All-Star Social Media & Underage Drinking/ Drug Use

[StephlCurry]

I must have been the most sheltered person ever in school and been blessed with an angel child. I would never have even considered doing half of this stuff. My daughter is 18 and she has had a drink with me at home for New Year's Eve but would never consider drinking at all around a competition. She is the one that had to sleep in my hotel room for Summit last year because the other girls were staying up too late and she wanted to be well rested for the competition. Hahahaha!

Either I traumatized her enough growing up and I got really really lucky!

 

[Official OWECheer]

At 25 (in two weeks) I'm forever grateful I wasn't one of those "cool" kids and had parents who would have murdered her for that behavior. Comparing one group of popular kids to my circle of best friend, they are roughly 0/5 in completing college and I believe 4/5 for having kids where my group is 5/5 on our degrees, 1 on her way to her doctorate.

Weird that several of the people in my grade who were popular drank in high school (and had no problem blasting it in social media) and are interning at prestigious companies RN and going to good schools, one has a startup company... then again a lot of their families are well-off (read: upper middle class/wealthy, as in country clubs and exotic vacations wealthy) so I'm not sure how much that has to do with it.

 

[Helen uk uni cheer]

In the UK the drinking and smoking age is 18. I have seen people get drunk the night before morning practice. I have seen some friends lives get screwed up by mental illness caused by drug use. I am against them and will be even more once I start child nursing course in September.
I think coaches should be more proactive on alcohol issues even if it means having a breathalyzer in the the gym or having parents and/or athletes signing an agreement.
Drug testing I think should be done at worlds and continued at ICU events.

 

[purplecheer]

im so glad i graduated when i did. I also remember senior project and how our senior class was the last class that had very relaxed rules on what was and wasnt allowed. i volunteered at an animal shelter for a year and "tried" to raise money, but no one would give me any, lol. I was taking 3 AP classes and an honors class my senior year, i wasnt about dedicating all my down time on another school project that year at that point. ha.
now a days they dont accept volunteering as a senior project anymore, you have to physical do some form of grand project in order to graduate.
ive decided that senior project is the devil, there was a teacher that teached english at my high school that brought the idea of senior project back in 2004 from another state she teached in, and so the school started implementing one, now a days i think a lot of schools in florida require seniors to do one as well.

What do people generally do for their senior project? I've never heard about it in Australia.

 

[katiecheer]

im so glad i graduated when i did. I also remember senior project and how our senior class was the last class that had very relaxed rules on what was and wasnt allowed. i volunteered at an animal shelter for a year and "tried" to raise money, but no one would give me any, lol. I was taking 3 AP classes and an honors class my senior year, i wasnt about dedicating all my down time on another school project that year at that point. ha.
now a days they dont accept volunteering as a senior project anymore, you have to physical do some form of grand project in order to graduate.
ive decided that senior project is the devil, there was a teacher that teached english at my high school that brought the idea of senior project back in 2004 from another state she teached in, and so the school started implementing one, now a days i think a lot of schools in florida require seniors to do one as well.

My school does something similar to this! They require 40 community service hours(20 each semester) and it has to be done at a nonprofit organization and it has to be connected to the world problem you chose(pollution, deforestation, drug abuse, lack of women's rights, lack of education and many other ones). If you don't do the project you fail both history and English of that year and you'd still need to come up with the 40 community service hours as it is a requirement for graduation. It's a year long project and can get stressful but nothing that can't be done. Although I was very dumb and chose a topic that was not very big(although still huge, didn't find much information on it) so it did take me longer than most other topics. It definitely opened my eyes to some things that I wouldn't have learned otherwise but was it worth it? Probably not.

 

[nicolee]

I may or may not have drank during high school... And I was an honors student, got straight As, did tons of co-curriculars and went to a good college. Whoops.

My family are European and Aussie, so they're of the belief that if you teach a kid 'how' to drink (for lack of a better term) then they'll be safe with it. I learnt about good wine and beer growing up, had the occasional glass with dinner that my mom would match with the food, and was taught that drinking can be a good social experience if done 'correctly'. So I never had the urge to drink to excess. If you teach kids that drinking is evil, they're more likely to do it behind your back, and are probably more likely to go crazy and have too much when alcohol is available to them.

