Who needs to pass college classes when passing out drunk is so much more fun?

Despite years of national hand-wringing over campus binge drinking, Colgate researchers came to the sobering conclusion that boozy kids simply enjoy college life much more than their dry classmates.

Sociology professor Carolyn Hsu and former assistant psychology prof Landon Reid, presenting at the American Sociological Association’s annual conference today, said the documented risks of heavy drinking are not outweighing fun times at Animal House universities across America.

Hsu and Reid asked students at a northeast liberal arts school in 2009 if they had gone binge drinking — defined as five drinks in one sitting for men, four for women — anytime in the past two weeks.

Then all respondents were asked if they “feel very positive about my social experience on campus overall,” rating themselves from 1 “strongly disagree” to 7 “strongly agree.”

The binge drinkers loved their college life at a 5.83 score while non-binge drinkers rated themselves at less-fun 4.61.

“It’s been well documented, they [college binge drinkers] get sick more, miss more classes, are victims of sexual assault, all these terrible things — but it doesn’t change anything,” Hsu said. “They’ve [college students] learned to expect a good time from drinking, learned to expect positive things from drinking.”

The researchers found, not surprisingly, that lower-income, female, minority and gay students enjoyed college less than their richer, white, male and straight counterparts.

But even within those disadvantaged socioeconomic groups, booze hounds are loving college more than tea drinkers, across the board, researchers found.

— Among poorer students: Non-binge drinkers 4.65, binge drinkers 5.20;

— Among minorities: Non-binge drinkers 4.45, binge drinkers 4.96;

— Among women: Non-binge drinkers 4.82, binge drinkers 5.34;

— Among gays: Non-binge drinkers 4.10, binge drinkers 4.58.

“It’s as if these groups are looking at the higher-status groups and saying `Hey they’re having a good time, what are they doing that we can borrow so we can have a good time too?’ “ said Reid, who is now studying law at NYU.

Both researchers said they’re troubled by their findings.

“Low-status students who binge drink are paying close attention to their environments,” Reid said.

“This is in stark contrast to the idea of the exclusionary racial minority or poor student who opts out of the broader college culture. Instead, we find there is a group of students who have copied their peers, all too well, by swapping short-term social satisfaction with negative long term outcomes.”