Revisiting the numbers: Liquor law violations at Syracuse University fell sharply from 2013 to 2014

Editor’s Note: The Daily Orange published a version of this story in October 2015.

The most recent figures available offer some hope that Syracuse University students are less likely to get into trouble for drinking than the university’s reputation has long indicated.

Disciplinary referrals for students charged with liquor law violations declined sharply, falling by about 30 percent from 2013 to 2014, according to the university’s 2015 security report. Although numbers for calendar year 2015 are not yet available, the decrease followed a steep 25 percent rise in referrals in 2013 — an increase that worried university officials.

Nationally, drinking by 18­ to 21­-year-­olds, the college ­age demographic, has fallen, but the intensity of alcohol consumption within that group has risen, experts say. On SU’s campus, administrators give credit to university­-sponsored programs designed to combat alcohol abuse.

In raw numbers, SU students racked up 1,303 state liquor law violations in 2013, but the number tumbled to 918 in the next year, according to the Department of Public Safety report. Violations of state liquor laws remain the highest reported crime on campus, far above the number of students caught with illegal drugs, the second ­most common violation.

The standard sanctions by campus authorities for alcohol­-related referrals accumulate and are “disciplinary reprimand” and community service on the first violation, the two plus an educational project and/or an “options program referral” on the second violation and indefinite suspension for at least one year on the third violation, according to the Code of Conduct.

George Koob, the director of the Bethesda, Maryland, ­based National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, said percentage-­wise, young people are using less alcohol.

“It’s a small drop, but still down,” Koob said. “Bad news is, there’s an increase in the intensity of those who do choose to binge drink.”

Koob added that students want to get as drunk as possible “as fast as possible” and don’t entirely understand the effects of alcohol. Similar behavior shows up at SU.

“We unfortunately continue to see a lot of students drink to the point of alcohol poisoning and/or have other alcohol-­related problems,” said Cory Wallack, director of the Counseling Center.

Programs like BE Wise and Orange After Dark, which work to inform students and provide alternative late night activities, have helped the university combat alcohol abuse, Wallack said. BE Wise, he added, has helped students get a better understanding of the warning signs of alcohol poisoning and how to be safer about drinking in general.

Wallack added that the Counseling Center’s available data show SU students drink more than the national average.

“I think our students need to step back and ask themselves why they chose to drink and why they chose to drink in the quantities that they do,” Wallack said. “Hopefully in doing so, we can see some behavioral shifts and insights gained.”

SU was ranked as the No. 5 party school in the United States in August 2015 by The Princeton Review, down from its No. 1 ranking in 2014. The Princeton Review provides information on colleges with a target audience of prospective students.

The average number of referrals for liquor law violations at SU peer institutions is about 530.

Tulane University in Louisiana and Lehigh University in Pennsylvania were the only two of SU’s 16 peer institutions to be named on The Princeton Review’s list of the top 20 party schools. Tulane University did not have 2014 numbers in its most recent report.

Nikki Cooter, the manager of administration and the Jeanne Clery Disclosure Act compliance for DPS, said when she submitted the numbers last year, the U.S. Department of Education contacted her to ask if something was wrong with the data because the alcohol violation numbers were so high. The numbers are cyclical, she said, and now the numbers are more consistent with what they had been in the past.

The Clery Act requires U.S. colleges and universities to publish an annual security report by Oct. 1 every year. The act requires three years of statistics and other security information.

“The aberration actually isn’t this year; it was last year,” Cooter said. She added that targeted programming, such as Orange After Dark, helps students do something other than drink.

The programs can’t completely be tied to the drop in numbers, Cooter said, as “correlation does not always equal causation,” but they play into the equation.

Generational and cultural changes play more of a role, she said, as societal and cultural changes can impact the way students “see themselves in the world and the way they behave in it.”

“I think every couple of years, you just get a bunch of party animals. For lack of a better way to put it, I think every few years there’s just a lot of them that want to have a lot of fun,” Cooter said. “I don’t know if they spend a lot of time watching ‘Animal House.’ I don’t know.”