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Members of the Athens Police Department and the Athens Sheriff's Office walk up to a house party and try to clear a path for medical personal to attend to a fest-goer at Mill Fest on Saturday, March 12, 2016. 

Ohio University did not make party school list on Princeton Review

Editors' Note: This story has been updated to include a quote from OU President Roderick McDavis and information regarding financial assistance.

Ohio University’s reign as a top party school might be over.

The university did not rank among the top 20 party schools in the 2017 Princeton Review, which came out Monday.

Instead, OU earned top marks on other lists in the latest rankings: 10th for best athletic facilities and sixth for "financial aid not so great."

Despite the university not being listed as a top party school, students said they still feel OU knows how to party. 

"I would still consider (OU) a party school, especially in Ohio," Alexandra Anderson, a junior studying broadcast journalism, said. 

OU President Roderick McDavis has made an effort to change the high-risk drinking culture, OU Spokesman Dan Pittman said.

“We’ve taken a deliberate approach with the Office for Student Affairs and others on campus, including our city partners, to establish a safe environment for students to grow intellectually and socially,” Pittman said in an email. 

OU came in 16th place in The Princeton Review’s top party school list for the 2015-16 academic year, which was a three spot drop from the year before. Previously, The Princeton Review ranked OU as the top party school in 2011 and third in 2012.

"That's just bizarre to me honestly (that OU is not on the list of party schools)," Anderson said. "I think that maybe we are dropping in the list because we were ranked the past couple of years and I guess people are starting to overlook it, like, that's just what we do." 

In September, Playboy named OU the top party school in the country, citing the Athens Halloween Block Party, the 18 bars on Court Street and the series of springtime fests as the reason.

"We are (the) No. 1 (party school) in our hearts," Scout LaCoe, a sophomore studying sport management, said.

In last year’s Princeton Review, OU also made an appearance on the best athletic facilities list at number 13.

Anderson said The Princeton Review is overrating OU in athletic facilities rankings. 

"I don't think our athletic facilities compare to any Big Ten, Big 12, SEC school," Anderson said. "They worship their athletic teams and here I haven't even been to a football game, and I'm a junior." 

In February, The Post reported the university raised about $5.66 million for the proposed Perry and Sandy Sook Academic Center.

The Sook Center, an academic center for student athletes, will include a large classroom, computer lab, patio and observation deck, lounge, study rooms, staff offices, learning specialist offices, tutor rooms and a copy room.

Madison Patton also expressed her surprise in regard to OU's ranking of athletic facilities.  

"(The athletic facilities) are good, but they're not state of the art," Patton, a sophomore studying management information systems, said. 

Although OU may be a new addition to the "financial aid not so great" list, the university has already garnered attention because of loan defaults, which is when a person goes nine months without making a loan payment.

OU students had the second highest default rate on their student debt among large, public, four-year institutions in 2011, according to the U.S. Department of Education.

The university's three-year loan default rate dropped from 15 percent to about 11 percent, according to 2015 university data. 

According to Pittman, 94 percent of first-year students at OU receive some form of financial assistance and 86 percent of all OU students receive some form of financial assistance.

This is The Princeton’s Review's 25th edition and it surveyed 143,000 students from about 380 colleges for its 2016-17 ranking.

@megankhenry

mh573113@ohio.edu

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