This piece is entirely satirical as a part our April Fool’s edition, the Trinibonian.
Operation Blackout debuted last Friday to rave reviews, providing promising feedback for the initiative backed by Health Services and Dining Services. With students being provided alcoholic beverages during orientation programming, it shows the first return to programs of the sort since the Optimal Buzz initiative in the 2010s.
Through this initiative, Trinity’s Health and Dining Services seeks to inform students about alcohol consumption, with a specific focus on gaining practical experience. Operation Blackout provides students with a safe drinking environment where they can find their blackout point, generally considered to be when an individual begins to have gaps in their memory. Elizabeth Holmes, director of Health Services, spearheaded the endeavor and dictated many details surrounding the program.
“Despite starting at Blood Alcohol Contents (BACs) of 0.16 on average, each person is different when it comes to their blackout point and what they might experience,” Holmes said. “It would be foolish for us to act like we don’t know students are drinking in their recreational time, so instead we are looking to make those periods as safe as possible.”
While the program is set to go into effect during orientation weekend, the pilot iteration took place in the Tiger’s Den. Twenty students at a time were provided with drink tickets, allowing them to trade them for three different drinks before having to purchase the rest with meal swipes and Bonus Bucks. Drinks were initially planned to feature a wide variety of foreign and domestic alcoholic beverages, but due to budget constraints, only three beverages were available: Busch Beer, Alamo Orchards (a local hard cider brand), and Everclear.
Over 100 different students were able to experience the learning event, provided that they completed a Google Form before the event, after the event, and the morning after the event detailing how they felt. Following these, some students were randomly selected and required to write a one to two page reflection in MLA format. Chad Johnson, freshman business major, attended the event and reminisced on memories of what others had told him about his experience.
“Yeah coming from Florida, I was thinking people could not turn up here, but Trinity showed me how to go crazy and be safe,” Johnson said. “The event itself was really well done and I liked that we could pay with Bonus Bucks for turns at a keg stand with Health Services helping hold us up.”
