What if the legal drinking age was lowered to 18?

A group of college presidents from around the country is pushing for that...'what if?' as a way to curb binge drinking.

Amythest Initiative, a group of college heads from around the nation, has created a plan to lower the drinking age from 21 to 18.
Their proposal claims that since Congress passed the minimum drinking age in the '80s, binge–drinking and fake IDs have taken off.
Some I–S–U students agree.

"It makes so much more sense, because people aren't going to be as rowdy if they can drink like starting when they're 18," said ISU student Matt Powles, 18.

Matt Powles says he was arrested two years ago after a friend was stopped for drunk driving and evading police, something Powles says would not have happened if he were legally allowed to drink.

"We would have had a cab pick us up or we would have just had our parents pick us up. But this was my junior year in high school, so we were still trying to hide it from our parents," said Powles.

Other ISU students shared the same sentiments, but the mayor of Normal says it was bad behavior that banned drinking for minors in the first place.

"It was removed because there were more traffic fatalities, more accidents as a result," said Normal Mayor Chris Koos.

Although there were definitely students in favor of lowering the drinking age, surprisingly the majority of students I spoke with said they were against it.

"If you lower it, people might not be responsible enough yet mentally to handle something like that.
So I think it would actually cause a problem if they do that," said ISU student Cara Suggs, 20.

"Drinking is probably considered a privilege just like driving is a privilege.
You shouldn't be able to do something that you know you're not going to be old enough to do yet," said Kevin Orabutt, 21.

Other students believe there would be more fights and a need for increased campus police.
So for now, Amythest Initiative's vision isn't shared by many students and officials on the ISU campus.