Blog Post 5

           In this broadcast This American Life investigates Penn State’s title as the number one party school in the country. It is an hour long, very detailed radio broadcast investigative report.

The issue it addresses is the many effects caused by drinking and partying at Penn State.

It is a very interesting issue and gives a few main reasons why it needs to be addressed. The broadcast states that the extensive drinking hurts the surrounding community. Drunken students damage property of residents at State College. These are regular people trying to live their lives, who constantly have to deal with drunk students who don’t care about anything. The broadcast gives another reason to investigate when it talks about the extreme risk and danger of students’ health. The amount of alcohol some students consume in very short periods of time is not good for them. The last reason to investigate is that drinking affects students’ grades. The broadcast cited a stat that many Penn State students admit that their grades have suffered because of alcohol and partying. 

The obvious audience is anyone involved with Penn State. The issue affects students, staff, and residents of State College. A broader audience is also other college students. This type of drinking by no means only happens at Penn State. IT happens in some form at almost every other college in the country. The American Life wants all college students participating in these behaviors to be aware of the damages it can cause.

The broadcast talks a lot about different groups of people that this issue affects. First, as I said before, it talks about residents of State College. It cites specifically one half hour period of time that the reporters were at a residence. They saw countless drunk people walking by. Some girls peed on the property, some kids threw trash, and some guys ripped a stop sign out of the ground and were dragging it down the street. This was just one night in a short period of time. It also stated a problem that I never heard of. Drunk people literally wander or break into peoples’ houses and fall sleep. The piece talks about cops and how the drinking affects them. For such a small safe town, something like 48% of the budget goes towards police enforcement. Another person related to the issue that the story cites is a deliver boy for Canyon Pizza. Canyon is a popular spot for drunk students to go late. The delivery boy told stories of how his car got severely damaged sitting outside the pizzeria. It got spit on, stepped on, and punched. The delivery boy even had his jaw broken by a severely drunk student.

After this broadcast I drew the conclusion that binge drinking is a serious college problem, but probably not going to change severely anytime soon. The broadcast also ends by making it clear that everyone associated with Penn State loves it with all their heart. It concludes with senior students saying they’ll be coming back to Penn State until they’re “old and wrinkled”.

There were literally too many interviews and too much research done to name nearly all of it. There were interviews done on students, residents, cops, deliverymen, alumni, Penn State staff (such as President Grahm Spanier), and local storeowners. There was a lot of research done having to do with the effects of bing drinking, and how much alcohol is consumed by students.

The story uses some effective narrative technique. First, it uses a lottttt of dialogue. Also, it tells some side stories and keeps you interested. The broadcast transitions with music and different act names, helping the story flow smoothly, and go a little faster.

            I definitely think this was a well done piece. I thought it was lengthy, but that may just be because I’d think anything I had to listen to for an hour is lengthy. I liked the transitions and the vast amount of information/perspectives