Student Union
What's the Worst That Could Happen If You Drink Too Much?
Emergency room doctor Louis Profeta wants college students to know what happens the day after someone spends the night drinking too much.
He describes a dorm room where the smell of feces and urine fills the air and how a roommate trips over his fraternity brother, now lying dead on the floor after a night of five vodka slammers, one after another.
"Dead, waxy, with rock-still, clouded eyes ... you could never envision a stare so distant," Profeta writes on his blog. "You played pickup basketball yesterday at the campus rec center and … now, he is so still, laying among the pile of yet-to-be-washed clothes or wrapped up in a blanket on a [urine]-soaked IKEA futon delivered to him last week."
Profeta sees students come through the emergency department of Saint Vincent's Medical Center in Indianapolis too often, he said. He understands the agony parents feel when their child's life is in peril.
"We're the ones who have to tell the parents how these kids die," Profeta said.
So, he talks with groups of young people and writes about extreme drinking and drugs, describing the scene in detail and hoping they will sidestep tragedy.
"I would tell their mom and dad that they were dead, and [explain] how Mom would pull hunks of her hair out until it bled, and Dad would punch the wall, shattering a bone or two," Profeta says to young students.
"Already, Mom and Dad would be blaming [their child's friends] for getting their kid drunk or stoned to the point [vomit] bubbled up in his throat, then plugged his trachea, choking him just as surely as if they had taken their foot and crushed their child's windpipe on their own.
"They will blame you for their child's death until the day you die. Are you ready for that?"
Finally, he describes how the "frat brothers" sit along the wall in the hospital waiting room, and sob.
Testing the limits
A person who has had too much to drink can choke or asphyxiate on his or her vomit, even while unconscious, and doesn't respond to pinching or shaking. The person's breath is slow or shallow or absent. The skin is blue, and cold or clammy, according to descriptions by the Gordie Center, a nonprofit at the University of Virginia working to prevent substance abuse.
As new freshmen are unleashed from their parents' protection at home, many test the limits of drugs and alcohol. Rites of passage are repeated each year by the uninitiated.
"So, my friends and I played beer pong tonight. Suffice to say it didn't quite go as expected," posted deutscheblake on the Reddit thread AskDocs. "The guy we all thought could handle liquor the best is now piss drunk sleeping on the floor of our house. He's had about 4 beers and the equivalent to 9 shots. My other friend and I are worried he might have alcohol poisoning. Is there something we should be looking for as a sign that he needs to go to the hospital?"
Alcohol abuse is complicated by other substances haunting America and its campuses, Profeta said.
"We are in the middle of a humongous opiate crisis," he said, "and throw in marijuana. ... So many of these kids are on antidepressants. When you combine those with alcohol, you will die. … They are doing this constantly."
And "they," Profeta said, "are not just frat boys. Young people are partying in basements, friends' houses, in high school."
Binge drinking
Nearly 17 percent of students surveyed said that the last time they partied, they had seven or more drinks, according to the Spring 2017 National College Health Assessment, which polls college students randomly each semester about their health behaviors.
Those amounts are well above the "binge drinking" of four or more standard drinks per occasion for women, and five or more standard drinks per occasion for men, as defined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Within the past 12 months, college students also reported using antidepressants, erectile dysfunction drugs, painkillers, sedatives and stimulants that were not prescribed to them, and 12.5 percent of the students surveyed said they had used one or more of these drugs together.
"They use Viagra," Profeta said, a drug typically prescribed to older men for erectile dysfunction. "They don't think they need it — it's all about the adrenaline rush — about something new, about something different, either escaping or doing something that's frowned on, it's all about walking the edge, walking the tightrope."
And fueled by the same thrill of other extreme experiences, sometimes students shimmy too close to the edge.
Adults should not be afraid to speak up.
"Sometimes things are not that complex," Profeta said. "Sometimes we have to say, 'Stop this. Things are not right.' You don't have to redefine society. We don't have to change what constitutes masculinity and femininity. That is wrong. Just stop. … just stop."
Hungry for facts
And while many younger people seem to screech toward a dangerous independence out of arm's reach of their elders, some are seeking advice similar to Profeta's.
