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Drew is best in one of 62 categories surveyed

Drew University took top honors among New Jersey colleges in one of the 62 categories included in Princeton Review's annual ranking of four-year colleges, The Star-Ledger reported.

The survey polled 122,000 students at more than 370 colleges across the country and voters ranked Drew University, which was originally established as the Drew Theological Seminary in 1867, as having the "best college theater" in the country, while Rutgers University and the New Jersey Institute of Technology scored high in categories like "dorms like dungeons" and "professors get low marks."

Voters decided that Bowdoin College in New England had the "best food. The University of Georgia took "top party school" honors, while private Ivy League school Harvard University had the "best library," according to the review. The results were published in "The Best 373 Colleges: 2011 Edition," out Monday.

Franek says the survey's 19-year history has not shown much change for New Jersey school's rankings unlike Princeton University, which consistently scores well in the "great financial aid" and "best classroom experience" categories. NJIT took top billing this year in the "least beautiful campus" slot, while Rutgers ranked Nos. 2 and 3 respectively in the "least accessible professors" and "financial aid not so great" categories.

Robert Franek, a senior vice president at the Princeton Review and the book's lead author, said each year, thousands of parents and high school seniors pore over the guide in search of high-ranking schools.

SEE THE LIST HERE

"Students are very savvy when it comes to picking the right college," Franek, a Drew University graduate, told The Star-Ledger.

"They're asking questions like, ‘what is the advantage of choosing this school? Will it help me land my first job? What is the campus like?'

While some universities use the guide's rankings as a measuring tool for what students think and what areas they need to improve, Franek says some colleges are quick to dismiss the accuracy of the guide's rankings, which they say can bias the college selection process.

A letter sent to the Daily Camera newspaper in Boulder, Colorado appeared to share the sentiments of some of those colleges. The author of the letter was University of Colorado President Bruce Benson, who criticized the Princeton Review and the rankings.

"What I get really upset about is this is headline-grabbing, and it's extremely unscientific," Benson's letter read.

CU-Boulder, a public research university, ranked 16th on the party list this year and No. 1 in 2003, according to the survey, which totaled responses in 60 categories.

— ALICIA CRUZ, NEWJERSEYNEWSROOM.COM