While on vacation, I visited the University of Florida (UF), a
public university in Gainesville, with about 36,000 undergraduates, about 90 minutes north of
Orlando. My guide was a senior finance major who had studied
abroad in Barcelona one summer. He also had a summer internship that he got through UF
which led to the job which he has accepted for after graduation.
UF is among the largest universities in the
nation. It has over 100 undergraduate majors, more than 1000 student
organizations, and is on more than 2000 acres. Most of the buildings are low-rise
brick buildings. One fun fact about UF
is that Gatorade was invented here.
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| Century Tower |
Housing and Food – Freshmen are not required to live on
campus but 75% do. There are about 8000 beds available on campus, including traditional doubles, suites, and apartments. Housing is on a first-come
first-serve basis so make a $25 deposit even before you get accepted, if you want to
increase your chance of getting the housing you want.
The school offers all-you-can-eat dining, as well as food from many chain eateries including
Chick-fil-a, Starbucks, Subway, and Einstein Bagels. Hare Krishna sells the
popular all-you-can-eat $5 vegetarian lunch.
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| Student Union |
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| Scooter & Motorcycle Parking |
Transportation – There are a lot of buses to take you around
campus and around surrounding Gainesville.
The most desirable parking is allocated to scooters and motorcycles.
Library – The libraries are organized from noisiest to most quiet floor as you go
from the first floor up.
Football – Go Gators! Football is huge at UF. Students pay $20 per game or $120 per season
for seats.
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| Football Stadium |
Applying – UF uses the Coalition for Access, Affordability
and Success Application. Students apply
by 11/1 and get a decision on the 2nd Friday in February at 6 pm.
UF re-calculates your GPA using only English, Math, Science,
Social Studies, and Foreign Language classes.
They weight grades depend on the difficulty of these classes (e.g.,
Honors, AP, IB). The mid 50% recomputed
GPA is between 4.2 and 4.5. The middle
50% test scores are 28-32 for the ACT and 1290-1440 for the new SAT. UF also
look at your senior year classes.