That's just my booze philosophy :)

But drinking or taking drugs around competitions or practices? Hell to the no. It should be the gym's responsibility to police that and take action as necessary.

 

[quitthedrama]

I may or may not have drank during high school... And I was an honors student, got straight As, did tons of co-curriculars and went to a good college. Whoops.

My family are European and Aussie, so they're of the belief that if you teach a kid 'how' to drink (for lack of a better term) then they'll be safe with it. I learnt about good wine and beer growing up, had the occasional glass with dinner that my mom would match with the food, and was taught that drinking can be a good social experience if done 'correctly'. So I never had the urge to drink to excess. If you teach kids that drinking is evil, they're more likely to do it behind your back, and are probably more likely to go crazy and have too much when alcohol is available to them.

That's just my booze philosophy :)

But drinking or taking drugs around competitions or practices? Hell to the no. It should be the gym's responsibility to police that and take action as necessary.

My family has the same philosophy. I've never understood why it is ok for an 18 year old to go to war but not have a beer, so we make our own rules.

 

[kristenthegreat]

Weird that several of the people in my grade who were popular drank in high school (and had no problem blasting it in social media) and are interning at prestigious companies RN and going to good schools, one has a startup company... then again a lot of their families are well-off (read: upper middle class/wealthy, as in country clubs and exotic vacations wealthy) so I'm not sure how much that has to do with it.

You bet your butt it does. My wealthy ex got away with SO much garbage and still had an adorably easy life because his parents had a boatload of money. Not that he didn't work hard, but his 'working hard' was easily supported in ways someone poorer could not. I had to drive the Range Rover in the Hamptons (oh lucky me who was used to driving a Honda), because A- he couldn't drive and B- his friend who COULD had gotten enough DUIs to have his license suspended. *sigh*

I may or may not have drank during high school... And I was an honors student, got straight As, did tons of co-curriculars and went to a good college. Whoops.

My family are European and Aussie, so they're of the belief that if you teach a kid 'how' to drink (for lack of a better term) then they'll be safe with it. I learnt about good wine and beer growing up, had the occasional glass with dinner that my mom would match with the food, and was taught that drinking can be a good social experience if done 'correctly'. So I never had the urge to drink to excess. If you teach kids that drinking is evil, they're more likely to do it behind your back, and are probably more likely to go crazy and have too much when alcohol is available to them.

That's just my booze philosophy :)

But drinking or taking drugs around competitions or practices? Hell to the no. It should be the gym's responsibility to police that and take action as necessary.

My family has the same philosophy. I've never understood why it is ok for an 18 year old to go to war but not have a beer, so we make our own rules.

My first sip of alcohol was at the age of 2. I asked my dad what he was drinking, he said 'Here, it's a beer. Try a sip.' Which I promptly spat back out into the grass. He gave me a sip of Merlot at 13. I drank very little in HS (too many extra cirriculars, no time), and more than my sister in college (who was the good girl who waited til she was 21). But I was always the first person to go home the minute I was tired and I've never blacked out or gone crazy.

I'm also a bit of a health freak and I'm like 'If I want to survive bungy jumping, I should probably NOT screw my heart up too badly..'

 

[nicolee]

My family has the same philosophy. I've never understood why it is ok for an 18 year old to go to war but not have a beer, so we make our own rules.

Or buy a gun. Or buy cigarettes. Or drive a car.

 

[SL&AM]

American culture and alcohol is, imo, why Americans struggle so much with alcohol. In high school I was never really a drinker or even a partier; I had my own vice and this is neither the time or place, but it wasn't anything illegal or harmful. It just wasn't for me---and I still joke that alcohol is an acquired taste I never really acquired. That said, living abroad as a newly turned 21 year old was not only ironic but also eye opening. The culture there is SO different----sooooo different, and honestly that's a good thing.

 

[XtremeWpg]

Maybe it's my small town Canadianness, but I was allowed by my parents to drink at 16. My dad once told me "you're going to anyway, I may as well know and know what you're drinking by buying it". We weren't allowed to drive a car to a party if we weren't the DD, my parents would always drop off my sister and I and pick us up if we needed.

