UC Santa Barbara was knocked off its throne as the best party school in America following a 2027 Niche ranking.
UCSB fell from 1st place to 26th place. Florida State University won the top spot in the overall list of best party schools in the country.
Niche, a website for reviewing and ranking schools in the U.S., uses student surveys on party scene, greek life and athletics, as well as data from the U.S. Census on campus access to bars and restaurants to make its list.
Last year, UCSB was ranked 1st for top party schools in America. But this year, the university fell out of the race as students saw Deltopia become a lost memory following a noise ordinance from the county aimed to stop the event, as well as a noticeable increase in police enforcement on weekends.
Despite being ranked 26th place this year nationwide, UCSB was ranked 3rd for top party schools in California. It was also ranked 1st place for best Greek life in the state.
In Isla Vista, “there’s always something happening,” said Victoria Arens, a junior at UCSB.
Arens said UCSB and its students have had a bad reputation for being known as a party school, and that the university started having a larger focus on academics.
But of all the parties at UCSB, Deltopia was easily the biggest and most well known by every student, said Gavin Moran, an incoming sophomore and athlete for the university’s baseball team.
However, Moran said he did not experience the annual unsanctioned event his freshman year following a noise ordinance from the county.
In January, the Santa Barbara County Board of Supervisors voted to enforce a noise ordinance on Isla Vista during Deltopia weekend, leaving many students like Moran unable to participate in the event.
While Deltopia was on its way out his first year, the partying at UCSB had been well known among Moran and his friends long before coming to the university, he said.
But the student athlete said that once he got here, most parties were hard to get into as a guy if you weren’t part of a fraternity. Instead, Moren and his friends mostly attended parties hosted by student athletes every quarter.
Still, Moren thinks the Niche ranking “doesn’t change anything” for him. UCSB still has the outgoing, outdoor lifestyle he has grown accustomed to.
Under UCSB’s profile on Niche there were 4,898 reviews for the university, giving it an overall four out of five star rating on the website.
