This academic year, UW changed policies and allowed hall residents to store and consume alcohol in the dorms.
The Residence Life & Dining Services office changed the policies and regulations for the 2017-2018 academic year and allowed residents who are of legal age to consume alcohol in their own rooms. These changes put more responsibilities on resident assistances to make sure that no underaged students are drinking alcoholic beverages alongside those who are of legal age.
“There are a lot of kids in the halls, who are not over-age. Making all the dorms opened to the alcohol could promote underage drinking. I feel, like it became less easy to regulate alcohol consumption and possession,” recent resident of Orr Hall, Piram Duran, said.
Alcohol consumption in the halls is regulated by Student Code of Conduct (see Dean of Students Office website, Student Code of Conduct), Policies and Regulations of Residence Life & Dining (see Residence Life & Dining Services website, Residence Halls, Publications and Documents, Apartment & Residence Halls Policies 2017-2018 and Policies & Procedures for 2016 – 2017 Academic Year) and University of Wyoming Alcohol and Other Drugs Policy.
Alcohol DO’s (if you are 21+ years old):
- Store alcoholic beverages only in your room
- Consume alcohol only in your room with the door shut
- Make sure there are no underaged people in the room when consumig alcohol
Alcohol DONT’s:
- Don’t store or consume alcohol if you are younger than 21 years old
- Don’t store or consume alcohol if your roommate is underaged
- Don’t consume alcohol in any common areas (fishbowls, lobbies, stairwells, hallways, etc.)
- Don’t play any alcoholic games, such as kegs, beer bongs and pong (with or without alcohol)
- Don’t possess or use alcohol containers (full, partially full or empty) as decorations if you are underaged
If the residents of the halls or their guests fail to follow policies, the incident will be reported by the resident assistants, including names and addresses of all involved parties. After the report is processed by the Conduct Officer, there are different sanctions and outcomes that could be applied:
- Discipline warning
- Housing probation
- Conduct probation
- Recommendation of suspension from the university
- Recommendation of dismissal from the university
- Participation in aware program
All the rules and regulations had to be explained to the hall residents during the floor meetings with RAs at the beginning of the semester.
“We went over rules briefly with the main idea of not being drunk in the hallways. It wasn’t a dedicated session on alcohol consumption. We were said something like ‘don’t bring drinks to your dorm,’ and that’s all,” an underage resident of Downey Hall, Nico Hoven, said.
“On the second week over here, we had a floor meeting where our RAs told about that,” Duran said. “I think they were mostly talking about common law enforcement. There wasn’t said much about anything else.”
With new regulations, resident assistants must keep their eye on all the residents, and know who is underaged, of age, or will turn 21 soon, to avoid cases of underage students being peer-pressured into consuming alcohol.
“When we first came here, and had floor meeting, RAs asked about our ages. And, I think, they mentioned that they have list of the people in the dorms who are over 21,” a student who lives in Downey Hall, Matthew Roche, said.
“They stressed that if someone is under 21, and has a roommate over 21, they shouldn’t have alcohol in their rooms,” Duran said.
Although the federal law and policies of the university prohibit underaged students to buy and consume alcohol, the cases of violation of these rules happens sometimes.
“I cannot say I’ve seen a lot of drunk people. But from time to time I can see a group of people walking in the hall or sitting in the fishbowl being drunk,” a resident of Orr Hall, Anna Klimova, said. “And I know for sure that people in the group I’ve seen once were under 21, I know these people.”
Oksana Kozlova, recent Orr Hall resident, said “I have seen drunk people in my dorm once. I think it was birthday. And those people were freshmen. Firstly, I’ve seen them in the street, and then later, I met them in the fishbowl at my floor. I’m not sure whether RAs caught that group. I haven’t seen any of them at that moment.”
The residents of the dorms need to be able to study and sleep, and sometimes drunk residents can be too loud and bothersome toward other students.
“Sometimes drunk residents start to scream, and doing something really loudly. It happens aroung midnight, or 1 a.m.,” said Klimova. “At that time, I’m trying to sleep, but all those people are so fu—ing loud, that I have no chance to get any rest.”
“There is one drunk guy one time, who was in the bathroom singing loudly for the most of the night,” said Duran. “He wasn’t using restroom, or taking shower. And he was just in the bathroom singing. And no RAs took any measures to stop it.”
