strictly calorie-wise, as people have said, it's mostly the same either way. however, there's a lot of other factors. for starters, I don't care what you tell yourself, you're not going to drink straight shots of liquor only, every time you drink. especially in college. you're going to be around people playing drinking games, almost all of which require either beer, or a sipping drink at least - beer pong, flip cup, quarters, various card games, etc. You're not going to sit there and be like 'nah i can't play, I only drink shots, for health reasons'. which brings me to my next point - when you add in the mixers, usually hard alcohol evens out, or surpasses beer in calories.
either way, the calories you DO get from alcohol fuck you over much worse than say, an equal amount of calories from some whole grain bread, a baked potato, or some other normal healthy food. afaik, your bodies normal metabolic processes get messed up by alcohol, and your normal fat burning rate goes way way down, for a long time after drinking. You'll be dehydrated for up to 2 solid days after drinking more tahn a few.
Bottom line, if you care, is eat healthy as much as possible, get exercise, and try to limit drinking to only weekends.