Kerby Anderson

Dennis Prager asks parents a very important question. He wants to know, “Did Your Child Return From College a Better Person?” I think many of us sadly know the answer to that haunting question. When I first joined Probe Ministries, they had a brochure with the title “Will Your Children Lose Their Faith in College?” His question attempts to dig even deeper into the current college environment.

For example, he looks at the percentage of college students who are drinking on campus. One website states that, “Roughly 80 percent of college students – four out of five – consume alcohol to some degree. It’s estimated that 50 percent of those students engage in binge drinking.”

Another example would be sexual promiscuity on campus. Dennis Prager observes, “we are all aware of the sexual activity that emanates from college drinking and can be regretted the next day (usually by the woman).” And I might add that the latest estimates are that one in four college students will contract an STD during their time at school.

A third concern is depression and mental illness. One writer in Psychology Today concludes, “It is neither an exaggeration nor is it alarmist to claim that there is a mental health crisis facing America’s college students. Evidence suggests that this group has greater levels of stress and psychopathology than any time in the nation’s history.”

That is why parents need to understand the dangers and begin to evaluate where their children attend college. They need to stop and realize they might be sending their kids off to a school that will increase their chances of depression, increase their likelihood of binge drinking, and return home with a head full of secular, progressive ideas about marriage, family, and society.