Academy teaches lesson with birthday drinks

[thedrifter]

Academy teaches lesson with birthday drinks
By Brian Witte - The Associated Press
Posted : Tuesday Dec 11, 2007 7:50:31 EST

ANNAPOLIS, Md. — The Naval Academy is taking a new approach to educate students about the effects of alcohol: a 21st birthday dinner with enough booze to put a midshipman over the legal limit.

Capt. Margaret Klein, commandant of midshipmen, told the academy’s Board of Visitors on Monday that the new program appears to be having its desired effect: Midshipmen learn it doesn’t take many drinks before they reach a 0.08 blood-alcohol content, the legal standard for drunken driving in Maryland.

“The resounding feedback I’ve had is that most midshipmen had no idea how few drinks it takes to get them to that .08 limit,” Klein said.

Klein told the board that the idea originated over the past summer, when academy leadership discussed ways to emphasize the importance of responsible drinking. While thinking of ways to address problems with binge drinking, Klein said she recalled having to deal with a midshipman about a year ago who drank too much celebrating his 21st birthday.

Under the new academy program, Klein sends out letters to midshipmen in the month of their 21st birthdays. “In addition to asking them to consider their new responsibility, we also invite them to a dinner,” Klein said.

The meal is served near the academy’s dining area, King Hall, and alcohol is provided.

“In addition to serving alcohol, we offer Breathalyzers so the midshipmen — we try to get them above that 0.08 limit — if they so desire,” Klein told the board.

“If they don’t desire to drink anything we don’t make them drink anything,” Klein added.

After the meal and breath test, the academy brings in Defense Department police to recount their experiences with young people and alcohol.

“We’ve done this now for three months,” Klein said. “It’s been very successful.”

Klein described comments from midshipmen who participated in October birthday dinners as “hugely positive, hugely educational.”

“And we hope to see results over the coming year,” she said.

Midshipmen who are 21 are only supposed to have one drink each hour — and not more than three drinks in a night. They’re never supposed to be over the 0.08 blood-alcohol content.

The academy has been working to crack down on alcohol abuse. The school suffered some bad publicity after a group of midshipmen on a Caribbean cruise prompted an academy investigation after heavy drinking during a spring break trip earlier this year. Two recent high-profile sexual misconduct cases also involved heavy drinking.

Earlier this year, a senior midshipman who was the service academy’s drug and alcohol education student sent a memo to all of the academy’s students, saying midshipmen were still breaking rules against binge drinking, despite the academy’s efforts to crack down.

In 2002, Midshipman John Paul Ruggiero, 20, fell 53 feet from a dormitory window at the academy and died following a night of off-campus drinking. A Navy investigation determined Ruggiero had a blood-alcohol content of 0.11 percent when he died and ruled the death accidental.

Ellie

[thedrifter]

Academy returns focus to math, science majors
By Brian Witte - The Associated Press
Posted : Monday Dec 10, 2007 17:06:26 EST

ANNAPOLIS, Md. — The Navy wants more commissioned officers with technical degrees in science and engineering, and it has directed the Naval Academy to graduate a specific number of those majors for the first time in years, the academy’s superintendent said Monday.

The chief of naval personnel recently directed the academy and Naval ROTC to have 65 percent of graduates who are commissioned to complete technical academic majors in science, technology, engineering or math, Vice Adm. Jeffrey Fowler told the academy’s Board of Visitors.

Fowler said about 61 percent of the academy’s graduates who go on to the Navy earn those technical degrees, not counting the academy’s Marine Corps commissions. Fowler said the academy will likely need to hire more instructors for the technical fields, but he didn’t think the directive would be hard to reach.

“There will be a few resources required to get this, but this should be relatively easily achievable,” Fowler said.

The new policy will apply to the class of 2013.

Defined benchmarks for the number of technical majors in the Navy have varied over the years. In the early 1980s, the academy was required to have 80 percent of its students graduate with technical majors, said William Miller, the academy’s chief academic officer. Later that decade, the number was changed to 70 percent.

In the 1990s, Navy leadership got away from demanding a particular number of graduates with those technical degrees, Miller said. While midshipmen were encouraged to pursue technical majors, they were allowed to pursue their interests, which have been bending more toward political science in recent years.

“And the Navy is saying, ‘Yeah, that’s good ... but we don’t want to take it too far,”‘ Miller said.

The average number of midshipmen with technical majors over the last decade has been 59 percent, according to a graphic showing the number of technical majors by class that was released at the board meeting.

Fowler told the board that all of the academy’s graduates earn a bachelor of science degree, meaning that they take four semesters of math, including calculus, as well as physics and chemistry.

Miller said the new policy will require the academy to recruit students differently, putting more of a focus on finding would-be midshipmen who want to pursue the more challenging technical degrees.

“It starts with bringing in the right people, and it continues with offering the right selection of academic programs so that it interests the midshipmen and excites them,” Miller said.

That could mean putting more emphasis on a curriculum that would include launching satellites to promote student interest.

Miller said about 40 percent of the academy’s midshipmen graduate with engineering degrees. The service academy has always focused on engineering and science, Miller said, and the school also has educated people in national security affairs, history and economics.

“It’s really adjusting the balance,” Miller said.

The top majors in engineering at the academy include systems engineering, aerospace engineering and mechanical engineering. In the nontechnical areas, political science, which includes national security affairs and international relations, is one of the most popular majors, Miller said.

“The perception of needing technical majors hasn’t changed,” Miller said. “It’s only articulation and whether there’s a specific number on it.”

The Naval Academy commissions about a third of the Navy’s officers, Miller said, with about a third coming from Naval ROTC and another third coming from officer candidate school.

Ellie