Be sure to mark your calendars! Ed Boucher, dean of students, is set to appear on Tech’s local public television station between 7 and 8 p.m., Feb. 15. “Mediation Services of Putnam County has a grant that I supported,” Boucher said. “The grant was for the B.A.S.I.C.S. program.”
B.A.S.I.C.S., or Brief Alcohol Screening and Intervention of College Students, is a tool created to help students make better decisions about their alcohol consumption. The target age group is college youth between 18 and 24.
Tech viewers will be able to call in to the show “Focus On.” and express their concerns about the issue of underage drinking.
“I know for part of the grant the local educational television station indicated they would be able to help us by doing events like this,” Boucher said.
This event was coordinated with the Stop Underage Drinking Services Project. The project seeks to help underage college students who are more susceptible to campus peer pressure.
Boucher, along with other guests, will appear on the call-in show to give voice to a cause in which he personally prepared for.
“We had a two day training session where one of the experts came in,” Boucher said. “Members of the Counseling Center, Mediation Services and myself were there and we underwent the training.”
Boucher explained B.A.S.I.C.S. as a way to combat college alcohol abuse and the threat of binge drinking. Students undergo a less confrontational style of intervention that reaffirms the safety of sobriety versus the recklessness of heavy drinking.
The programs are focused on raising student awareness of the risk factors involved with alcohol abuse.
The grant for the project is pulled from the resources of the Tennessee Commission on Children and Youth.
