Features

Students shrug off latest
survey by Princeton Review 

ROLLA, Mo. — R.J. Agee says the University of Missouri-Rolla is a great place, no matter what you read about it. 

Citing “dungeon dorms,” bad food and poor community relations, The Princeton Review’s latest college survey says Agee and his classmates at the university should be the unhappiest students in the country. 

But many who attend the school, where 70 percent of the students study engineering, just scoff. 

“A lot of people don’t understand it. The facts have no basis. It’s a joke,” said Agee, a senior and the student council president. 

The review, which surveyed 100,000 students nationwide, placed Missouri-Rolla last in the quality of life ranking of its “Best 345 Colleges” guide — the bottom of the heap in a section called Purgatory. 

The publication said Missouri-Rolla also suffered from inaccessible professors and political apathy. The school took more lumps for its tiny size and supposedly bad food — it ranked 20th in the food ranking, making it the best of the bad. 

Many students say they’re content: Classes are rigorous, Internet access is top notch, and there’s free cable in every dorm room. Yahoo! once ranked it one of the nation’s most wired campuses.