Based on surveys taken from 122,000 students, the Princeton Review has released their annual rankings of colleges. By far the list that gets the most attention is the ranking of the top party schools in the nation. The ranking is figured based on survey questions relating to student use of alcohol and drugs, hours of study done each day, and the popularity of the Greek system at the school.

The University of Georgia was ranked number one for the first time, which is surprising considering the effort put forth to curb student drinking. Georgia requires first year and transfer students to complete an interactive online alcohol course, a program that students must pass before the first day of classes. Georgia will also call home to parents when an underage student gets caught drinking.

But Georgia students still have easy access to alcohol with nearly 100 bars located near the Athens campus. In the ranking Georgia took seventh place for students who drink beer and placed in the top 10 for how little students study, the popularity of the Greek system, and how many students attend football games.

Georgia parties so hard, even one of their administrators was busted for a DUI.

But according to this letter to the editor, Georgia is partying way less than it used to:

Call up anyone you know who went to Georgia 10 years ago. Ask them what it was like. Ask them about the rule that stipulates that two alcohol related events within a year of one another will get a student suspended. Ask them about the increased security at bars downtown. Ask them about the newly-instituted pairing of police officers on practically every street corner downtown. Aid them in retrieving their jaws from the floor. Ask them about their craziest college memory – I’m willing to bet its pretty wild – or at least wilder than yours. Aid yourself in retrieving your jaw from the floor. Inquire into how the Greek life scene was back in the day – then tell them about all of the rules and ‘regs currently in place.

Two factors that determine the top party schools are those with the least amount of study time and the amount of alcohol the students drink. We think it should be those who study more, get high marks, and still make time to party that should get the higher honor. Anyone can go out and party. It takes a special dedication to want to go out late and be social, yet still manage to wake up for that 8am class.

Princeton Review's Top Party Schools for 2011

1. University of Georgia
2. Ohio University
3. Penn State University
4. West Virginia University
5. University of Mississippi
6. University of Texas at Austin
7. University of Florida
8. University of California – Santa Barbara
9. University of Iowa
10. DePauw University
11. Florida State University
12. University of Wisconsin - Madison
13. University of Alabama
14. Sewanee - The University of the South
15. Indiana University - Bloomington
16. University of Colorado - Boulder
17. University of Missouri
18. University of Illinois
19. University of Maryland
20. Michigan State University

It is interesting to note that the majority of the colleges in this list also have big football programs with a high presence of tailgating and after game festivities. These are type of schools whose game day parties begin with kegs and eggs and end with burning couches. Something about college sports just brings about the party and riot atmosphere.

Other category rankings in the Princeton Review that relate to “partying” include:

Worst Party Schools

1. BYU
2. Wheaton College (Illinois)
3. U.S. Coast Guard Academy
4. U.S. Air Force Academy
5. Wesleyan College
6. College of the Ozarks
7. U.S. Naval Academy
8. U.S. Military Academy
9. Calvin College
10. Thomas Aquinas College
11. Grove City College
12. Wellesley College
13. Mills College
14. Marywood University
15. Berea College College
16. Cal State - Stanislaus
17. CUNY Queens
18. Mount Holyoke College
19. Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering
20. Agnes Scott College

Most Beer Drinkers

1. Ohio University – Athens
2. Pennsylvania State University – University Park
3. University of New Hampshire
4. University of Florida
5. Claremont McKenna College
6. University of Alabama – Tuscaloosa
7. University of Georgia
8. West Virginia University
9. Colgate University
10. Providence College

Most Hard Liquor Drinkers

1. Providence College
2. University of Georgia
3. Tulane University
4. University of Wisconsin – Madison
5. University of Mississippi
6. Indiana University – Bloomington
7. Ohio University – Athens
8. University of Alabama – Tuscaloosa
9. Sewanee – The University of the South
10. Trinity College (CT)

Most Potheads

1. University of California – Santa Cruz
2. Eckerd College
3. Bard College
4. University of Vermont
5. Skidmore College
6. University of Colorado – Boulder
7. Colorado College
8. Hampshire College
9. University of California – Santa Barbara
10. Ithaca College

Students Study the Least

1. University of North Dakota
2. University of Central Florida
3. University of Mississippi
4. State University of New York at Albany
5. West Virginia University
6. Louisiana State University Baton Rouge
7. University of Iowa
8. Florida State University
9. University of Georgia
10. Salisbury University

Unless your dorm is like a palace, the thought of cramming two beds, two desks, and two people with all of their stuff into one small room is mind-boggling. It makes one wonder how those with three people to a room survive (and you wondered why so many go home for the weekend). Outside of being a minimalist, your best solution is having a loft bed in your dorm room.

Sure, you can go out and by an expensive loft bed set-up, or pick up a cheap metal frame from IKEA, but since it's summertime… how about a summer project?

Building your own loft bed is a project that pays off twofold: it will save you money and will allow you to maximize the space of your dorm room. Elevating your bed allows you to place your desk under the loft, giving you more space to arrange your room.

Cost

The wood and supplies needed to build the loft will cost about $100-$150, unless you can get your wood for free. Any time and expense you put into building this project can easily be recovered by selling the loft frame to another student when you no longer need it.

Building Tips

• By constructing the loft bed frame with nuts and bolts instead of screws, you can easily disassemble the loft at the end of the school year and reuse it again in the fall.


