The Smithers Institute rests on the legacy of R. Brinkley Smithers. Our commitment is to fight the battle against the disease of alcoholism and specifically take that battle to the workplace.
It is our belief that the workplace will provide us with the arena for education, intervention, and prevention. This perspective combines the workplace orientation, which has been the tradition of the School of Industrial and Labor Relations, and concern about alcoholism, which has been the legacy of the Smithers Foundation. The R. Brinkley Smithers Institute stands on the shoulders of both of these traditions.

Working together with foundations, government agencies, labor organizations, corporations, schools, and communities, the R. Brinkley Smithers Institute for Alcohol-Related Workplace Studies has established a rich tradition of continuous research and education. Our research agenda has focused on workplace risk factors, member assistance programs, employee assistance programs, intervention strategies, retirement and substance abuse, and sexual harassment and substance abuse. Our educational agenda has developed programs which allow labor and management to put into place the type of assistance programs that assure the individual plagued by alcoholism or other modes of substance abuse that they can turn toward others for help, without fear of retribution or loss of confidentiality. In the process of our work, we include students, practitioners, and academics as partners in developing research and education agenda.

Now in our tenth year we have expanded our efforts to an international arena doing more comparative work and working closely with international agencies. Over the next few years we hope to continue to pursue our old agenda while continuing to establish new goals. The R. Brinkley Smithers Institute for Alcohol-Related Workplace Studies is committed to being a leader in research and education as related to substance abuse in the workplace.

- Samuel B. Bacharach, Director R. Brinkley Smithers
Institute for Alcohol-Related Workplace Studies