JEANNA DUERSCHERL The Roanoke Times

Tinker House is a substance-free dorm at Hollins University.

JEANNA DUERSCHERL The Roanoke Times

Hollins University graduate student Danielle Spratley (right) arm-wrestles Madeline Eschenburg as her roommate and fellow Hollins graduate student Evelyn Haselden (back left) and friend Kelly Wisecarver watch during a party at their apartment in Old Southwest.

Erin Lavender-Scott, a rising senior at Hollins University, spent her sophomore and junior year living in Tinker House, the wellness hall offered at Hollins.

About the series

This is the third installment in an occasional series about the effects of underage drinking on Virginia college campuses. Part One in the series focused on higher education leaders and how they view the Amethyst Initiative. Part two was a Q&A with former university president John McCardell, who is behind the initiative.

Your take

Message board

• The drinking age: What do you think?

Part One

• The drinking age: A debate for the ages
• Rethinking 21: Western Virginia college presidents on the Amethyst Initiative

• From the Newsroom blog:"Under 21" explores the Amethyst Initiative and campus drinking
• Dan Casey column: Age-old debate on drinking continues

Part Two

• John McCardell, founder of the Amethyst Initiative, is at the center of the drinking-age storm
• Video: Hear John McCardell explain his position
• Visit the Amethyst Initiative website

College life for Erin Lavender-Stott is more about academics than alcohol.

For one, she is only 20 and can't legally drink.

But more importantly, Lavender-Stott describes herself as studious and serious about college and her career, and doesn't want underage alcohol use to put them in jeopardy.

After getting a bachelor's degree in psychology, she plans to attend a university in another state to earn a doctorate degree.

"I came to school because I want to continue with my education," said the rising senior at Hollins University.

Plus, Lavender-Stott is the type of person who prefers watching movies instead of hanging out at a bar.

For two years, she has chosen to live in and serve as the resident assistant in a wellness hall -- where students commit to living alcohol-, tobacco- and drug-free in one of the Hollins dormitories.

The environment was more suited to her needs, including the longer quiet time for studying and resting. The latter was especially helpful for the swim team member who had to be up at 5:30 a.m. for practices.

The idea behind wellness-focused housing, which colleges across the country have been using for nearly two decades, is to give students the chance to live in an environment that promotes healthy and substance-free lifestyles. It also provides space where students can avoid having their study time interrupted by partying or their property damaged by rowdiness.

As college officials in Virginia and across the country deal with the challenges of underage and excessive drinking among students, substance-free or wellness housing is another tool they can use to help students make safer choices about alcohol.

Students of legal age at Hollins -- a private college north of Roanoke with 783 undergraduate women and 266 coed graduate students, and no sororities or fraternities -- are allowed to have alcohol on Hollins' campus and in their dorm rooms, with some stipulations.

The same goes for students at Virginia Tech, Roanoke College, Washington and Lee, the University of Virginia and others.

But some students choose not to drink, and Hollins officials say they feel it's important to give them the option to live in an environment that is alcohol-free.

"It's part of our effort to make our campus attractive and comfortable if a student wants to live substance-free and with others who are committed to a healthy lifestyle," Hollins University President Nancy Gray said.

"We want a student who does not want to drink at all to be as comfortable on this campus as a 21-year-old who chooses to drink."

Lavender-Stott has since moved out of the wellness hall and will relocate to an apartment. She is president of the Student Government Association and said it would be tough to juggle those duties with those of a resident assistant.

She said that she will miss the wellness hall, though, and the interaction with students who know what they want to achieve at Hollins.

Another change for the student from Blacksburg is that she turns 21 in September and plans to drink alcohol, in moderation.

A focus on wellness

Hollins has three wellness halls for students who have signed agreements saying they won't smoke, drink alcohol or use illegal substances, said Nickie Smith, director of housing and residence life.

The wellness halls are located in two dorms and are wings of rooms for students. The halls are a component of the specialty housing that Hollins offers. There also are halls for students interested in fine arts, outdoor activities and international culture.

