The legal age for drinking alcohol in the United States is twenty-one. Underage drinking is a crime but also a common part of college social life.
These policies differ from school to school, as do enforcement efforts. But many schools have been moving to strengthen their rules.
The United States has more than seventeen million students in higher education. Each year, one thousand seven hundred of them aged eighteen to twenty-four die from alcohol-related road crashes and other injuries.
Six hundred thousand more are injured while under the influence of alcohol. And almost seven hundred thousand are attacked by another student who has been drinking.
One behavior that college officials are trying to prevent is binge drinking, having four or five drinks or more in a short period of time. Some researchers have found that students who think binge drinking（酗酒，大量饮酒） is normal often overestimate how much other students really drink. A person can die of alcohol poisoning.
At the University of Oklahoma, new policies went into effect after a nineteen-year-old student died in two thousand four. He had been drinking heavily at a fraternity party（大学里的男生联谊会）.
Now alcohol is banned from all fraternity and sorority（n.女学生联谊会）houses and university housing. Student organizations can serve alcohol at events but only on Friday and Saturday nights. And they must provide for transportation to and from off-campus parties. Other new requirements include an alcohol education program that first-year students take online.
Since January of two thousand five, six hundred thirty-three students have had a first strike. Thirty have had a second strike —— and one has been suspended. An official at Oklahoma tells us the aim is not just to punish but to change behavior and the culture at the university.
