The University of Wisconsin-Madison topped the list of the nation's party schools Monday despite a decade-long effort by school officials to reduce its reputation for heavy drinking.
UW-Madison has ranked among the top party schools on the annual Princeton Review report in 13 out of the 14 years it has compiled the list and was No. 3 a year ago. Meanwhile, Brigham Young University was tops among "stone cold sober" schools for the eighth straight year.
UW-Madison Chancellor John Wiley dismissed the report as "junk science that results in a day of national media coverage." But the chairman of the campus student government said many students would take pride in the ranking considering its other reputation as a top academic institution.
U.S. News and World Report ranked UW-Madison No. 34 among national universities in its annual survey last week.
"It just shows that we work hard but we play hard also," said Eric Varney, chair of the Associated Students of Madison.
The list _ which is not affiliated with Princeton University _ is based on on-line surveys of more than 110,000 college students and included in the Princeton Review's "Best 361 Colleges."
The top party schools rankings are based on survey responses regarding alcohol and drug use, hours of study each day, and the number of students in fraternities and sororities.
Schools often put down the list, while the American Medical Association has urged Princeton Review to cease putting it out, saying it legitimizes students' drinking.
But Robert Franek, who authored the report "The Best 361 Colleges," said students are looking for more than just a classroom experience when they pick a college.
"The mission is very simple _ to provide information to make the college search palatable for a student and all of them to find a school that's the best fit for them," he said.
UW-Madison has long had a reputation for heavy drinking, ranking No. 3 this year for the amount of beer and hard liquor consumed. Still, the school touts its nine-year program to cut down on binge drinking they it says had led to a drop in students who drink to excess, fewer admissions to local detoxification centers and more freshman who say they don't drink at all.
"We're not trying to tell students that they can't drink at all, but they really do need to learn how to drink responsibly," said Susan Crawley, who heads the effort.
Still, the school's reputation has been hard to shake. Its annual spring party drew 20,000 revelers this year, while Halloween weekend has been marred by riots the last two years as thousands have descended upon the city.
Senior Liz Drilias lunched Monday at the student union, where the school has a bar and had the beer taps open by noon. She said the ranking was no surprise but no source of pride, either.
"People get a bad image of Madison, that we just drink all the time," Drilias said. "There are people who are like that, but there are just as many people who aren't."
The other top party schools are: Ohio University in Athens; Lehigh University in Pennsylvania; University of California-Santa Barbara; State University of New York at Albany; Indiana University-Bloomington; University of Mississippi; University of Iowa; University of Massachusetts-Amherst; Loyola University New Orleans; Tulane University in New Orleans; University of Georgia; Penn State University; West Virginia University; The University of Texas-Austin; University of Tennessee-Knoxville; University of New Hampshire; University of Florida; Louisiana State University; University of Maryland-College Park.
Posted by Priyajeet | 
first of all you have to listen to this sound effect:
http://www.putfile.com/media.php?n=loseing-horn
there, thats kinda how im feeling. i think there might be a PROBLEM.
it might be a bit long to read but want you to understand whats happening and get your advice. also i know this is a minor problem compared to when some of yous come here for advice for life problems. im sorry.
as you know, my computer is one of the crappiest here. i got it as a gift from my granparents about 4 years ago, a few months before pentium 4 came out. it gets 3 frames a second on cs1.6 at 800x600. when it was bought, i wasnt a real computer nerd yet, but my grandpa said it was 'top of the line' and there was nothing better. that may have been true back then with the excetpion of the video card. i dont know. its 900mhz pentium III with intigrated vid card, came with 128 mb ram, and a 40gb hard drive. dont know mobo specs. its an HP. although it is kinda mine as i am the main user, this computer replaced the old family clunker and is my familys only computer. we all use it. and it sucks. perhiperils are all sticky and the mouse broke from my little sister. got a new opticle mouse and its almost done for too. im the only one in the family that really knows how to use it anyway and my dad blames me on just about every problem, even ones that i have no control of, such as the fact that windows ME slows down after use.
now, my grandpa (he bought this remember) had an old computer and all he does is stuff for business. all he really did was use it to type documents on microsoft word, save them into the my documents folder, send and recieve email, and occasionally do some stuff online. thats it. a few months ago, like back in november or december i think, he decided that he needed to upgrade (i dont think he did because he didnt hardly use it as he isnt a computer person). well he knows i am a computer person, but didnt tell me he was going to buy a new computer. he just bought a dell, i dont know the exact specs, but its really more than he needs. its got a intel pentium 4 with hyper threading. and i think 512mb ram. a flatscreen monitor. wireless keyboard and mouse. its even got an upgraded video card (its still only a cheap one though). now he thinks its great but doesnt know what all that stuff is for. see, the ONLY game he plays on it is solitare that comes with it. he isnt a gamer AT ALL. and he doesnt run any big apps either. just the stuff he did before with IE and microsoft word. thats it. so he really dosent need a pentium with hyper threading or that much ram or a video card (gee, i think it was a radion 200) thats not intigrated.
so, i asked him why he got it. including monitor, printer, and perhiperils, it cost over $1000. now, i know that for him its a lot, but for most of you gamers, its not really a gameing machien. thats teh problme. when i asked him why he got it, he said he had me in mind when he did. i also assume its because he is getting older and wanted to get something thats more than he needs while he still can. he ordered it from dell. i played the hl2 demo on it, and even with most of the settings medium or low, with none on high, and at 1024x768 resolution, i didnt like it. slow framerate, and very stuttery. it would also often freeze for a while and take forever to load. now here's where the problem starts to come in: he thinks its a great computer. and as i said, he doesnt know computers but he knows i do like computers. and he knows my computer is crap. he said to me that maybe he will buy one for me before i go to colledge. then he said maybe next year he will get me one. my grandpa recently retired, so his budget has gotten a bit tighter.
now, my birthday is on aguust 11. in the past, its kinda been my grandparents tradition to give me $100. today they came over for a quick visit. usually they talk about my birthday to me before it happens but they didnt mention it so i reminded my grandpa that my birthday was in a few days. jokeingly, he said 'oh we are kinda tight on money so we'll just be forgetting about it this year' with a smile. then before he left he told my grandpa that i reminded him of it and jokeingly asked me how i was with just forgetting about my birthday this year. then, my grandma said that they had a surprise for me. this is when i kinda started to worry. 4 or 5 years ago when before they gave me my (or should i say my familys) current computer for christmas, they said that they had a surprise for me. now i know this doesnt mean anything concrete, but i am hopeing that they dont give me a computer. most likely it will be a dell like my grandpas. if i were to get a computer, i would want to save up maybe 5000, and build myself a decent one. also, in a few months, the next version of windows is comeing out (someone remind me of when exactly), and the next generation of graphic cards are comeing out (someone tell me when in the ballpark that might happen), and also pentium 4 has been around for a while, so when will pentium 5 come out? so not only would i be getting a computer that i dont really want because that would keep me from getting one that i do want, but i think if it just waited about 6 months it would be so much better and not obsolete already. and my grandparents would think this is a great gift and i dont know what to say if in fact, it does turn out to be a computer.
i wouldnt want to make my grandparents spend 5000 bucks either.
so what do you think i should do if on my b-day i do get that surprise, and how long do you think it will take for windows longhorn, the next generation of pc grahpics cards, and the next generation of pentiums to come out?
thanks for reading that.
http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?s=&postid=3216330#post3216330
Posted by Priyajeet |
