By AMY FEZZA

Ramapo plans to implement  training sessions this upcoming fall for both “wet-housing” residents where alcohol is allowed, as well as for incoming freshman to reinforce responsible drinking  on campus.

Training for Intervention Procedures, also known as TIPS training will be enforced to all students looking to apply for housing in wet-areas of Laurel Hall and the Village. Newly incoming freshman will also be required to take an alcohol.edu course online over the summer break before beginning classes at Ramapo.

“TIPS prepares students with the skills and confidence that handle those situations and will then be able to intervene effectively to prevent peers from harming themselves or others,” Vice President of Student Affairs Miki Cammarata said. “It develops student’s people skills and provides specific information in detecting when a friend or classmate has had too much to drink.”

For the juniors and seniors who reside in Laurel Hall and the Village, they are now expected to fulfill another mandatory requirement. Laurel Hall, which is a 432-bed suite-style residence and houses 1,728 residents and the Village has 22 three-story buildings and 520 students, both consist of wet-housing status. Other requirements consist of certain number of credits, personal record, class status, and age.

Judy Greene of Health Services and Miki Cammarata of Student Affairs have been in communication for a way to help alleviate drinking problems on campus and to better a student’s welfare overall. Dating back to the open forum hosted by the Student Government on campus in regards to the various drinking incidents last semester, Greene took into consideration what students had to say.

“Back in September, issues with Four Loko and feedback from the forum allowed me to see that students really didn’t know how to identify someone who had been drinkning too much and may be medically compromised,” Greene said.

Like Greene, Cammarate hopes that this program will teach students not to assume when in alcoholic situations.

“Hopefully people will learn about alcohol and how to serve it,” Cammarata said. “We shouldn’t assume that every senior knows what to do.”

TIPS training will require Ramapo students to register for the training session during the add/drop period in the near future. The training aims to prepare students on the precautions of drinking. More than 50 faculty members and other certified students will teach the class.

“We’re looking to have this as a class about prevention and education and not doing a triage and hospitalization,” Cammarata said.

The course will include three sections of development skills: curriculum, skills training, and a practice session. If students fail to register or complete this program, they will then be unable to participate in the wet-housing selection.

“I hope students don’t find this to be another hurdle to drinking and I’m sure there will be some that will,” Cammarata said.

However, some students approaching their senior year feel as though they shouldn’t have to do anymore than they have over the course of three years.

“As seniors, being here for three years, we shouldn’t have to go through another requirement in the housing selection,” junior Colleen Steel said. “We have to make certain deadlines, live in other dorms, fill out surveys, it’s one thing after the other.”

Like current members at Ramapo moving up in the housing selection, incoming freshman will be required to go through an online program known as, alcohol.edu in order to give the college a sense of the majority class’s drinking patterns are.

“A lot of other schools do this,” Associate Vice President of Student Affairs Pat Chang said.

Ramapo on average admits around 900 freshmen each academic year.

Samantha Ullrich, a junior at Ramapo bartends part-time, but doesn’t know if this training will be as effective as the officials think it will be.

“As a bartender it’s my job to know when people are too intoxicated and when to serve them,” junior Samantha Ullrich. “As an upcoming senior living in the Village, I feel like it is important that hosts knows when it’s too much. However, I don’t think a host of a party is going to stop and see that each and everyone of their guests is okay and babysit them.”

Overall, faculty and students are looking beyond a typical college curriculum and putting students’ health first in efforts to reduce negative outcomes from alcohol on campus.