College disappointment

The most disappointing thing about college today is the same thing that it was when I was in college nearly 25 years ago. Life still revolves around alcohol. (Yes, it was fun - sort of - I may have done it just to fit in perhaps - but after I graduated, I realized that my time could have been better spent actually learning new things, ideas, and subjects.)

If anything, it sounds like college students have not changed all that much - and in some ways have perhaps gotten worse. Triggered by this article:

I'm a student at Princeton, and before I even arrived on campus my freshman year, I heard the Tiger Inn stories: competitive projectile vomiting, harmonious chanting of "tits for beer," and naked guys standing on tables while strumming their "penis guitars." I looked on--kind of horrified, but also transfixed. Then sophomore year came around, and a bunch of my girlfriends made a decision that blew my mind. Tiger Inn. They were going to try to be a part of it.

My friends aren't the only women to embrace a college culture that I think is best defined by the term "fratty": extreme rowdiness induced by the consumption of a whole lot of alcohol. An upcoming study from Alcoholism: Clinical & Experimental Research, which will be released in October, finds that college women today are more likely than men to exceed the weekly drink limits suggested by the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. In 2009, the Washington University School of Medicine reported a similar trend: Women in college drank excessive amounts of alcohol 40 percent more often than they did in 1979, while the numbers for men didn't change. Then there were the Miami University hotel shenanigans that went viral in 2010: college women having sex in the caterer's closet, playing toss with crystal vases, and attempting to urinate in the bathroom sinks.