The University of New Mexico

NEWS RELEASE

 


Media Contact: Laurie Mellas, 277-5915

Sept. 25, 2006

UNM Forms Consortium Aimed At Reducing High Risk Drinking Among Students

The University of New Mexico Campus Office of Substance Abuse Prevention (COSAP) recently received a grant from the New Mexico Department of Health to form a higher education prevention consortium aimed at reducing high-risk drinking among New Mexico college students.

“The consortium's goal is to expand prevention efforts so students throughout the state can fully benefit from their college experience without being derailed by alcohol-related consequences,” said COSAP Program Manager Jill Anne Yeagley.

Charter members are UNM, New Mexico State University, New Mexico Highlands University, San Juan College, Eastern New Mexico University and the Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute.

The consortium's first initiative is to assess each school's community using informant interviews, focus groups, social indicator/arrest data and a nationally-standardized alcohol and other drug (AOD) survey, the first multi-site AOD survey of New Mexico college students. Survey results and community assessment tools will allow each school to design a prevention approach.

“Bringing together AOD professionals from colleges across the state to explore and implement solutions to hazardous drinking is something we've wanted to do for years,” said John Steiner, survey coordinator. “Now we have funding to build the kind of prevention capacity at the smaller schools that previously existed only at UNM and NMSU.”

Increased prevention can lead to lower rates of drinking and driving and improve retention and graduation rates, Yeagley said. National statistics indicate 1,700 college students die each year from alcohol-related causes. Nearly 30 percent leave before graduating due to heavy alcohol/other drug use, she said.

“That's not the future we want for students here at UNM, or at any college in New Mexico,” Yeagley added.

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The University of New Mexico is the state's largest university, serving more than 32,000 students. UNM is home to the state's only schools of law, medicine, pharmacy and architecture and operates New Mexico's only academic health center. UNM is noted for comprehensive undergraduate programs and research that benefits the state and the nation.

www.unm.edu