Dear Editor:

As a current Stanford junior who’s helped plan some of Stanford’s largest student events, from class formals to Full Moon 2010 and the recent Cataracs concert, I couldn’t be more excited thinking about the potential that exists with the newly created Office of Alcohol Policy and Education (OAPE). I think that Monday’s Editorial Board piece (“Sobering up at the OAPE,” Oct. 10) unfortunately missed the mark.

There were around 300 students (not a “few dozen”) at the T.G.I.F. event, the first of the Cardinal Nights series. It was not designed to be an “alcohol-free frat party,” but rather an enticing, low-stress night for freshmen to hang out, play casino games outside Wilbur and connect with new friends. Last Friday, OAPE put on another event: a comedy and bingo night; over one hundred students attended, watched the SIMPs, and enjoyed themselves.

But, looking to the future, OAPE doesn’t exist to plan fun for students; it wants to plan fun with students. Cardinal Nights from OAPE is one of a whole series of new initiatives focused on alcohol abuse education and prevention, and it is designed to empower students, student groups and people with great ideas (like your class presidents and Frosh Council) to realize their non-alcoholic events for the whole campus on Friday and Saturday nights. By next quarter, we hope to have a Cardinal Night every “party” night, initiated by students and planned in collaboration with the experience and resources of University staff.

A great example of this kind of thinking was the Cataracs concert that kicked-off the year with about 1,800 attendees. The University worked with a group of students, including myself, to create a framework and a budget for a totally unprecedented beginning to the year. We took the reins to make the event popular, fun and memorable, and were supported every step of the way by professional staff. If I have a vision for how we could make a “concerted effort” for fun on this campus, it looks a lot like this.

We won’t get every event right, but I hope we let ourselves experiment occasionally as we create events for every weekend night. We don’t want events that just appeal to non-drinkers, either. We hope to create a campus atmosphere where even the hardest-core rager will be enticed to take a break once in a while. Most exciting, we want to create that atmosphere by having more large campus traditions of all kinds — from alcohol-free parties (think Maus and Full Moon), to comedy nights, viewing parties and everything in between.

If you’re interested in joining this effort, get some friends, or maybe your student group, together to plan a Cardinal Night and apply (oape.stanford.edu/nights). If you’ve got ideas for big moves (anything that could become the Full Moon of winter or spring quarter), send me an email; a student programming board is convening with representatives from the ASSU and major student groups to develop and implement new campus traditions. We need your input.

Please note: I am employed by OAPE as of Monday, and I look forward to planning and supporting more campus-wide fun. My opinions are, however, my own.

Stephen Trusheim ’13
Student worker at the Office of Alcohol Policy and Education