The Iowa State Daily has been serving its community since August 1890. And most of those years, the organization was doing journalism the traditional way — telling stories through words and then with photos and videos.

However, times have changed, and The Daily’s way of doing journalism has too. Now, instead of keeping the community at arm’s length in an effort to remain objective, The Daily is flipping that conventional wisdom on its head.

The Daily is going beyond words and photos and engaging the community in productive conversations on important issues. The first example of this is this week’s responsible drinking social media campaign in conjunction with Collegiate Alcohol Awareness Week.  

The Daily, along with partner organizations, will be encouraging students to interact with us on social media and tell us why they drink responsibly. The Daily, along with Student Government and ISU PD, will also be sharing safe drinking tips with #IDTT or “I’ll Drink to That.”

The hashtag is meant to be a casual way to connect with students all the while sharing tips and showing approval for making smart drinking choices. 

Engaging and educating students about responsible drinking is more important now than ever. Overwhelmingly, the choice among college students is to drink. According to the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), 4 in 5 students do make the choice to drink.

Often, the idea of drinking responsibly is an idea that many students have trouble accepting because it can be misinterpreted as being told to stop drinking.

Frankly, asking college students to refrain from drinking is an unrealistic expectation. This is why The Daily is taking this particular approach during National Collegiate Alcohol Awareness Week.

The NIAAA also reports that 1,825 college students between the ages of 18 and 24 will die each year as a result of an alcohol-related incidents. This number is far too high.

In order to celebrate Collegiate Alcohol Awareness Week as well as educate and interact with students, The Daily and partner organizations will top off the week with a Root Beer kegger from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Friday by the library or in the Memorial Union, where students can get free root beer, learn about safe drinking and tell us why they drink responsibly.  

College should be a fun and well-rounded experience, and The Daily understands students must make their own choice about whether to drink. But The Daily, along with its partners, want to be here to engage and educate students on important issues like safe drinking.