Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: MONDAY, November 15, 1993                   TAG: 9311150037
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: C-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Landmark News Service
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Long

COLLEGE GUIDE TELLS WHERE THEY PLAY, WHERE THEY PRAY

So says "The Princeton Review Student Access Guide," a new college book that rates 286 schools based on multiple-choice surveys filled out by 40,000 students.

Like most college guides, this one will tell you average SAT scores, tuition stats and popular majors. But it'll also give you a fix on campus life and tell you where students pray the most, where the "dorms are like dungeons," and where gays get the coldest shoulder. Here's the lowdown for Virginia:

Twelve schools are mentioned, including the usual stars in higher education - the University of Virginia and William and Mary. But two women's colleges, Hollins and Sweet Briar, won the loudest raves.

Hollins ranked tops in the nation in terms of "best quality of life," "happy students," "things run smoothly" and "professors bring material to life."

Sweet Briar was first in the country in offering "great food," fifth in "dorms like palaces," 12th in happy students and 18th in students going on "old-fashioned dates" (as opposed to hanging out in big, unromantic groups).

So how can students be so rah-rah about a place where there are no guys? That's exactly why, says Carson Scheppe, a junior at Sweet Briar.

"I like not having them here 24 hours a day," she says. "It's just a bunch of girls having a good time. We see them when we want to see them."

Katherine Allen, a freshman at Hollins, isn't surprised that she's at the happiest campus. "I really don't know anybody who doesn't like Hollins," Allen says. "Here, they go out of their way to individualize the school to help the students; it's not like students have to conform to the school."

That attitude comes from the top. The guide praises the effervescent president, Jane M. O'Brien, whom most students refer to simply by her nickname, Maggie. And so does Allen.

Allen knows one student who was fretting last year about getting a job after graduating. She went to Maggie's house and hashed out her anxieties over the kitchen table. Maggie called some friends who work for Time/Life Books and - presto! - the student got a job in public relations there.

Both women's colleges made the top seven in the country for easy-to-find profs. "They come to all the school functions," Scheppe says. "You eat with them and party with them on fall weekends. They have you over for dinner at the end of the semester, and you meet their families."

And what about that A-1 food? No arguments there. "The food here is excellent; it's detrimental to your waistline, but it's excellent," says Sweet Briar sophomore Abby Phillips, who goes for the fudge pie and chocolate mint ice cream.

Scheppe's picks are the pecan pie ("sweet but not too rich at all"), shrimp-and-steak night and omelets. Better than at home? "It doesn't compare. My mom cannot make an omelet."

The University of Richmond was No. 1 in the country for having a "homogeneous student body" and "race/class relations" that are "strained or nonexistent." That didn't appear to bother too many folks: It ranked 18th in the nation in "quality of life."

Ronya Edwards, a black freshman from Norfolk, said she hasn't found many problems. Allison Burris, a white senior, recalled her first thought on campus: "These people are so white. . . . I was nervous that every girl would be snobby and rich and have cherry red BMW convertibles. A lot of students don't have cars this year. The university is attracting more people now."

Randy Fitzgerald, a school spokesman, said, "The perception of UR students as rich and white and close-minded is way off the mark." More than 40 percent get financial aid, he said, and the percentage of students who are minorities has gone from 4 percent to 10 percent in the past five years. State figures show that less than 5 percent are black.

At Washington and Lee University in Lexington, heavy partying apparently doesn't detract from academics. The school was ranked tops in the nation in "major frat and sorority scene" and third in "lots of hard liquor." But it weighed in No. 17 in "overall academic experience" - the only Virginia school in the top 20.

Despite the convivial atmosphere, Washington and Lee was also fourth in the nation in "gay students ostracized/discriminated against" and sixth in "homogeneous student body." (No Virginia school, by the way, made the top 20 in "gay community accepted" or "diverse student body.")

James Madison University, according to the book, goes heavy on the food and light on the homework. It ranked 10th in the nation in great food and 16th in having students who "[almost] never study."

Rich Flinchbaugh, a senior who's into the chicken and Mexican food, says he studies only two hours a week. "I don't study more because I've been here long enough to know what's going to be asked and what's required," he said.

UVa and William and Mary have surprisingly few mentions. UVa was fifth in the nation in "lots of hard liquor," 10th in "great libraries" and eighth in "college newspaper gets read." William and Mary was 19th in "students pray on a regular basis."

That's not so surprising to the lead author, Tom Meltzer. At big-name schools, he said, "students often come with high expectations and end up disappointed."