webmaster@wpi.edu Last modified: Tue May 27 12:25:00 EDT 1997The May issue of Yahoo! Internet Life Magazine lists WPI as the 28th "most wired college" in the U.S. This ranking is based upon WPI's responses to a survey conducted this past winter. The survey asked questions like "What percentage of courses have a web page?" and "Are the dorms wired?" Also, the percentage of students and student organizations with personal web pages weighed heavily in the ranking.
WPI fared very well in the ranking, just missing the top 25. 300 colleges were selected by Yahoo! to participate in the survey, and 100 of these were ranked based on their responses to the survey. Other notables in the ranking were Renssalear at #4 and MIT at #1. Four of the seven "Ivy League" schools ranked lower than WPI; only Dartmouth (#5), Princeton (#12), and UPenn (#27) ranked higher. Surprisingly, Holy Cross, the only other area school represented in the ranking, came in ahead of WPI at #22.
The Social Web (social.wpi.edu) created by WPI's own Troy Thompson earned WPI a place in the "Top 5 Wired Party Schools - notable for their leisurely use of the 'net." While overstating the number of "friends and lovers" that have "met through its matchmaking feature," Yahoo! accurately cites the Social Web as uniting the ten campuses of the Worcester Consortium "socially online."
The complete issue of Yahoo! Internet Life is available on the web at http://www.zdnet.com/yil/filters/toc/currentoc.html.