The University of Minnesota-Duluth has reacted strongly to the death of a freshman rugby player who drowned after a night of drinking with the team.

Monday, June 11, 2001

The University of Minnesota-Duluth has reacted strongly to the death of a freshman rugby player who drowned after a night of drinking with the team. It has suspended the club, ordered the members to pay their own way through a university-sponsored alcohol education program and made a policy that underaged drinkers would be sent to an official detox center instead of being allowed to sleep off their binges in campus dorm rooms. Fines and the possibility of expulsion for repeat offenders also have been announced for violators.

But the UMD administration went one step too far when it said it would report underage drinking violations to offenders’ parents. And UMD has a lot of company in that decision.

College students are legally adults. They are therefore responsible for their own behavior. When colleges and universities continue to turn to moms and dads to enforce rules via long distance, students will not rise to the world of practical adults.

And then there are the students who are not only legal adults, but those who are financially emancipated from their families – they pay their own tuition, room, board and other expenses. Those independent students, in particular, should not be subject to such mandatory reporting.

Instead, universities and colleges should combine education about alcohol’s dangers with another potent tool in the war against underage drinking – the legal system. When universities and colleges make full use of the police, instead of moms and dads, they’ll be onto something. The ivory tower shouldn’t be a refuge from the law.