Prereq for Pack frosh: Booze 101 online

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CORRECTION

A front-page story Friday misidentified the source of money for the AlcoholEdu program at N.C. State University. The Wake County Department of Alcohol Beverage Control paid roughly $80,000 for alcohol-related programs, including about $28,000 for AlcoholEdu.

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RALEIGH -- Chugging. Shots. Beer pong. Togas. Sound fun? How about herpes? Vomit. Hangovers. Expulsion.

Public health officials hope 5,000 incoming freshmen at N.C. State University will see the progression beginning this month when they take a three-hour alcohol course required for admission -- a first on campus.

Taught completely over the Internet, AlcoholEdu introduces students to the science of inebriation and shows how a social lubricant can lead to social problems -- and social diseases.

Part survey, part test, part lecture, AlcoholEdu is used on more than 500 campuses nationwide and required at roughly 100, including Duke University.

The jury may be out on whether it changes behavior, and some students laugh it off as a meaningless chore. But public health advocates say the course braces young students for the newfound freedom and drinking culture that awaits.

"We didn't create it with the goal for all kids to stop drinking," said Aaron White, a Duke psychiatry professor who helped create AlcoholEdu. "The goal was to create a course that made students aware of the risks, of the science."

At N.C. State, surveys show that students have up to four alcoholic drinks at a typical party, said Chris Austin, assistant director of health promotion and substance abuse prevention at NCSU.

Despite the idea that college means out-of-control drinking, and concerns about tail-gating at N.C. State sporting events, Austin and others stress that on average, consumption is reasonable.

Students volunteered to take AlcoholEdu for the past three years, but this year, the state Alcoholic Beverage Control Commission offered to put up the $80,000 cost if the program went mandatory.

"It's just the realization that on every college campus, their major issue is alcohol," Austin said.

Do shots? Black out?

The course is no high school health class with blood-on-the-highway overtones. White said lessons that frighten or preach to students tend to fail.

AlcoholEdu requires an ID number, then the course starts with a survey.

How much do you drink? Do you chug? Do shots? Play drinking games? Black out? Forget things? How do you buy alcohol underage? What's the most you drank in the past two weeks?

It covers social problems one at a time: Binge drinking, date rape, academic failure. Then it calls up a student's survey results and displays on a graph his or her worst night of drunkenness. A 235-pound man going through a dozen beers in a night finds himself well beyond the legal blood-alcohol content -- even twice as much.

Duke sophomore Tommy Gamba said he understands the point of AlcoholEdu, but making it a requirement for enrollment seems excessive and perhaps grandstanding. "To a degree," he said, "It was like, 'Look what we're doing.' "

Gamba came away from the test thinking it well-intentioned but idealistic. "Realistically," he said, "the ability to prevent college students from drinking is practically impossible. The program is good in that it emphasizes the negative sides and safe ways to go about it."

Results from N.C. State's voluntary AlcoholEdu program in 2006 show that students who think about their blood-alcohol content while drinking jumped from 38 percent to 64 percent.

Still, Austin said, NCSU's results have more to do with attitude than behavior, which takes more time to change.

"Whether it's changing actual behavior is still being researched," said Jeff Kulley, coordinator for alcohol and substance abuse services at Duke.

N.C. State students can't start taking the test until July 18, and they take a follow-up portion once they've spent time on campus.

On campus Thursday, rising freshman Liz Stollbrink chalked it up as an item on her to-do list.

"I don't drink as it is," she said.

The course includes tidbits that would surprise even a hardened drinker .

A "blackout" doesn't necessarily mean losing consciousness. Rather, after five to 10 drinks, the body can press on without an agile mind and even drive a car. In a "brownout," a drinker needs reminding of how he spent the previous evening.

AlcoholEdu offers scenarios, too, as in the case of fictional "Jason," who travels to the beach for his first spring break and returns with dim memories and a rash that proved to be genital herpes.

Another: One group of students drinks alcohol and another group drinks placebos. Both groups say they feel happier and more attractive. The moral: It's all in your head, not the booze.

(Staff writer Michael Moore contributed to this report.)