Freshers Weeks: Fresh and disorderly

This month, the class of 2002 begin their university careers. Many of them are being welcomed with freshers' weeks. But has the traditional induction period now descended into an expensive, drunken orgy? Lucy Hodges talks to parents and students

Last week, Samuel Richardson embarked on his student life at Edinburgh University in an alcoholic haze. He started drinking at around 5pm most evenings and continued until late, finally turning in to bed at 3am – all in the name of having fun, making friends and settling in. On a typical day, he consumed five vodka and cokes, two bottles of Stella beer, two BK Blues and a shot of Bacardi. Then, he had to get up first thing for his induction into Scotland's most prestigious university. He might have been forgiven for feeling a little more light-headed and disoriented than usual. Welcome to freshers' week, your hello to university life.

Samuel Richardson is a real person, though his name has been changed. He may represent a minority of the 18-year-olds tumbling into university campuses but it is thought to be a substantial minority. Parents who find out about the frenetic partying are concerned that it gets their offspring off on the wrong foot for the sober business of growing up and studying for a degree. It means they are exhausted and ragged at the start of term, and left with a big hole in their pockets.

Some of the rich and not-so-rich students spend hundreds of pounds in this week. Samuel Richardson spent about £100. "They go wild, especially if they go straight from school," says one mother of a student already at university. "They're desperate to be seen at the centre of things."

Another mother explains: "I had been going along with the idea of freshers' week as being the way to settle in, but then I heard about all this desperately ferocious drinking and I thought, what an introduction to a university career! It's a bad message to be sending that drinking to excess is normal. And for those who don't drink excessively, it is really tedious to have to witness all these people becoming legless around you. It's not the best way to make friends and meet people."

The universities know there can be a problem with freshers' week and say they do what they can, but in the end 18-year-olds are adults. The National Union of Students also knows about the drinking culture in universities and is worried about it, which is why it has launched a new campaign to encourage sensible drinking on campus. Privately, student union officials acknowledge that freshers' week can degenerate into a boozy orgy, which is why they try to ensure that binge drinking isn't promoted.

"We don't condone kids going out and getting drunk," says Jonathan Meenagh, president of Edinburgh's student association. "We deliberately don't have offers in any of our buildings for cheap drink, like they do in clubs in the city. And there's nothing we can do about the places that offer vodkas for 50p."

Some universities, however, are making changes to the introductory period, so that it is better run and not as long. University freshers' weeks vary. Some are run exclusively by the students' union, others by students and the university combined. Some last a few days, others last two weeks. Some are well organised, and integrated with academic orientation; others are less well organised and less well integrated.

This year, the University of East Anglia (UEA) cut the amount of time for its freshers' introduction, which led to protests on campus of the kind not seen since the Seventies and Eighties. The students were angry that the five days, which freshers traditionally had to acclimatise themselves, was cut to two or three days. "A lot of them are brand new students, straight out of home," says Ned Glasier, the student union communications officer. "They are coming to a foreign environment. University is like nowhere else in the world. Students are coming to a new site – sometimes a new country – and they need time to sign up with the welfare service and the medical centre. They need to find their way around before they rush to their first lecture."

One of the reasons the change was introduced was that first-year students complained of time hanging heavy on their hands in the first few days, said a UEA spokeswoman. "Students want to meet their lecturers and the other people they are studying with," she added. "It gives them a sense of purpose to get on with the term. On the whole, they want to get on and get started. We believe there has been plenty of time to do the traditional freshers' week activities, such as joining sports and societies, as well as get started."

Another university that has reformed its freshers' week this year is Sussex, reducing the introduction from a fortnight to one week. The decision was made in consultation with students, and it involved a focus group of incoming students as well as a group of those already at the university. "It has meant things are much better organised," says Oliver McGhie, a second-year student studying English.

As Ros Hall, Sussex's union president, explains: "We have tried to make the week much more action packed. We have brought the socialising together with the academic induction. Freshers have sessions on timetabling, how to use the library and the computers during the day; then, in the evening, we have had low-key events culminating in the freshers' ball. We made it clear that you didn't have to get bladdered to have a good time."

Only one person was thrown out for drunkenness at the freshers' ball, according to a university spokesman.

Newcastle's freshers' week is run by the student union exclusively, and it lasts for five days. Like others, it is a bizarre mix of the routine (registering at the university and meeting your personal tutor), the frenzied social whirl and Disneyworld. Newcastle students can go bowling and paintballing, all for a charge of £36. At Edinburgh, they pay £26 for a freshers' package that includes fairground rides and a Peruvian live band.

"Obviously, there is drinking," says Louise Needham, Newcastle's communications officer. "It can involve students being rowdy but the week is about getting to know new people. It's about having a laugh, having fun, whether you drink or not."

One of the biggest universities, Leeds, which has 28,000 students, gives more than two weeks to introducing freshers to their new life. Incoming students are given attack alarms, shown around campus, and treated to an array of social events – which include a party with a live band, a comedy night, a hypnotist and his dog, and, finally, the freshers' ball, with the band Sugababes.

"We want to keep students busy and have a lot of things on," says Lucy Abell, union communications officer at Leeds. "Freshers' week makes it easy for them to mix and bond with others. They're all in the same boat. We don't want them to sit in their rooms and feel homesick. When students move away from home for the first time, they do tend to go out more and spend more at first than they do the rest of the year."

There is not necessarily anything wrong with that. The big question is whether freshers' weeks as they are currently organised are the best way to introduce young people to university life.

'I HAVE BEEN COMPLETELY DRUNK MOST OF THE TIME'

For biology student Hamish Backhouse, the freshers' week at Edinburgh was "absolutely brilliant". Every day he partied the night away, going to bed in the small hours of the morning after an evening mixing his drinks. "I don't know how I did it," he says. "I think the excitement kept me going. I have loved every minute of it. I have been completely drunk most of the time."

Although Edinburgh University provided a long list of workshops, telling you how to make the most of essay writing, lectures or practicals, Hamish gave them a miss, preferring to concentrate on hard-core socialising. He also missed the societies fair, which enables you to join anything from the whisky appreciation society to rock climbing. But he is planning to sign up for rugby and swimming.

He spent £20 on food and drink some nights, but he had managed to reduce his outgoings to at least half that by the end of the week.

Ruth Pearce, who has enrolled for a degree in anthropology and archaeology, was similarly enthusiastic. "It's brilliant because there is so much to do," she says. "In fact, it's difficult to know what to leave out because you're worried about missing out on the chance to make friends."

So far, Edinburgh has lived up to her expectations and more, she says. She loves the fact that you can start from scratch again with making friends, and she has joined four sports societies – girls' rugby, skydiving, snowboarding and windsurfing. But all the drinking finally took its toll, she says. She spent one day last week in bed, recovering from alcohol poisoning. The advantage was that she had a cheap day. Until then, she had been spending £10 a night on drink and food.

l.hodges@independent.co.uk