SA's drinking task force faced with great burden

2/10/11 6:00pm

While it is important for the campus to assemble itself in a centralized structure to deal with the recent onset of alcohol abuse at Rice, we at the Thresher believe that the SA has a lot of work ahead to tailor its response to the problem in an optimal manner (see story, page 1). The minuscule scale of this task force is a matter of concern; the committee is slated to have five slots. Of these five spots, it's possible that one or two will go to prominent SA members or at least to the senators involved with the alcohol issue up to this point. The remaining spots could filled by college leaders such as chief justices and college presidents, leaving very few spots for at-large students who wish to contribute to this task force. We at the Thresher feel that it is important to have both chief justices and at-large students who may be social leaders at their college on the task force, and we urge the SA to consider all of these groups when choosing candidates.

This task force hinges on getting input from the colleges; however, if there is not a member on the committee from a given college who can report at the college government meeting, that college could be cut out of the discussion. A truly inclusive attempt would have opened up the task force to allow for representation from each and every college on campus; an 11-person committee would allow college leaders, SA members and at-large students to be represented on the committee. However, since that is not the case, SA's current plan instead could establish more barriers than it will break. Its final resolutions and solutions could be much less representative than is necessary if task force members do not make an effort to seek out opinions from all the different groups of students on campus that will be affected by any potential changes to the alcohol policy. Therefore, we urge the five task force members to make every college's voice heard.

Furthermore, the SA has elected to dissolve the task force in under a month. Considering the magnitude of the problem and all the input that needs to be accumulated to solve this problem, a timeline of a month is short. We encourage the SA to consider renewing the task force if, at the end of the month, they have made progress but work still remains - as does indeed seem likely given the magnitude of the issue.

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We hope the SA considers its past difficulties in being relevant to the student body as it forms the task force, so that it can be as effective as possible in affecting real change according to the needs and desires of the whole student body.

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