Underage Drinking

Image via Wikipedia

Now alcoholic consumption is only legal for individuals that are of twenty-one years of age or older, is this not 4correct? The answer is yes, but this does not stop teenagers from trying to experiment and try alcohol. The Surgeon General reported that almost seventy percent of people under eighteen years of age have tried drinking alcohol. So this means as a future teacher the incidence of alcohol related problems occurring within your school, or with your students is quite high.
So where could the influence of trying alcohol come from in the first place, and how could it be so influential? Well the answer is that usually the notion to try alcohol comes from peer pressure, or environmental influences. The Surgeon General also states that individuals that try alcohol by the age of fifteen usually grow to up to become alcohol dependent, or have some sort of alcohol related problem. Also according to the Mayo Clinic an amount of 755 million dollars is spent yearly on alcohol related injuries within teenagers, and that out of 40,000 teenagers from 15-20 years of age that were injured, about seventy-nine percent obtained that injury in an alcohol related accident.
Now the only way that comes to mind as to how and curb this number is by giving students the knowledge as to how and not become involved with alcohol in the first place. Now knowledge is one thing, but really getting through to the students is another. It really is a team effort in trying to prevent a statistic like this. Having the whole community come together and perform community based events showing the issues that coincide with teenage drinking I feel is really important. This helps to bring the environmental factor that contributes to underage drinking down considerably. Myself being an advocate of health and physical fitness, to become a crucial leader in the fight against underage drinking, as well as drug use within the youth will be a primary goal of mine.