The Beginning of the Blog!
My Much Appreciated Readers,
Welcome to my blog! The topic of this blog is one that has generated alot of controversy in the past few months: alcohol. Ever since the Duke Lacrosse incident, there has been pressure from within and outside the University to reexamine the influence alcohol has here at Duke. In fact, the Campus Culture Initiative, a program headed by Dean of Trinity College here at Duke, Robert Thompson, is designed to do just that. This blog in particular will examine the academic effects of drinking on the University and their influence on University prestige.
Before I dive into the phenomenon known as Drinking at Duke, I'd like to pose a few questions for you all (my readers).
1) Do you yourself drink?
2) Does drinking have benefits? Does drinking have setbacks?
3) What is college drinking like?
4) What are college academics like?
5) What does a University value more, culture or curriculars?
Feel free to discuss these or leave comments of your own.
Thank you,
V.U.
posted by Vivek Upadhyay @ 7:28 AM
1 comments
1 Comments:
I drink, but only for social purposes. I oddly sound like one of my friends who claims he won't be an alcoholic even though he "drinks for social purposes" every night. Family gatherings are a huge drinking occasion, and I'll down a few for my mother, who doesn't react too well to alcohol. I have never been drunk, and once I finished off maybe three glasses of wine in a dinner to the point where I couldn't drive at all (in Gran Turismo, a video game) and I got spanked by my little cousins.
When I was in high school, a wild night out would be tennis until midnight and then video games until we couldn't open our eyes. Now in college my hallmates regularly come back belligerent and start throwing trash cans at walls. Or have sex on my door. This might be a result of alcohol, but I can't tell.
For me, academics come after sleep. The introductory courses have mostly been boring except one, and I often find myself sitting next to someone who passes out midway. At my school, academics are not taken very seriously by most of the peole I have met. I'm not even that serious, but at least it's second on my list. Academics seem to be third to social and sleep agendas.
Universities want culture; it should be what sets them apart the easiest. "A" wants to distinguish itself from "B," and while it could go around bragging that its students have the most knowledge about wafer doping, that could change when "C" adds more about the topic to its curriculum. What might be harder to emulate is the behavior of the students -- the culture -- under certain conditions. Brown shouldn't be trailing Harvard that much, but why do you want to go to Harvard instead of Brown?
"Because it's Harvard, man!"
The name, with all of the associations made with it, counts.
Post a Comment
<< Home