To this day I've never driven with someone intoxicated or intoxicated myself. I sometimes wonder if it's because I was taught such a respect for alcohol and the consequences from being young. My house also had zero sympathy for a hangover either. The number of times at 18 I was up doing yard work at 8am is astonishing.

I've mostly coached Open aged teams. The rules have always been that prior to competing, if they opt to have a drink at dinner, more power to them, but anything more isn't okay. After competition? Have at it. You're all over legal age, in Canada anyway, if you want to get trashed, that's on you because you're a grownup.

 

[Official OWECheer]

I may or may not have drank during high school... And I was an honors student, got straight As, did tons of co-curriculars and went to a good college. Whoops.

My family are European and Aussie, so they're of the belief that if you teach a kid 'how' to drink (for lack of a better term) then they'll be safe with it. I learnt about good wine and beer growing up, had the occasional glass with dinner that my mom would match with the food, and was taught that drinking can be a good social experience if done 'correctly'. So I never had the urge to drink to excess. If you teach kids that drinking is evil, they're more likely to do it behind your back, and are probably more likely to go crazy and have too much when alcohol is available to them.

That's just my booze philosophy :)

But drinking or taking drugs around competitions or practices? Hell to the no. It should be the gym's responsibility to police that and take action as necessary.

This reminds me of parents who never give their kids the sex talk for fear that they'll be 'telling their kids what to do' (WTF?). And so the kids go and collect misinformation from their friends about sex, sexual health and pregnancy. These are the kids who can't name more than 5 STDs, how to prevent them, can't list certain types of contraceptives and think that pregnancy can be prevented using ridiculous and highly ineffective methods. Compare those kids to the ones whose parents actually sit them down and explain everything to them. And most importantly, they set boundaries but let their child know that they can come to them for anything (help, advice, etc.). Those are the parents who can intervene when, for example, a friend gets pregnant (think Spike and Manny on Degrassi), or in the case of drinking, the child who messes up and gets drunk at a party and knows that they can call their parent to drive them home instead of trying to wing it and drive themselves, which often has tragic consequences.

 

[gofriars610]

My school does something similar to this! They require 40 community service hours(20 each semester) and it has to be done at a nonprofit organization and it has to be connected to the world problem you chose(pollution, deforestation, drug abuse, lack of women's rights, lack of education and many other ones). If you don't do the project you fail both history and English of that year and you'd still need to come up with the 40 community service hours as it is a requirement for graduation. It's a year long project and can get stressful but nothing that can't be done. Although I was very dumb and chose a topic that was not very big(although still huge, didn't find much information on it) so it did take me longer than most other topics. It definitely opened my eyes to some things that I wouldn't have learned otherwise but was it worth it? Probably not.

what a complete and utter waste of time.

 

[MissCongeniality]

This reminds me of parents who never give their kids the sex talk for fear that they'll be 'telling their kids what to do' (WTF?). And so the kids go and collect misinformation from their friends about sex, sexual health and pregnancy. These are the kids who can't name more than 5 STDs, how to prevent them, can't list certain types of contraceptives and think that pregnancy can be prevented using ridiculous and highly ineffective methods. Compare those kids to the ones whose parents actually sit them down and explain everything to them. And most importantly, they set boundaries but let their child know that they can come to them for anything (help, advice, etc.). Those are the parents who can intervene when, for example, a friend gets pregnant (think Spike and Manny on Degrassi), or in the case of drinking, the child who messes up and gets drunk at a party and knows that they can call their parent to drive them home instead of trying to wing it and drive themselves, which often has tragic consequences.

I love that Uber exists. It gives another option to kids too scared to call Mom/Dad. And, yes, the kids are using it! I highly suggest adding the app to the phone of your teenagers for that "just in case" need.

 

[Official OWECheer]

I love that Uber exists. It gives another option to kids too scared to call Mom/Dad. And, yes, the kids are using it! I highly suggest adding the app to the phone of your teenagers for that "just in case" need.

Great tip!