• Before building, you may want to check with your dorm regarding any regulations they may have. Sometimes you have to leave a certain amount of clearance between the bed and the ceiling, and the dorm may have other rules like not allowing loft beds to be placed in front of windows.


• It is a good idea to know your room’s dimensions so you know what you’re working with.


• What size mattress will you be using? The majority of dorms use a twin XL mattress. Check with your dorm to make sure.

Building Plans for a Loft

To begin your construction of a loft bed you will need a plan to follow. Free plans can be found on the Internet at DIY websites. The plan we are looking at today comes from Knock-Off Wood.

The plan from Knock-Off Wood is a loft for a twin bed. If you will be using a twin XL mattress you will need to make minor adjustments as a twin XL is 5” longer than a twin. The plan was designed as a “teen” loft bed, so some larger students may want to add cross bracing for additional stability.

Tools required for this job include:

• Tape Measure
• Square
• Level
• Saw
• Drill
• Sander
• Finishing Tools (Paint Brushes, etc)

After following the 13-step plan for building your loft bed, you should have something that looks very similar to this:

Other Plans

Other loft bed plans can be found at Ask the Builder and on the Instructables website.

UCLA's Higher Education Research Institute recently conducted a survey of students in their first year of college. The survey was taken in spring of 2009 by over 25,000 first year college students. Questions were designed to analyze the academic and personal development progress of students through their first year in college.

Obviously there is a big change going from high school to college. This survey takes a look at the multiple aspects students face when going through this adjustment phase. Among them is time management.

In the transition from high school to college, first year students have found themselves spending much more time studying and doing homework. However, these students are still able to find a balance between academics and extracurricular activities, as nearly 80% of those surveyed agreed so.

Students were asked how much time they spent per week on various activities. Here is what the majority of those surveyed reported:

How College Students Spend their Time

Other related surveys

The Bureau of Labor Statistics conducted a Time Use Survey to look at how the average college student spends their weekday. They found the typical college student spends 3.3 hours engaged in educational activities, 3.1 hours working, 8.3 hours sleeping, and 3.7 hours doing leisure and sports activities.

The number of college graduates moving back home has continuously increased over the past few years. In 2009, 80% of college grads moved back home after graduation. How many 2010 grads will do the same?

With the current economic condition and a tight job market, many recent grads return home to save money and stay there until they land a job, or become financially stable.

Things are looking slightly better for this year’s class. About 25% of the Class of 2010 who applied for a job actually have one lined up.

Graduating also means payments for student loans will soon be due. This financial pressure adds fuel to the fire in an already stressful situation of finding a job after college.

Because of the tight job market, college graduates seem to be more willing to accept entry-level jobs. This year, 39 percent of seniors reported they had received job offers, with 59 percent of those students taking the job. Last year, 40 percent of seniors were offered jobs, but only 45 percent accepted them.

Students are realizing they can’t be picky in their job selection, as they grasp the fact that the market is already flooded with many others with bachelor’s degrees looking for work.

Percent of college grads moving back home:
2006 - 67%
2007 - 73%
2008 - 77%
2009 - 80%
Source: CollegeGrad.com

Many first-year college students are having concerns about being able to afford college. Students surveyed in 2009 showed that financial concern has reached a 40-year high when it comes to paying for college.

This financial pressure is forcing more students into debt as 53.3% turned to student loans in 2009, up nearly 4 percentage points from 2008 and the highest level reported in nine years.

Financial concerns have also affected college choice as 41.6% of students reported that cost was a "very important" factor in choosing which college to attend, the highest level since the question was added to the survey five years ago.

Because money plays such a huge part in college selection, more students are looking into colleges that provide top-notch career services and are choosing colleges where graduates get good jobs. The percentage of students reporting employment and financial success after college as "very important" increased to 56.5 percent in 2009, the highest level since the question was introduced in 1983. Perhaps this is why schools like Dartmouth are seeing an all-time high number of applicants; the school was ranked #1 in a recent salary survey.

No major introduction needed here, as a picture is worth a thousand words. Here we take a look at some of the most magnificent university libraries across the country.

Comfort and atmosphere play a huge role in getting in a quality study session. The problem is that some of these libraries are so beautiful that they almost become too distracting to study in.

Quick List

1. Bapst Library, Boston College
2. William W. Cook Legal Research Library, University of Michigan
3. Suzzallo Library, University of Washington
4. Butler Library, Columbia University
5. Fisher Fine Arts Library, Penn
6. Chancellor Green Library, Princeton
7. Doe Library, UC Berkeley
8. Harper Library, University of Chicago
9. Frederick Ferris Thompson Memorial Library, Vassar
10. Sterling Memorial Library, Yale
11. Firestone Library, Princeton
12. Powell Library, UCLA
13. George Peabody Library, Johns Hopkins University
14. Widener Library, Harvard
15. Special Collections Library, University of Virginia
16. Perkins/Bostock Library, Duke University
17. Riggs Library, Georgetown University
18. Bizzell Memorial Library, University of Oklahoma
19. Rush Rhees Library, University of Rochester
20. Baker Hall, Harvard
21. Williston Library, Mount Holyoke College
22. Uris Library, Cornell
23. Monroe Library, Loyola University New Orleans
24. Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library, Yale
25. Baker Memorial Library, Dartmouth