Between fall 2012 and fall 2013, the proportion of alcohol incidents involving first-year students decreased from 49 to 46 percent of all incidents, according to data released Monday by The Dartmouth College Health Improvement Program and the Greek Leadership Council. During that time period, the overall number of incidents of intoxicated undergraduate students handled by Safety and Security dropped approximately 16 percent, from 99 incidents in fall 2012 to 83 in fall 2013. This marks a decrease from prior years as well. In fall 2010 Safety and Security handled 123 incidents of intoxication, and in fall 2011 they dealt with 111.
Over the past four years, the number of undergraduate students receiving medical care for intoxication at Dick’s House or Dartmouth-Hitchcock Medical Center has steadily decreased. One hundred and twenty students were brought to either of the facilities for intoxication in fall 2010. In fall 2011, the number of students admitted was 107, and in fall 2012 it fell to 97. This number decreased to 82 in fall 2013, per DCHIP data.
The number of Good Samaritan calls made to Safety and Security has also dropped, from 48 in fall 2012 to 37 in fall 2013. In fall 2010 there were 56 calls, and in fall 2011 there were 46.
In fall 2013, the GLC launched the Greek First-Year Safety and Risk Reduction policy, a six-week ban on freshmen in Greek houses where alcohol is being served. The program will continue next year, GLC executive board chair Elliot Sanborn ’14 said.
Former College President Jim Yong Kim launched DCHIP in 2011 to tackle high-risk drinking at Dartmouth. He challenged DCHIP to eradicate high blood alcohol content levels at the College, and the program reports that the number of high-BAC incidents decreased from 36 in fall 2010 to 7 in fall 2013. High BAC is defined as over 0.25 percent, three times the legal limit in New Hampshire.