"There should be a drug-ed class like sex-ed, where they teach you how not to overdose or get alcohol poisoning and stuff," wrote RumpyStiltz_56 on the Reddit thread Shower Thoughts.
"There needs to be a class where you learn about a safe-use system for drugs and alcohol," wrote Justanothermolifer, who also said the fact of the matter is that drugs and alcohol will be involved in a lot of students' lives in one way or another.
"I do not think this is a problem with universities or education," Profeta said. "I'm not sure it is a problem with parents. There is a lot of blame to go around everywhere. It's up to us to navigate those threats."
See all News Updates of the Day
- By VOA News
What types of graduate student housing are there?
Anayat Durrani of the US News & World Report breaks down the options. (April 2024)
Pro-Palestinian protests spread on US university campuses
U.S. university campuses are seeing pro-Palestinian protests daily. Students are demonstrating against the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza and demanding that humanitarian aid be allowed to flow into the territory. VOA’s Veronica Balderas Iglesias reports.
US police clash with students who demand colleges cut financial ties to Israel
Police tangled with student demonstrators in the U.S. states of Texas and California while new encampments sprouted Wednesday at Harvard and other colleges as school leaders sought ways to defuse a growing wave of pro-Palestinian protests.
At the University of Texas at Austin, hundreds of local and state police — including some on horseback and holding batons — clashed with protesters, pushing them off the campus lawn and at one point sending some tumbling into the street. At least 20 demonstrators were taken into custody at the request of university officials and Texas Governor Greg Abbott, according to the state Department of Public Safety.
A photographer covering the demonstration for Fox 7 Austin was arrested after being caught in a push-and-pull between law enforcement and students, the station confirmed. A longtime Texas journalist was knocked down in the mayhem and could be seen bleeding before police helped him to emergency medical staff who bandaged his head.
At the University of Southern California, police got into a back-and-forth tugging match with protesters over tents, removing several before falling back. At the northern end of California, students were barricaded inside a building for a third day at California State Polytechnic University, Humboldt. The school shut down campus through the weekend and made classes virtual.
Harvard University in Massachusetts had sought to stay ahead of protests this week by limiting access to Harvard Yard and requiring permission for tents and tables. That didn't stop protesters from setting up a camp with 14 tents Wednesday following a rally against the university's suspension of the Harvard Undergraduate Palestine Solidarity Committee.
Students protesting the Israel-Hamas war are demanding schools cut financial ties to Israel and divest from companies enabling its monthslong conflict. Dozens have been arrested on charges of trespassing or disorderly conduct. Some Jewish students say the protests have veered into antisemitism and made them afraid to set foot on campus.
Columbia University averted another confrontation between students and police earlier in the day. The situation there remained tense, with campus officials saying it would continue talks with protesters for another 48 hours.
On a visit to campus, U.S. House Speaker Mike Johnson, a Republican, called on Columbia University President Minouche Shafik to resign "if she cannot bring order to this chaos."
"If this is not contained quickly and if these threats and intimidation are not stopped, there is an appropriate time for the National Guard," he said.
Shafik had set a midnight Tuesday deadline to reach an agreement on clearing an encampment, but the school extended negotiations, saying it was making "important progress."
On Wednesday evening, a Columbia spokesperson said rumors that the university had threatened to bring in the National Guard were unfounded. "Our focus is to restore order, and if we can get there through dialogue, we will," said Ben Chang, Columbia's vice president for communications.
Columbia graduate student Omer Lubaton Granot, who put up pictures of Israeli hostages near the encampment, said he wanted to remind people that there were more than 100 hostages still being held by Hamas.
"I see all the people behind me advocating for human rights," he said. "I don't think they have one word to say about the fact that people their age, that were kidnapped from their homes or from a music festival in Israel, are held by a terror organization."
Harvard law student Tala Alfoqaha, who is Palestinian, said she and other protesters want more transparency from the university.
"My hope is that the Harvard administration listens to what its students have been asking for all year, which is divestment, disclosure and dropping any sort of charges against students," she said.
Columbia encampment inspires others
Police first tried to clear the encampment at Columbia last week, when they arrested more than 100 protesters. The move backfired, acting as an inspiration for other students across the country to set up similar encampments and motivating protesters at Columbia to regroup.
