May Day, 1979.  Ashland University held its annual May Day celebration in the traditional Ashland style.  During the 1970s, Ashland, like most universities at the time, allowed its students to drink on campus. Beer trucks rolled in onto the quad, and May Day began.

The day ended with several students in the emergency room with alcohol poisoning. Beer had been thrown on hall directors, along with the assistant dean of students. In just a few months, current Vice President and Dean of Students Sue Heimann would arrive at Ashland as a hall director, assigned to Amstutz Hall.  

“I was warned not to come here because it was out of control,” she said. A few months after she arrived, bikers started a riot in fraternity circle. The Dean of Students resigned.  Students regularly mixed drugs and alcohol, resulting in many E.R. trips for students.

“I knew ER doctors by name,” said Heimann. “It was an extreme situation to say the least.”

Homecoming weekend, 2013.  With the exception of the senior apartments, Ashland University is a dry campus. Within at least one Clayton suite, however, things haven’t changed too much.

The fridge is full of cheap beer, the sort only consumed on college campuses. A lock chest full of plastic liquor bottles and generic mixers allow one amateur bartender to hone his craft. Drink of the day was gin and tonic.

“It tastes like Christmas trees!” said a male student. The student is not named due to his violation of campus and state law.

The alcohol flows in the middle common room of the suite. There is a buzz in the air, as much from the alcohol as from the situation. Nearly every part of the alcohol policy is being violated, yet there is a lack of concern in the room. Resident Assistants do their rounds through the buildings, but it is not a major concern in the suite.

“Usually if I can avoid (alcohol violations), I will,” Joe Griffith a senior RA, said. “Typically students are either smart about it and don’t get caught, or they get way too drunk.  It’s kind of hard to avoid that.”

Griffith has written students up for alcohol possession, as well as being loud and belligerent after returning from a night of drinking.

Enforcement is different for each RA. Victorialyn Keay, another senior RA, has rounds on Thursday nights. She understands it is a big drinking night, and there is often alcohol containers found in her area, both in hallways and outside of the building.

“It’s always good to be aware of the situation so that if it happens you aren’t surprised.  But being prepared for it and expecting it to potentially happen are different than looking for it,” she said.

Even with moderate enforcement, there have been a fair number of alcohol policy violations the past few years. 2009, 2010, and 2011 saw 116, 105, and 115 alcohol violations respectively.  However, with her first experiences at Ashland in mind, the number of violations isn’t Heimann’s top priority.

“It may mean someone had someone underage there (in the senior apartments) but it’s not people drunk.  For the most part students are being responsible,” she said.

The introduction of alcohol to the senior apartments has given some students the opportunity to drink on campus. Alcohol is restricted to beer and wine, and alcohol cannot be present if anyone in the apartment is under 21, among other restrictions.  This policy was introduced in 2008 by student senate, and the policy was enacted for the 2009-2010 academic year.

Even with the change, Ashland University has one of the strictest alcohol policies among the 26 benchmark institutions used by the Office of Institutional Research. Of the schools, 15 institutions had less restrictive alcohol policies, allowing students of legal age to drink in their rooms, with some restrictions. Eight institutions were completely dry campuses, but allowed students to move off campus after at least their junior year.  Gannon University had a similar alcohol policy to Ashland, but allowed students to move off campus as juniors. Only Olivet Nazarene University had a completely dry campus along with a stricter residence policy.

Some students over the legal age are comfortable with this policy.

“I love going to The Melt and having a pumpkin Dogfish Head beer but I am also okay with the university preventing me from having alcohol in my room especially when a lot of campus is underage,” said Griffith.

“I respect the rules because I know that I’m the oldest so I have to set an example,” said Sam Mariscal, a 26-year-old living in Andrews Hall.

One student, who requested to not be named, moved off-campus partly due to this policy. He is a 21-year-old junior whose family lives in commuter range, but he lives in his own house with housemates.

“It’s weird because, with the policy in the rooms on campus, you have to be 22 to live off campus.  That just puts 21-year-olds in a bind because it’s either live in a dorm where there is a no-alcohol policy or, as a junior being 21, pray you can get into the senior apartments somehow so that you’re allowed to have beer and wine or you’re just screwed,” he said.

With a backpack full of beer, the group of students left Clayton, heading to the off-campus house owned by the 21-year-old junior. In these late hours of the night, campus seems silent. All the activity is just down College Avenue. Another group of students is leaving a party, open beer cans in hand as they cross under the arch into campus.  

Even off-campus, Ashland University’s policy still has some reach.  Since residents of the houses are still Ashland students, the University still has jurisdiction to enforce applicable policies. They attempt to control parties in a variety of ways.

“We notify landlords, we call the police, we send students letters because when you have 100 students jam-packed in a house and nobody is monitoring any kind of consumption behavior, neighbors get very upset and we have to deal with that,” Heimann said.

The student hosting the party feels his house is safer than much of campus.

“It’s close to campus, if people were to get intoxicated and aren’t able to drive home they can literally just walk five minutes and they are back at their dorms and they don’t have to worry about (Safety Services) or the cops or anything, except for when they are walking,” he said.   

He is especially disappointed with Safety Services enforcement of policies he feels are more minor.

“They’re Safety Services, they’re not supposed to be parking ticket services or party buster services which I think as time has progressed they’ve changed toward that mentality a lot,” he said, “but their policy makes sense for a Christian school.”

The group of students from Clayton leaves the party sometime after 2 a.m.  Everyone makes it back safely to their rooms, capping off a successful homecoming night.  

For the majority of students at Ashland, the alcohol policy will always be irrelevant, due to state law.  However, there is some appreciation for the policy.

“I appreciate, actually appreciate, a university that tries to limit in certain ways the amount that someone can abuse alcohol,” said Griffith.

Of course, there will always be students ignoring both campus policy and state law.  For Heimann, she offers a simple challenge to those students.

“I think the bottom line is students need to be mature in their decision making; that to have a few beers if you’re under 21 and you choose to drink, my challenge is can you just have a couple of beers and not get drunk?” she said.

For these students, relaxation of the policy is not a great desire.

“I don’t think it matters,” an underage sophomore male student said, “It doesn’t really affect anything anyway.”