I have a confession to make. When I was accepted to NIU and they gave me a student handbook to read, I did not look through much of it. Well, probably not any of it, really, although I doubt that would make me a minority. So, from things I’ve noticed on campus so far, I must have really missed out on a lot of interesting information. The most intriguing of these is where it actually declares authority over the law. I mean, we all know the law says the drinking age is 21, so in my irresponsible reading I must have just missed the section where it changes the drinking age to 18 if you’re a student.

Or maybe — gasp — they’re just breaking the law.

There’s no denying, whether you approve or not, that a vast number of underage students are drinking regularly on and off campus. Any student or police officer can tell you this without a doubt. During last year’s school term, the university’s Judicial Affairs dealt with 359 underage drinking cases, up from 262 in the 2004-05 year, according to Larry Bolles, the director of Judicial Affairs. So what are the university and those in authority doing about it?

Unfortunately, many have taken the stance that underage drinking is inevitable, and the best course of action to take is to try and make it safe for them. I strongly disagree with this, and though I certainly agree that students’ safety should be top priority, it should be safety through preventing drinking. This is not what I have seen on campus, however. If anything, I have seen those in leadership, who represent the university, facilitating underage drinking in several instances.

I am a member of the honors program on campus. As such, I was required to go to an honors retreat with the purpose of learning about the school and interacting with our peers. One of the components of this experience was to break down in small groups with an older group leader and discuss any questions we may have about school. I can not speak for other groups, but in mine, the majority of the time spent talking was focused on alcohol and the means by which to obtain, store and find good places to drink it. Everyone in the room was under legal age except for the leader. A recurring theme was that as long as one is not stupid about it, thus “responsible,” one can get away with it. There is no responsible underage drinking because it is against the law, and breaking the law is irresponsible! Tell me, university honors, how is this representing your program and university?

Many community advisors fail to keep students accountable as well. When you have a CA who is not willing to tell you that they won’t allow alcohol on the floor, you have a problem.

On the other side there is Judicial Affairs, which deals with discipline of students enrolled at NIU. Their policies are somewhat strict, focusing on discipline first, and also care for the student and community by forcing them to be involved with programs that evaluate the student’s well-being and educate them about alcohol.

So what exists is a consistent inconsistency — ­­a serious problem. You have the law, the university rules, those implementing the rules and those who do not implement the rules. There can be no hope of curbing underage drinking without an entirely dedicated university staff. Why is there such a lack of awareness to this fact? This is the most looming problem I see today facing universities across the entire nation. So what are you going to do about it, NIU? Well, if you pay attention the next couple weeks, I’ll have some suggestions.

Matt Weir is an opinion columnist for the Northern Star.