On Wednesday about 60 tents remained at the Columbia encampment, which appeared calm. Security remained tight around campus, with identification required and police setting up metal barricades.
Columbia said it had agreed with protest representatives that only students would remain at the encampment and they would make it welcoming, banning discriminatory or harassing language.
On the University of Minnesota campus, a few dozen students rallied a day after nine protesters were arrested when police took down an encampment in front of the library. U.S. Representative Ilhan Omar, whose daughter was among the demonstrators arrested at Columbia last week, attended a protest later in the day.
A group of more than 80 professors and assistant professors signed a letter Wednesday calling on the university's president and other administrators to drop any charges and to allow future encampments without what they described as police retaliation.
They wrote that they were "horrified that the administration would permit such a clear violation of our students' rights to freely speak out against genocide and ongoing occupation of Palestine."
Netanyahu encourages police response
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lashed out at the pro-Palestinian demonstrations on U.S. college campuses in a video statement released Wednesday, saying the response of several university presidents has been "shameful" and calling on state, local and federal officials to intervene.
Students at some protests were hiding their identities and declined to identify themselves to reporters, saying they feared retribution. At an encampment of about 40 tents at the heart of the University of Michigan's campus in Ann Arbor, almost every student wore a mask, which was handed to them when they entered.
The upwelling of demonstrations has left universities struggling to balance campus safety with free speech rights. Many long tolerated the protests, but are now doling out more heavy-handed discipline, citing safety concerns.
At New York University this week, police said 133 protesters were taken into custody and all had been released with summonses to appear in court on disorderly conduct charges. More than 40 protesters were arrested Monday at an encampment at Yale University.
Columbia University demonstrators in talks with administration officials
Officials at Columbia University were continuing talks Wednesday with student demonstrators from the Gaza Solidarity Encampment as the protest reaches a full week.
At 9:41 p.m. Tuesday, university President Nemat “Minouche” Shafik sent an email to the Columbia community setting a midnight deadline for an agreement to be reached about dismantling the encampment and dispersing the protesters.
“I very much hope these discussions are successful,” she wrote. “If they are not, we will have to consider alternative options for clearing the West Lawn and restoring calm to campus so that students can complete the term and graduate.”
As midnight passed, Columbia University Apartheid Divest posted a statement on X saying, “We refuse to concede to cowardly threats and blatant intimidation by university administration. We will continue to peacefully protest.”
The statement also said the university had threatened to call the National Guard. But after visiting the university earlier in the week, New York Governor Kathy Hochul said Tuesday she had no plans to deploy the National Guard.
As midnight approached on Tuesday, a student organizer announced that the deadline had been extended to 8 a.m. Wednesday.
At 4:09 a.m., the Office of the President sent an email saying the discussion deadline would be extended for 48 hours, given the constructive dialogue, and the university would report back on progress.
The email announced that leaders of the student encampment had agreed to remove a significant number of tents, get non-Columbia affiliates to leave the encampment and comply with New York Fire Department requirements. They also agreed to ensure that the encampment is “welcome to all” and to prohibit “discriminatory or harassing language.”
This development comes nearly a week after more than 100 students were arrested at the school on April 18, after Shafik authorized police to clear away protesters. Some of the students received suspension notices from the school.
Columbia’s action prompted an onslaught of pro-Palestinian demonstrations at other universities and responses from faculty and politicians.
Students at other campuses, such as Yale, Stanford and New York University, have also rallied around the Palestinian cause, calling for their universities to divest from companies with ties to Israel and for a cease-fire in Gaza. Many also have put up tent encampments on their campuses. About 150 students and faculty were arrested at New York University Monday night.
Columbia also announced Tuesday morning that classes on the Morningside main campus, where the protests are taking place, will be offered in a hybrid format for the remainder of the spring semester. The last day of classes is April 29.
- By VOA News
Paper: International students faced extra pandemic challenges
Astrobites, which describes itself as "a daily astrophysical literature journal written by graduate students in astronomy since 2010," focuses on the challenges international students faced during the COVID-19 pandemic.
It examines a paper published in the Journal of Comparative & International Higher Education entitled The Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on International Students in a Public University in the United States: Academic and Non-academic Challenges.
Read the Astrobites article here. (April 2024)
