Ball State University's Substance Abuse Prevention Outreach Team, in co-operation with Health Education, is trying to educate students about the effects of alcohol during National Collegiate Alcohol Awareness Week.
The team is sponsoring events this week in hopes of convincing students to make healthy choices, John Stachula, Counseling Center therapist, said.
Today's at the Scramble Light a wrecked car, donated by a local business, will be filled with beer cans, Anna Lamb, alcohol education coordinator, said.
The display is designed to make students aware about the dangers of drunk driving, she said. Informative posters about driving while intoxicated and penalties will also be shown.
Students can guess how many beer cans are in the car, and the student who guesses correctly will receive a prize, Lamb said.
Senior Adriana Hodson, a member of the substance abuse prevention outreach team, went to three different bars and contacted Village shops to find beer cans to fill the car.
Hodson also volunteered at a booth set up by the prevention team in the Atrium Monday. The booth provided information and a chance to for students to try doing everyday functions while wearing beer goggles. Beer goggles simulate the visual perception of an intoxicated person.
"What we're trying to have people realize is that it's not that you can't see things when you're drunk, it's that your perception is off," Hodson said.
Activities such as the beer goggle simulations entice students to approach the booth, Stachula said. This provides the outreach team the chance to distribute information. Another booth will be set up Wednesday.
"We know the majority of students are not engaging in frequent high-risk substance-use behaviors; it's actually a minority of students that do that," Stachula said. "The assumption becomes that the majority of students do that, which is not true."
A new event is a drunk driving simulation on Thursday and Friday from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on University Green.
Using a golf cart donated by the athletic department, students will drive through an obstacle course, once without beer goggles on and again while wearing beer goggles. University Police Department will supervise the course, Lamb said.
A grant recently received from the Delaware County Coordinating Council to Prevent Alcohol Abuse helped fund the event, she said.
Lamb said she planned to use the grant money for informative events later in the year.
One of the events, Party Kit, will hopefully begin in January, she said.
Party Kit teach students how to throw responsible parties, Lamb said, and also educate the students about the laws and penalties regarding distributing alcohol to minors.
"Our primary goal isn't to get pamphlets in the hands of students," Stachula said. "We're mainly out there to talk to and interact with students."
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