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Walk Uptown on a Friday night or through the Mile Square on Sunday morning and it is evident that many Miami students drink.

But Miami faculty member Joe Sampson and his Advanced Electronic Journalism class are bringing Miami's drinking culture to a different venue — the classroom — in their documentary, "Restoring Honor: A Campus and Community Response."

The documentary, which will be screened on Dec. 7 in Williams Hall, focuses on how Miami's drinking culture affects not only students, but every member of the Miami and Oxford communities.

"What we're trying to say here is that there's a problem not unique to Miami or Oxford, and how can we fix it," Sampson said.

Sampson launched the project following students' first weekend back at Miami when the Oxford Police Department responded to two felonious assaults, four assaults, five house burglaries, one robbery and 19 underage alcohol consumption crimes.

Since then, Sampson's students have conducted about 75 taped interviews with everyone from President David Hodge to members of the Oxford mobile home community.

"At the end of the day, this topic of drinking affects everyone," Sampson said.

Sampson said it is the most ambitious project he has done since he began teaching the class, but with only seven students enrolled this semester, he knew he would be able to take on a large, in-depth project.

"We have such a small class that we saw we could have an opportunity to do more," said senior Amanda Van Doorn.

The students spent the month of October gathering footage from interviews, as well as documenting in areas like Uptown on a Friday night.

Sampson said he was impressed with the maturity levels of his students, as the documentary could have easily turned into something disastrous if they had not taken the project seriously.

"One of the hardest parts was to maintain objectivity as a student," said senior Jen Cahill. "People don't expect us to have a variety of opinions and balance."

One of the many topics the documentary covers is image versus reality.

"I've always been interested in how local media covers the Miami drinking culture," Sampson said. "Is Miami's reputation being tarnished by the media?"

He said Miami suffers from its image, even though when alcohol-related incidents happen, they are out of the norm.

"What we want to know is how to reconcile the image," he said.

Both Sampson and his students agreed the response they have gotten from members of the Miami community have been positive.

"I was amazed at how supportive people were — administration, the journalism department and students," senior David Spunt said.

The class is hopeful the documentary will evoke a reaction from the Miami and Oxford communities and, as senior Kristin Cuddihy said, "open up people's eyes."

"This year is a big year of change with the alcohol task force," Van Doorn said. "This (documentary) puts it in perspective and shows there's no good or bad. We're all trying to work on this together."

The screening of "Restoring Honor: A Campus and Community Response" will be at 5:30 p.m. on Thursday in the Williams Hall Television Studio. It will be free and open to the public.