Motivational Interviewing is a student-centered dialogue to guide one towards changing their behavior. The focus is to elicit and strengthen motivation for change.

• It is a way of talking to people that builds their internal motivation to change.
• It uses questions and statements to think and talk in a positive, forward direction.

The objective is not to solve the problem or even to develop a plan; the goal is to help the student resolve their ambivalence, develop some momentum and believe that change is possible.

Officers are in a unique position to talk to students. First of all, officers in uniform possess a certain level of authority or “position of power” when talking to someone just by being in uniform. Secondly, when faced with a possible enforcement situation (i.e. an underage student found in possession of alcohol), that student’s motivation to change is very high. Before that contact with the officer, the student likely was not thinking about his drinking behavior or whether he should change that behavior. There’s something about coming in contact with an officer that will often trigger thoughts about a change in behavior. Funny how that works!