wholesaler for Budweiser products. “Today, we emphasize dry rushes (recruitment for sororities and fraternities) and general moderation.

“Of course, we are in the business of selling beer, but I think the message is starting to get out that it’s not necessarily cool to be smashed, that the person who can drink the most is not always the most cool.”

Among the three campuses, UCSD has taken the most significant actions during the last year, particularly in terms of strengthening legal enforcement.

“For years, I think we were overall more lax,” Vice Chancellor Watson said. Though California’s legal drinking age has been 21 for many years, UCSD did not actively enforce it on campus until the last year. Now, dormitory advisers watch for underage drinking, which in the majority of cases is easily spotted since almost all dormitory residents are freshmen or sophomores and, therefore, usually under 21.

The few students who are of legal drinking age must consume alcohol in their private rooms with doors closed. By prohibiting alcohol in any public area on campus, UCSD officials have in effect forced parties off campus, both Watson and students agree.

“Obviously, I cannot say to you that there is no underage drinking in our (residence) halls or on campus,” Watson said. “But we have set a norm that we expect students to follow.”

Added Tom Colthurst, director of alcohol programs for UCSD extension, “Clearly, alcohol problems do not start and stop at the campus boundary . . . but pro-drinking messages in the absence of any (alternative) do have a cumulative effect in shaping attitudes.”

Rowdiness Is Down

Watson said initial reports from housing advisers show that dormitories have less rowdiness and are providing a better atmosphere for study.

Beer is still sold at the UCSD Triton Pub and served during the occasional outdoor “TGIF” parties on Fridays that feature live music. But students must show identification and receive a colored wristband indicating they are 21. And both in the pub and at the outside TGIF, monitors roam the crowd looking for violations, especially underage students receiving cups from those able to drink legally.

Watson said he allowed the TGIF parties to continue “as a judgment call” in large part because they are a longstanding tradition on the high-powered intellectual campus, where social activities have never been paramount.

Some UCSD students have complained that more students now drink and drive because all parties are held away from the campus. Unlike the situation at San Diego State, there are few off-campus student residence halls and apartments within walking distance of UCSD’s sprawling La Jolla campus.

“I think in a way there are more students going to parties off campus and then having to drive back,” said UCSD student David Friend, who has been active in student government.

Watson conceded that the drink-and-drive issue has been raised “quite vigorously” by students “as an argument for us to be quite liberal, turning our back to allow drinking on campus.

“But to drive after drinking is a student’s decision independent of what the university decides to do. . . . Students who make an informed decision to drink and drive know the consequences.”

Free Taxi Service Touted

The UCSD Associated Students funds the Tipsi Taxi, which provides free service to students from 9 p.m. to 3 a.m. weekends if they are drunk and do not want to drive. The agreement with Yellow Cab covers an area from Solana Beach to Mission Beach and east to Interstate 15.

But Watson decided not to help with university funds for the service. “Are we encouraging more drinking with it and just eliminating the negative consequences?” he asked. “In my personal view, it might mean more students going off campus and drinking more.”

Sister Schmeling of USD takes a different view of administrative participation. USD helps pay for a similar seven-day-a-week taxi agreement with Orange Cab for its students. The service is even available for students who find themselves inebriated in Tijuana.

“I guess our philosophy is that we (will help the student) who recognizes that he or she has had too much to drink and should not get into a car and drive or ride with someone else who has been drinking. Hopefully, we can get them into a pattern of using public transportation in these cases, and meet them halfway if they make the responsible decision not to drink and drive.”

Also, any student who uses the service three times during a semester must sit down with Schmeling for an evaluation on whether the student has more than a social drinking problem.

“We take the program one step further by adding the educational component that can flag an alcohol abuse problem,” she said.

Bartenders Attend Sessions

Schmeling allows parties at USD to serve alcohol on a case-by-case basis. But as a condition, all bartenders who will be working the parties must attend a six-hour course that includes information on California law and on third-party liability, on the requirement for providing attractive non-alcohol beverage alternatives, and on how to deal with a person who is belligerent or asleep from intoxication.

At San Diego State, the major alcohol problems traditionally have been associated with fraternities and sororities. (SDSU has the only fraternity and sorority houses among area universities.) The university has less control over off-campus Greek system activities, university adviser Doug Case said.

“Our regulations (for them) basically involve publicly advertised parties by fraternities,” Case said. “If they are private parties, we really have no control.”

But Case and student affairs vice president Barnes said that national headquarters of fraternities are increasingly downplaying alcohol because of difficulties in obtaining liability insurance.

“Especially during rush periods, we are seeing more and more dry rushes,” Case said. “Eighty percent of pledges each semester are under 21, so having functions where alcohol is available as a recruiting tool doesn’t make a lot of sense, and there have been the legal problems resulting from people becoming intoxicated at fraternity functions.”

Barnes said several well-publicized incidents at San Diego State fraternities involving drunken students falling off balconies or attacking female students have played a factor in the overall tightening of policies.

“It’s fair to say that whenever you have a celebrated case, that motivates people, both in our office and among the Greek system, to consider procedural changes,” Barnes said.

Students Getting Message

Case said cases of underage drinking and general intoxication have by no means disappeared, but he hears more and more students talking about designated drivers and other ways to avoid some of drinking’s consequences.

In the case of sponsorship of athletic events, all three universities have had to balance the desire not to promote alcohol with the need to pay for extensive intramural programs.

Watson initially wanted to eliminate beer sponsorship of all UCSD events but later decided only to end beer advertising on official UCSD athletic department publications. He rejected a proposal to have a beer company pay for the new basketball scoreboard, opting instead for a soft drink company even though fewer dollars were involved.

“To the extent possible, we don’t want to be dependent on beer monies,” Watson said, “since we don’t want to be putting alcohol encouragement before students.

“But as long as the advertising (banners, etc.) at an event are not blatant and are not the most prominent aspect of an (intramural or non-official events), we’ll let it go.”

USD’s Schmeling said some faculty members have raised the issue of beer company advertising at athletic events. “It has raised the awareness of some of our faculty, and we debate this back and forth, but we realize that beer companies do provide a lot of money to these events,” she said.

Beer Ads OK at SDSU

At San Diego State, administrators have no problem with beer company advertising or sponsorship as long as alcohol is not served at the events. And the university is actively courting corporations, whether beer manufacturers or otherwise, to become official sponsors of specific sports so that the university can provide more athletic scholarships.

“They (beer companies) do want to get involved, so we are trying to package things to generate more scholarships,” said Rick Taylor, assistant athletic director.

To keep the pressure on for continued moderation, administrators from all three universities periodically meet with representatives of the state Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control and police to discuss drinking issues.

“I think there is a growing consensus that at every turn we must signal that to be in, to be popular, to succeed, does not require the companionship of alcohol,” UCSD’s Colthurst said. “We measure progress in small increments, but that means (even in individual cases) protection of life, limb and property.”