The University's Center for Alcohol and Substance Education received a $675,600 grant this week to educate fraternities and sororities about the negative effects of alcohol abuse.
The University is one of seven schools to be awarded the three-year grant from the National Institute of Health's National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.
CASE members drafted the grant proposal for the Rapid Response to College Drinking Problem grant competition last June. Presidents and co-chairs of the four Greek Councils also worked with CASE members to create the proposal.
"We talked with students as much as possible," CASE Director Susan Bruce said.
CASE plans to use the grant to form an advisory committee comprised of student representatives from each of the four Greek councils. Fraternities and sororities are the target of the grant because they are an easily accessible group of students, Bruce said.
"We are looking for a lot of student input," she added.
Some of the grant will be put towards funding an existing program that trains fraternity and sorority leaders to deliver scripted programs to their chapter members regarding students' behaviors and attitudes concerning alcohol abuse.
Inter-Sorority Council President Courtney Cherry said the social norms program will continue because it yielded positive results from the control group in the past.
"Some students lack exposure to information on responsible drinking habits," Cherry said. "People have a skewed sense of reality and norms. If nothing else, that reality check will be in the back of people's minds as they make decisions."
The grant will also fund a new initiative, in which fraternity and sorority members will complete an online questionnaire concerning their perceptions about their peers and alcohol abuse. Students will then receive immediate feedback about how their perceptions match the reality of their peers' drinking habits.
"These two methods have gotten a lot of national recognition, and we hope these programs have a positive effect," Bruce said.
Cherry said she believes the online program will generate results because it will be easy for students to get involved.
To encourage participation, Bruce said chapters that take part in the programs may receive financial compensation to be donated to their national philanthropy.
Donations to chapters' national philanthropies would offer a motivation to chapters, Cherry said.
"Many chapters strive for national recognition, and by participating in the programs, it definitely does present a good incentive," Cherry said.
Bruce said although the programs will require student leaders to devote time and effort to implementing initiatives, she believes they will be successful.
"Ideally, if [the programs] show good results, we will offer them to other types of groups," Bruce said.
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