Check out this old Tom Green video I stumbled upon.  It’s completely ridiculous, but he makes a great point.  People look really stupid when they’re wasted.  Have a fun and SAFE weekend!

I feel very honored to share this exciting news.  I have been nominated for Best Speaker AND Best Female Artist in the 2010 Campus Activities Magazine – Reader’s Choice Awards!  Cast your vote by visiting the CAM website.  CAMPUSPEAK is also up for Best Agency.  Thank you all for your support and nominations!

Haiti needs our help now.  Visit the Clinton Foundation website to make a donation that immediately converts to food, water, medicine, and shelter in Haiti.  Or text “HAITI” to “90999″ and $10 will be given to the American Red Cross Relief for Haiti, charged to your cell phone bill.  For more ideas, click here for a list of reputable charities.  You can help make a difference today.

Happy New Year! Let’s start 2010 on a positive note. Although this website often shares tragic news, its main objective is to spread information on how to prevent senseless deaths. Brooke Bailey’s friends did just that. They took a close call situation and turned it around in the nick of time. Please check out this MVP story about three friends who saved a life.

Of the many drinking games that occur in a frat house, one of the big events that many like to host is a “beer Olympics”. This is basically any drinking game you can think of in marathon form with teams of 2 guys and 2 girls. Me being the competitive type, I wanted to win, and drank to win. I already had a reputation of being a heavy drinker and would be the “perfect partner” for this game. Well, one thing led to another, and I was blacking out. Of the bits and pieces I remember, I was on a couch in the fraternity house, then in a car, and then back in my sorority house. I had become belligerent and would not listen to anyone. Three sisters drove me back to my house and tried to get me to calm down, but nothing seemed to be working. Not only did I have alcohol working against me, but I am bipolar as well, and bipolar + alcohol = very bad. I refused to listen to anyone and could not stop shouting. Three of my sorority sisters (Lis, Savannah, and Samantha) called the campus police and paramedics. Had they not done this, I could have severely injured someone else or myself. Upon arriving at the hospital, I was told that my BAC was at a .27 and the outcome would have been a lot different had I been left on campus. These three sisters really did save my life.

Brooke Bailey

Georgia Institute of Technology

Click here to read more MVP stories.

Wishing you all a warm and joyous holiday season.  It’s been a trying year, but there is much to be thankful for.  Peace to you all.  All my very best, Erica

I am deeply saddened to hear of yet another young person dying from alcohol. My parents can relate to Aydin’s – both sons had such promising futures and this abrupt end is…well…devastating. 18-year-old Aydin Salek had it all going on. He was the student representative on the board of trustees for his 4,000-student school district, a well-liked student leader, president of The American Cancer Society on campus, and a writer for the South Pasadena High newspaper, just to name a few accomplishments.

My brother and Aydin had a lot in common, both in life and death. It sounds like Aydin’s friends were pretty scared to get him the help he needed on Saturday night after they realized he wasn’t breathing. Instead of calling 911 right away, they left the party and took him to another 18-year-old’s home, knowing that this person could administer CPR. What Aydin really needed was a hospital with trained doctors.

My brother’s friends made similar mistakes the night Joey died, as so many young people do. They don’t know what to do, and once you add fear and alcohol into the mix, you’re left with a big mess. Aydin’s friends will have to live with this guilt for the rest of their lives. I hope they learn from this mistake and find a way to spread the word so that other young people don’t make the same mistake. We never think that we will find ourselves in this type of situation, but when we do (and many of us do), we need to take action and do the right thing. We need to save our friend’s life. We need to call 911.

I’m liking these funny commercials from LG asking teens to “give it a ponder” before sending questionable texts that can lead to cyber-bullying.  Visit giveitaponder.com to watch more videos.  On a more somber note, the second known suicide linked to bullying after “sexting” occurred a few months ago.  Hope Witsell’s mother is speaking out about her daughter’s death – you can learn more here.

What would go through your mind if you found yourself in this situation?

“Around 1 am a girl knocked on my dorm room door.  She asked if she could hide her friend there because they locked themselves out and she was worried her friend was going to get in trouble. We saw what the girl looked like – she was being carried by two upperclassmen and had a trash bag to throw up in around her neck.”

Many students don’t call 911 when they should.  They are scared, they don’t know what to do, and they don’t want to get in trouble.  In this situation, this student did call 911.  The paramedics said she saved the girl’s life – a stranger’s life – all because she picked up the phone and did the right thing.

During my visits to colleges across the country, I have found more and more schools in the process of adopting Good Samaritan Policies (also known as Medical Amnesty Policies).  These policies protect students from getting in trouble when seeking help for a fellow student suffering an alcohol or drug overdose.  Think about it…wouldn’t you be more likely to make that call for a friend or stranger knowing that you won’t get in trouble?  I firmly believe that students should not be punished for doing the right thing – they should be encouraged to do the right thing.  Here are a few links that can help kick-start a policy at your school:

Students for Sensible Drug Policy website

List of schools with Good Samaritan Policies

Higher Education Center website

I just finished an amazing book, and I highly recommend it.  “Smashed: Story of a Drunken Girlhood” is a compelling and creatively told tale of destructive drinking.  This is Koren Zailckas’s first book, but man, can she weave a story together so brilliantly and true to form.  College feels like yesterday when I read her anecdotes.  Some even feel like my own, coming to life with more vivid detail than when I lived them myself.  Koren shows us how her own drunken, moronic choices consumed her so fully; how they made perfect sense at the time, no matter how dangerous or empty the results.  Hindsight is always 20/20, and we see how those “important” nights were really just a waste: of brain cells, genuine human interaction, and integrity.  Here are a few excerpts:

“Of course, Coors isn’t crank or coke or crack.  And Heineken isn’t heroin.  And vodka isn’t Valium.  And nothing that’s mixed with cranberry juice will score you respect with the folks who cop drugs in the public bathroom in Tompkins Square Park.  But don’t tell that to my brain because when I’m drunk, it purrs with the ecstasy of being thoroughly high…Amstel Light is my upper and my downer, it is my euphoric bump, my sweet nod into vagueness, the hallucinogenic that contorts my world into one that’s worth living in.  After two beers, there is no question as to whether I should have two more.  After four, my world is the first forty minutes of a movie so moving I can’t bear for it to end, or a cake so sweet I can’t help but cut another, and then another, sliver.  My reality is a climax so close I can’t bear to pull away.”   (page 158)

“Alcohol is a manipulative bitch.  If she was a person, I think she’d be a telemarketer or a used-car saleswoman, the type of woman who could persuade you to do just about anything.  I think this because when my mind is stewing in alcohol, it prompts me to do things that I’d normally oppose, like take my bra off under my coat in the corner convenience store because I’ve suddenly decided it pinches.  Drunk, I can seduce myself into any course of action.  I can always come up with motivation to draw that proverbial line in the sand back one more inconsequential inch.  That’s how I convince myself on the night of the date party that I want to lose my virginity to Chris.”   (page 188-189)

“When Robert Frost said, “College is a refuge from hasty judgement,” he was undoubtedly referring to the infinite hours of class time spent debating one top or another, but the quote can easily be used to describe the way college insulates students in regard to alcohol abuse.  Before and after college, drinking oneself into a state of blissful oblivion requires a degree of secrecy.  In high school, it needs to be hidden from parents.  In the working world, it must be downplayed to bosses, or concerned friends, or lovers.  But in college, we can wear our alcohol abuse as proudly as our university sweatshirts; the two concepts are virtually synonymous.”   (page 110-111)