'Sadness and Loss' Grip SUNY Geneseo

March 5, 2009 -- SUNY Geneseo students are still grappling with grief and disbelief over the death of a sophomore who allegedly had too much to drink at a college party.

"The general feeling is of sadness and loss on campus," said Danielle Forrest, SUNY Geneseo's student association president. "It hits close to home when a student dies on your campus, who has been there for two years."

Arman Partamian, 19, of Flushing, N.Y., was found unresponsive Sunday inside a nonsanctioned fraternity house near campus after consuming an excessive amount of alcohol at a party of between 20 and 30 people, police said. New York State Police spokesman Mark O'Donnell said the department is still investigating the case.

Partamian's death is the latest fatality linked to what experts deem an ongoing problem of binge drinking on college campuses across the country.

Nearly half of college students say they binge drink, which is defined as consuming five or more drinks in one sitting for men, or four or more for women, according to the college alcohol-consumption study at the Harvard School of Public Health.

At the start of the academic year, many students, including those at SUNY Geneseo, were greeted with warnings about the clear and present dangers of alcohol consumption.

"The college does a good job of educating the students about binge drinking," Forrest said. "The school gives a presentation for every student about the topic, and has for the past two years."

At the same time, however, presidents of roughly 100 colleges and universities wrote letters urging lawmakers to consider lowering the drinking age to 18 from 21. They argued that existing laws encouraged their students to drink heavily over a short period of time.

Young students who don't know their limits or succumb to peer pressure are more likely to drink dangerously if it is illegal, say the proponents of lowering the drinking age.

The presidents' proposal met fierce opposition from groups such as Mothers Against Drunk Driving, which argued that a lower drinking age would lead to more fatal car crashes.

Health experts, for their part, say the biggest obstacle is convincing students that binge drinking is a problem. And adding to the challenge is the lack of a hard-and-fast definition of binge drinking, which can result in long-term effects including alcoholism, liver damage and cancers of the mouth, throat, esophagus and brain.