Thank You, Dr. Hanlon

WASHINGTON -- If you are the proud parent of a Dartmouth student, you should send a thank-you note to President Philip Hanlon. Actually, if you are the proud parent of a college student anywhere, or one nearing college age, you should also drop Hanlon a line.

Because while the stemwinder of a speech that Hanlon delivered Wednesday night was aimed at what he described as "extreme behavior" at Dartmouth, Hanlon's admonitions could apply to colleges, and college students, anywhere.

"Dartmouth's promise is being hijacked by extreme behavior, masked by its perpetrators as acceptable fun," warned Hanlon, who arrived on campus just last year. He cited sexual assaults, "a culture where dangerous drinking has become the rule and not the exception" and "a general disregard for human dignity as exemplified by hazing, parties with racist and sexist undertones, disgusting and sometimes threatening insults hurled on the Internet."

Hanson noted "a grave disconnect between our culture in the classroom and the behaviors outside of it -- behaviors which too often seek not to elevate the human spirit, but debase it." Dartmouth, he said, cannot "be held back by the few who wrongly hide harmful behaviors behind the illusion of youthful exuberance. Routinized excessive drinking, sexual misconduct and blatant disregard of social norms have no place at Dartmouth. Enough is enough."

Dartmouth has long been known as the rowdier, frattier Ivy. Hanlon, class of 1977, belonged to Alpha Delta, a real-life inspiration for "Animal House," where the math major's still-extant mustache earned him the nickname "Juan Carlos," after the newly installed king of Spain.

So it would be comforting -- certainly for me, as the parent of a freshman elsewhere -- to imagine that this is a Dartmouth-specific problem.

Likewise, college has long been a time for excess, for youthful experimentation, for testing limits and learning the painful, head-throbbing consequences. So it would be comforting as well to imagine that the excesses of the present day only seem excessive because we have conveniently forgotten our own appallingly stupid behavior.

If only.

Dartmouth has a problem -- with alcohol, with sexual assault, with out-of-control and out-of-line behaviors -- and it is suffering the consequences of its bad rap, with applications down 14 percent last year. But so do many other schools with equally selective admissions.

"This is very definitely an issue that's on the minds of every college and university president in the country," Hanlon told me in an interview.

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