After reading and hearing for the last ten months about plans to keep Veishea dry, I have finally come to the conclusion that nothing is really going to happen. This doesn’t mean that there are not individuals who desire a dry Veishea; it means that simply saying that “Veishea is going to be dry this year” is not going to cut the mustard.

As far as I can ascertain (feel free to correct me on this point), no one has a definitive “plan” on how to bring this initiative to life. The end result of this is a Veishea that is most certainly not dry. As anyone who was on or near campus last year can clearly remember, Veishea 1997 was most definitely not dry, and no major changes have occurred other than city and university members and groups advocating a dry Veishea.

In my eyes, there is about 20 percent of the student population who will not drink regardless of what others are doing around them. There are also about 20 percent of the student population who will drink regardless. The university and the city of Ames, in order to make Veishea as dry as possible, need to target the 60 percent of the students that fall in between these two categories.

Veishea has a tradition of being an alcohol-filled celebration, and in order to break this tradition, there needs to be a major initiative on the part of not just the university, but the city of Ames as a whole. Several ideas come to mind, but I will outline one main course of action that could greatly reduce the amount of alcohol consumption in Ames on Veishea weekend.

The first idea is that Iowa State needs a “Rock Veishea” promotion encouraging people not to drink This could be done by hiring a few of the top rock groups to play at Hilton Coliseum on the Friday night of Veishea weekend. Select a few groups that the students would really want to see, like Pearl Jam, Oasis, Smashing Pumpkins, Eric Clapton, or Squirrel Nut Zippers. (OK, maybe not the last one; that’s just me.) Then, throughout the year, put up posters of these groups reminding students of the upcoming concert.

How will this help the drinking situation? ISU should buy the entire coliseum’s tickets and give them away free to students who pass a breathalyzer test and a pat-down at the gate. I firmly believe that seeing such an incredible rock concert would be more than enough for much of the 60 percent target group to avoid drinking for at least one night of Veishea.

Saturday night, in much the same fashion, there could be a free ticket basketball game between Iowa State and Kansas. Load the place with students (everyone knows that with a house full of students, the place would be rockin’) and have a ton of awesome giveaways at halftime, like a trip to the NBA Finals, 100 CDs, a home entertainment center, a trip for two to Paris over the summer, or get the residence halls involved and give away a triple-as-single for the years you remain on campus.

Things like this would definitely encourage students not to drink Veishea weekend. If the university wishes for its target group to remain dry, then the university needs to take a major initiative in the right direction. Perhaps my ideas are not perfect, but they are a start.

Trent Seigfried

Sophomore

Biology