Changing the Drinking Age Story aired: Wednesday, September 05, 2007
Rider University is forming a task force to study the use and abuse of alcohol on campus in the wake of the recent death of an 18-year-old freshman at the New Jersey school.
Police say Gary Devercelly had a blood alcohol level more than 5 times the legal limit for driving after binge drinking during a pledge initiation at a fraternity house at Rider.
John McCardell says Devercelly's death is exactly the reason to lower the legal age for drinking from 21 to 18.
It sounds counterintuitive, but McCardell, who was president of Middlebury College in Vermont for 13 years, says lowering the drinking age will take it out of the basements of fraternities and allow college president to move from policing illegal drinking to teaching kids how to drink responsibly.
His proposal has groups like Mothers Against Drunk Driving hopping mad.
McCardell is now president emeritus at Middlebury and he's formed an organization called "Choose Responsibility," that aims to lower the legal drinking age.