Two wellness halls are offered for first-year students, while the third is for upperclassmen. The program started in 2007 with 47 students living in the wellness halls. Now, 62 students are signed up.

Students in those halls focus on more than staying substance-free. Programs also spotlight exercise, nutrition and healthy relationships, Smith said.

Smith said that many colleges offer wellness hall-type programs and she sees it as an effort to respond to the different needs of students, such as those who prefer quieter environments so they can focus.

Hollins officials have not had any reports of students violating the agreements in the wellness halls and they've "never had to ask anyone to leave the hall," Smith said.

Patty O'Toole, dean of students at Hollins, said she believes the wellness halls also can be attractive to "individuals who may be in recovery, as well as for those individuals whose religious beliefs is one that promotes abstinence of alcohol."

Hollins is not the only college in the region that offers a substance-free housing arrangement.

Virginia Tech has the Wellness Environment for Living and Learning (WELL). The area takes up a couple of floors at West Ambler Johnston Hall, and there is space for 120 students -- a fraction of the 9,000 or so beds on campus.

Students sign a contract at the beginning of the year that says they will not possess alcohol, tobacco or any illegal drugs in WELL or be intoxicated while in it -- or have guests over who are intoxicated or in possession of alcohol, tobacco or drugs.

WELL started in 1996, said Kristine Dahm, Tech's assistant director of theme housing.

Last year, 82 students in the WELL responded to a survey, and 77 percent indicated the substance-free environment as their primary reason for applying to live there.

Dahm said the students self-police, and serious violations are so rare that the community standards board formed to enforce the rules no longer exists. Resident advisers take care of minor infractions.

Radford University started a wellness theme hall in 2005, and there is a focus on wellness-oriented programming, such as about nutrition and exercise. Students get placed in the wellness hall by expressed interest and request. About 100 of the university's 3,100 on-campus students live in the wellness hall.

Study: Halls 'protect'

At least one national study suggests that substance-free and wellness housing is working.

A 2002 report in the Journal of American College Health found that students in substance-free housing were less likely to experience alcohol-related problems -- ranging from missing sleep and being forced to care for a drunken friend or roommate to being assaulted physically or sexually.

"Because substance-free housing helps protect students from experiencing secondhand effects, placing more students in such settings might have helped keep the overall rate from rising at a time when frequent binge drinking was increasing nationally," according to "Trends in College Binge Drinking During a Period of Increased Prevention Efforts."

"Substance-free residence halls represent one promising strategy for reducing problems with alcohol ... and might protect those who did not binge drink in high school from binge drinking in college."

The report was based on the Harvard School of Public Health's four surveys of more than 10,000 students from 1993 to 2001.

And although college binge-drinking rates did not change significantly between 1993 and 2001, according to the Harvard surveys, there was one subgroup that showed an alarming trend toward binge drinking: women's colleges.

"In 1993, students attending all-women's colleges had much lower rates of binge drinking, and attendance at these schools seemed to protect women from a heavy-drinking lifestyle," the report reads.

"Since that time, students at these schools have reported significant increases in frequent binge drinking, and they are now narrowing the gap in drinking behavior between all-women's colleges and coeducational schools."

O'Toole is aware of the Harvard surveys. And she pointed to a study published last month by Washington University in St. Louis that showed that raising the drinking age to 21 two decades ago has decreased the rates of excessive drinking by many, but not for college students.

The study, based on national databases involving more than 500,000 individuals, found that binge drinking by male college students was unchanged, while binge drinking by female college students increased after the drinking age went up.

With binge drinking by female students increasing across institutions, O'Toole said that would also affect women's colleges.

Gray is one of 135 university leaders in the nation who signed the Amethyst Initiative, an effort launched in July 2008 that calls into question the wisdom of the legal drinking age of 21 and asks for renewed public debate about it.

