by Zach Rus, Director of Educational Programs, and Dr. Jason Kilmer

Responding to students’ drinking habits has been a long-standing issue — and there aren’t any clear solutions. A new program from Sigma Alpha Epsilon, the Alcohol Skills Training Program, aims to provide straightforward lessons. The bottom line is simple: Whether or not you approve of students’ consumption of alcohol, it’s important that everyone be educated on alcohol’s effects on the body.

And you can be a part of that program. The Fraternity is recruiting alumni interested in serving as moderators for ASTP events around the country — making the program unique because it meets students on their own ground. The entire effort is coordinated by staff at the Fraternity Service Center, and chapters that are eligible to receive the program’s training are dictated by the ability of our volunteers to visit them.

The ASTP is an educational effort that starts with the premise that some college students make the choice to drink. While the program acknowledges that abstinence is the best way to avoid consequences associated with drinking, it also recognizes that steps toward risk reduction are steps in the right direction. The ASTP takes the topics students are interested in — tolerance, beer goggles and how alcohol affects social skills — and challenges their expectations. It clarifies what’s considered “normal” on their campus and in their chapters, and then, it helps students develop new strategies for making better choices.

Earlier this decade, the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism commissioned a group of scientists to review the best ways to reduce college-student drinking. Of the only three strategies that were identified as effective in reducing drinking and related consequences, the Alcohol Skills Training Program was the only one identified by name as an example — and so Sigma Alpha Epsilon is implementing an extension of this promising program.

This is where you come in. After more than two years of training alumni like you all over the country, Sigma Alpha Epsilon’s alcohol-education training is now available to the entire Realm. We equip alumni to visit chapters, helping them educate undergraduate members on how alcohol can affect them. No sad stories. No emotional pleas. Just the simple facts.

Volunteers were trained by Dr. Jason Kilmer, an expert in his field and a researcher who has been a part of many alcohol-intervention evaluations. Kilmer teaches volunteers about the role of expectations, alcohol’s effects on the body and consequences that could be lessened or eliminated if students make changes in their drinking. That education includes the concept of “diminishing returns.” Those concepts allow those who choose to make responsible decisions and to minimize their risk while both saving money and making decisions on how to change their drinking habits. Abstainers aren’t left out, either. They’re given information on the positive effects of their healthy choices. And, of course, participants are reminded that if they are under 21, it is illegal to drink.
The ASTP has already been presented at various chapters across the country as well at as the 73rd John O. Moseley Leadership School. James Balandran, an undergraduate at the University of Texas-Dallas, immediately saw the program’s benefits. “I believe that this program is unique because it does something that I have not seen any other program do,” he said.

“ASTP is not the same program every time it is given. The interactivity makes it specific to the people in the room. The program also shows the audience the science behind alcohol and what it does to the body. Both these items make the Alcohol Skills Training Program a great resource for educating my chapter on alcohol.”

You can make the difference for a chapter in your area. For more information on ASTP or to submit you name as a volunteer, e-mail ASTP@sae.net with your name, chapter and contact information.