Daily Skiff

After reading some of the numerous e-mails TCU blasts to the student body daily, I sometimes wonder if we are a university or an elementary school, because the tone suggests an audience of children.

In anticipation of Spring Break, Detective Vicki Lawson of the TCU Police Department sent a safety advisory with some important information regarding travel to Mexico and general safety tips, which were relevant and useful for the most part. The e-mail lost my attention and its credibility when I read, under the large red 'Alcohol' heading, "If you are not of legal age, DO NOT drink alcohol."

Wow, how insightful. If an administrator announced that at my high school, the room would burst out in laughter. TCU is a university - an institution of higher learning. Treating students like young children is both insulting and counterproductive. If you tell young, rebellious intellectuals not to do something, they're probably going to do it.

They may as well have sent an e-mail saying, "We know you've heard this a thousand times and wont pay attention to a word of this, but we need to absolve ourselves of liability by informing you once again."

Do administrators think students are going to sip on "mocktails" and play "cola-pong" by the pool because we've been awakened to the fact that there are consequences to consuming excessive amounts of alcohol?

I don't mean to negate the university's effort to promote student safety because I appreciate my school's being proactive in my personal safety. But that being said, instead of infantilizing and offending their constituency, the university should send information at a level of sophistication that matches the students reading it.

John Andrew Willis is a sophomore environmental science major from Dallas

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