"My motivation in signing this was not specific to Hollins, but from having worked on a number of college campuses," said Gray, who came to Hollins in January 2005. "I'm very much aware that having a drinking age of 21 does not stop underage drinking.

"The Amethyst Initiative is about having a serious study so that we can define public policy that is in the best interest of our college students and other young adults. I think we need to be setting the legal drinking age based on what we think is going to encourage the most responsible behavior among young adults."

Gray said while the school's addition of wellness halls and approach to some alcohol education programs have changed since she arrived, the school's policy regarding alcohol has "always been to enforce the law and to do all we can to encourage the development of healthy lifestyles and responsible decision making."

Learning limits

In addition to allowing drinking in dorms for those of legal age, alcohol is allowed at certain events sponsored by student organizations at Hollins.

Recent Hollins graduate Lia Kelinsky said she appreciates that the university respects that legal right.

The 22-year-old recalled drinking at events, such as the fall formal and spring cotillion, and said she believes her experiences at Hollins, along with living in Europe, helped her realize the importance of drinking responsibly in social settings.

"Hollins is not just an academic education. It encourages women to explore all aspects of life and grow in the social aspects," she said.

O'Toole said the university's policy is an example of respecting the law and that the goal at Hollins is that if students who are of age do drink at an event or in their rooms that they learn how to do so responsibly.

"If you want to consume alcohol your whole life, then it's important to recognize that abuse of alcohol has or can cause negative consequences," O'Toole said. "Alcohol is not bad. It's how you choose to use it."

Kelinsky, who graduated in May, said in her own life, drinking alcohol "doesn't have much of an allure for me."

Still, she believes that having the opportunity to drink alcohol while of age at Hollins helps students better understand their limits.

That kind of education is beneficial not only in college, but also when students graduate and find themselves in different social situations, such as a business dinner with a boss, she said.

"I think it's important to have experience with it," said Kelinsky, a Kilmarnock native. "It can be a very dangerous substance if you don't know how to control it and yourself."

At Hollins, alcohol is permitted at events sponsored by student organizations, and any alcohol purchased can only be bought with money raised by the student groups. Food must be served, and nonalcoholic beverages must be available and readily accessible at the events, O'Toole said.

The events also must follow the state's alcoholic beverage regulations, and students are asked for their ID. Security must be present at an event where alcohol is served, according to the Hollins alcohol-use policy.

O'Toole also points out that most events on campus -- such as bingo, karaoke nights or gatherings with other colleges -- are alcohol-free.

Along with the experiences with alcohol comes the education of how to handle it wisely.

O'Toole said she interprets the Amethyst Initiative as further study into the cause of binge drinking and what can be done to reduce it no matter the age.

"The research might tell us if there is an appropriate [drinking] age out there," she said. "Who knows if that age is 18, 25 or older?"

Lavender-Stott and Kelinsky said they are aware of the initiative and talks of whether the drinking age should change.

Lavender-Stott said she thinks it's fine to study the issue, but isn't sure whether the drinking age should be lowered.

"I'm not convinced that it would fix anything," she said about binge drinking. "Our brains don't really finish developing until we're in our mid-20s, so why mess with the chemistry?"

George Dowdall, author of "College Drinking: Reframing a Social Problem," said he doesn't support the Amethyst Initiative but believes it has put another spotlight on binge drinking.

But he also said it might be a matter of convenience for college administrators.

"The Amethyst Initiative might appeal to some college presidents because it reframes the problem as a problem of public policy," said Dowdall, a professor of sociology at Saint Joseph's University in Philadelphia. "It sort of neatly gets the problem off the desks of the college presidents and sticks it on the desks of a legislator or congressman."

Still, he agrees that excessive drinking in college is a problem that needs to be addressed, and said he supports better enforcement of the existing drinking age.

"This is probably one of the most significant, maybe it is the most significant, health problem that college students have, so we should take it seriously and not try to walk away from it or shift responsibilities of it onto other kinds of issues," Dowdall said.

Staff writer Greg Esposito and www.insidehighered.com contributed to this report.