Iowa tries new strategy to curb Thursday parties

by Carl Jaeger

Wednesday, November 14, 2007 00:30

If the University of Iowa administration gets its way, students at the university had better cancel their Thursday night party plans.

A new proposal would grant UI departments $20 for each student in a class period switched to Fridays, all in an effort to curb binge drinking on Thursday nights.

"We’ve talked about trying to increase the number of classes taught Friday for some time," UI Vice Provost Tom Rocklin said. "On our campus, we teach an average of about 2,400 class sections Monday through Thursday, but that drops to 1,400 on Fridays."

Rocklin said the University of Missouri released a study last summer that included "some pretty good evidence that Friday classes reduce Thursday night binge drinking."

In addition, Rocklin said the university wants to emphasize that "being a student is pretty serious business."

"We took all those things together and said we would like to offer more classes on Fridays," Rocklin said.

He added the proposed plan would also maximize UI’s facility usage.

Rocklin said the additional funding departments would receive will come from internal reallocation within the College of Liberal Arts.

Feedback regarding the proposal, Rocklin said, "has been pretty positive," although some departments have said moving classes to Fridays simply will not work for them.

"I’ve heard from new faculty members who have said ‘Oh, sure, that sounds good. I’d like to do that,’" Rocklin said. "We’re not telling anybody that they have to do it."

Sue Crowley, director of the University of Wisconsin’s PACE — an organization with the goal of decreasing high risk drinking and the consequences that come with it — said she was doubtful UI’s strategy to limit Thursday night drinking would be effective, or that a similar policy would ever be instated at UW.

"I think there are a lot of theories as to why that happens. I think some of that is related to the distribution of classes," Crowley said. "If you look at the distribution, there are still a substantial number of classes on Friday, but not as many as other days of the week."

Crowley said the reduced number of Friday classes may send a message that it is acceptable to consume alcohol on Thursday nights, adding UW students are "more willing to drink excessively on a Thursday night because they probably have a lighter academic load" the next day.

Crowley acknowledged that at UW, "the weekend starts for many students on Thursday night." But she worries if universities move more classes to Fridays, students will be less likely to enroll in the courses.

"I’d be surprised if this will work because there’s going to be some self-selection," Crowley said. "Some professors are going to sign up and say 'Okay, I’ll take the money and do this,'" but unless you’re doing it pretty consistently across all the disciplines on your campus, then it seems to me that students are going to self-select out of those classes that are on Friday."