When offered, she took a swallow, alcohol hitting her taste buds for the first time.

She was 13.

"I thought it would be fun and get me hyper," said the La Crosse middle school student. "It was all fun and games."

She's still 13, and she's still drinking - virtually every weekend, she said, since that first taste.

Like her, many young teens aren't waiting until high school to turn to alcohol. About 40 percent have tried an alcoholic beverage by the time they finish eighth grade, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse.

In La Crosse schools, 24 percent of eighth-graders in 2005 said they'd consumed alcohol in the past 30 days and 16 percent had gotten "drunk" at least once within two weeks of the survey. That's up from levels seen when the survey was done in the mid-1990s, said Steve Ross, the district's director of student services, who called the earlier drinking trend "an issue of

great importance."

Said Ross, "There is a problem."

Middle schoolers aren't turning up in hospital detox or being caught at underage drinking parties - though not unknown, that still is a rare occurrence, officials said.

But chatter about weekend parties and drinking escapades is common at the city's middle schools, several students said.

Kids share stories of sneaking alcohol from the family cupboard or refrigerator. Of getting it from friends of friends.

They gossip about getting drunk on alcohol stolen from local stores, while their parents were in another room.

"It's all you hear about in the hall," said one.

Drinking alcohol is considered to be "cool" and a way to look older and "more sophisticated," the teens said.

Alcohol also provides an escape from boredom and the "same old, same old" activities, one said.

Mark Taylor said he, too, has seen a "significant increase" in early teen drinking during his 14 years as a psychotherapist at Gundersen Lutheran, especially among younger females.

"Girls have really been catching the boys in the last few years," Taylor said. "In my practice, boys are more into marijuana and girls are more into alcohol. There are a lot of hard-partying teen and preteen girls out there."

Teens tell Taylor a variety of reasons as to why they've started using alcohol, but he said it all comes back to "the whole culture is going crazy." The U.S. is at war. Global warming is in the news.

"The brighter kids" and "the kids that are quite sensitive" seem most prone to substance abuse, Taylor said.

"A lot of times they pick up on stuff that an adult breezes by as the way it is," he said. "For a lot of kids, it's really overwhelming.

"They say I'm bored, but it is really more of a statement of 'I don't know who I am and I don't know what I'm here for,'" he said.

Another factor in the younger drinking trend, Taylor and other professionals said, was the introduction of "alco-pops" - sweet, fruity alcoholic drinks marketed for younger crowds.

"They're clearly targeting the 18- to 24-year-old age group," said La Crosse police Officer Drew Gavrilos. "You're seeing kids starting to drink at a younger age - 12, 13, 14 years old - and what's going to appeal to an 18 year old is probably going to also appeal to someone who's younger."

Anheuser-Busch announced May 17 it had ceased selling Spykes, a flavored malt beverage critics contend was aimed at underage drinkers.

Launched nationwide in January, Spykes was offered in lime, mango, melon and hot chocolate flavors, packaged in colorful, nail polish-sized bottles. The drink contained 12 percent alcohol by volume, about the same as wine.

"It doesn't taste like alcohol, it tastes like you're drinking pop," said Gavrilos, who also holds a degree in business administration and a minor in marketing.

"There's an incredible amount of marketing to these kids - whole lines of drinks specially blended and advertised towards kids - and kids are very susceptible to advertising," Taylor said.

When contacted by the Tribune about the drinks, Anheuser-Busch officials replied with a prepared statement that Spykes was "unduly attacked by perennial anti-alcohol groups." It was discontinued, the company added, because it did not perform to expectations.

Onalaska High School teacher Bridgett Hubbard, who developed the school's marketing program 13 years ago, said her sophomore to senior students discuss marketing alcohol to minors during an ethics portions of class.

"We need to be careful - even though we want to make a profit as a business, we still are socially responsible to our public," said Hubbard. "To be honest, alcohol advertising to minors is not new, it's historic."

Responding to the younger drinking trend, the La Crosse School District introduced an alcohol program, Project Northland, for grades 6 through 8. It is a series of five to 10 lessons that deal with risky behavior scenarios, Ross said.

And a number of middle-schoolers still stay away from alcohol, the students interviewed said, focusing instead on school activities or sports.

They believe what their parents told them - that it's not something to experiment with, the teens said.

One who did but gave it up added, "I just have fun being me. I don't want to drink. I don't want to be an alcoholic."

A CULTURE OF DRINKING

Western Wisconsin ranked high nationally for underage and binge drinking, according to a 2002-04 report by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. About 25 percent of 12- to 17-year-olds in western Wisconsin reported drinking alcohol in the 30 days before the survey, according to the report. About 18 percent of the same age group claimed to binge drink, defined by the study as consuming five or more drinking within a couple of hours, according to the report.

Potential penalties for underage drinking in La Crosse County

Ages 16 and under

nFirst offense - $163 and driver's license suspension for 90 days

nSecond offense - $225 and license suspension for 180 days

nThird offense - $349 and license suspension for one year

Ages 17 to 20

nFirst offense - $349 and license suspension for 90 days

nSecond offense - $411 and license suspension for 180 days

nThird offense - $473 and license suspension for one year

If the person does not have a driver's license when cited, it automatically will be suspended when issued.

Autumn Grooms can be reached at (608) 791-8424 or agrooms@lacrossetribune.com. Anne Jungen can be reached at (608) 791-8224 or ajungen@lacrossetibune.com.