In the wake of unusually high media attention, DePauw University officials defend not only their reaction to The Princeton Review's "Top Party Schools" ranking but also how they responded.
After the initial ranking, Cindy Babington, vice president of student life, and Steve Setchell, vice president of development and alumni engagement, sent out an e-mail to alumni expressing the university's thoughts on the ranking.
In it, they criticized the methodology used by The Princeton Review, a private company that is not linked to Princeton University, and deemed the ranking to be "wholly specious" and a "disservice" to students, alumni and faculty.
"Anybody can take that survey, which is one of the key flaws," said Ken Owen, executive director of media relations.
Senior Vice President and Publisher of The Princeton Review, Rob Franek, insists that this is not the case.
"We only allow students to use their .edu address," Franek said. "We also work with a third party clearing house at the end of each of our data collection season, which ends right around the end of February. Then, we will validate that those students are who they say they are using a third party collection service."
The website for the survey notes that a .edu email address is preferred, but it is not required for taking the survey.
And while the rankings come from the student surveys, the surveys can be up to three years old.
"School's students can come and fill in our survey throughout the academic year, but every third year, we prompt your school through an official outreach," Franek said. "There are always new surveys coming in from at least one-third of the schools in the book each year."
The last formal resurvey for DePauw University was in the 2011-12 academic year, which means that the ranking this year includes the formal resurveys and independent surveys completed in the 2010-11 and 2012-13 academic years.
The criteria for the party school ranking comes from five separate rankings: lots of beer, lots of hard liquor, lots of drugs, hours spent studying and prevalence of greek life.
DePauw is currently in the top ten for two of the categories, ranking No. 9 for lots of hard liquor and No. 1 for lots of greek life.
Within days, the e-mail was leaked to the Huffington Post by "a concerned alumna," sparking a media and social media frenzy.
Online news sources, such as MSNnow, Total Sorority Move, Total Frat Move and BarstoolU, picked up the story. Current students and alumni alike commented on various forms of social media debating over whether or not the administration should have sent the e-mail.
The debacle began on August 5, when The Associated Press published The Princeton Review's 2013-14 list of the top 20 party schools in the nation. This year, DePauw was ranked 13th, a drop from the previous No. 12 ranking that spurred an e-mail from President Brian Casey to staff, faculty, alumni, parents and current students last August.
Casey's biggest complaint was that the ranking overshadows the other accomplishments from DePauw students, a sentiment that was echoed by the administration this year as well.
Babington cited responses she received that said DePauw is more than just that particular ranking.
"I said, 'Yeah, you are right on DePauw is X, Y and Z, but not everybody sees it as that when they're just looking at our name on a list,'" Babington said, adding that it seems like people appreciate that the school articulated how they felt about the ranking. "All in all, I felt like it was a good thing to do."
Owen speculated that one of the reasons for the excess media attention about this year's rankings is a result of DePauw being the only school in Indiana on the list.
"It was blasted everywhere," Owen said. "The Huffington Post thing was like Frankenstein being revived and storming the countryside again."
Owen noted that some people think that the ranking is a badge of honor.
Dan Meyer, vice president of admission, has always had displeasure with the "work hard, play hard" mentality that many students have.
"When you equate academic quality and being a party school, those two don't go hand in hand," Meyer said. "It's almost like they're saying we can do both."
Meyer and Owen both worry that the ranking has the potential to deter students that would have otherwise come to DePauw. Additionally, Owen worries that the ranking could impact future job interviews for DePauw graduates.
"What we're doing is saying, 'Wait a minute, I don't think that's really us,'" Owen said. "I don't think we're saying that we're sitting around a campfire singing Kumbaya with marshmallows every night."
The administration believes that the ranking is a misrepresentation of DePauw as a whole and stand by their actions.
"At the end of the day, it's tough because if you respond, you risk giving the thing more oxygen," Owen said. "I think if we're stone silent and every Associated Press article has got us in a top 20 list, we're almost saying implicitly that it is right, and we don't think it is."
