Accepted for Fall class of 2025

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Central Florida
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So sorry to hear that. You were pretty positive about her experience last I saw. My D18 has a similar experience in NY and S21 has many teachers just assigning extra homework hoping the kids will teach it themselves as well.

I was surprised by the virtual orientation. We were able to attend a U of SC in person admitted students day. It was done very well (according to Co-vid guidelines) and I am unsure why more campuses are not following their lead.

I am a teacher and in person hybrid since September. We are set to go back 5 days next week. It is very frustrating to hear so many refuse to go in since I am in the classroom every day. By no means should someone who is immune compromised be forced to go in, but there are many ways to adapt, such as having a TA in the room while the teacher teaches synchronously.

I have seen the added activities and hoped that it meant things were getting back to “normal.” I guess we will have to keep watching.

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We’re still positive on UCF, but we sure are hoping for improvement. I’m also very concerned that she’s not actually learning much – and that it will hurt her in the long run.

Right now, I’d say we are doubtful for Summer 2021 and waiting to see what happens for Fall 2021. I’m hoping they’ll run out of excuses by Fall.

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Do you have any idea what percentage of classes are in person? Does anyone she knows have in person classes? Are clubs only meeting virtually?

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I have no idea on the percentages. The only thing I know along those lines is that my D originally had 3 of 5 classes scheduled for in-person for Fall 2020, and all three of those disappeared overnight the night before actual registration opened.

Clubs are meeting only virtually as far as I know. And frankly, I think UCF’s normal VERY active club life has deteriorated to almost nothing.

She has three freshmen roommates. None have had ANY in-person classes in either the Fall or Spring semester. All 4 of the girls have 28-30 hours of credit – zero in-person. She has several other friends, none of whom have had a single in-person class in either semester.

She has one friend who is in Honors. She had one in-person class in Fall 2020 and one in Spring. That girl is the only freshman my D knows who has had more than one in-person class.

We have other friends who are upper-classmen and they have a few in-person classes – apparently depending on major and year. One had 4/4 this Spring, but he’s a senior in archeology.

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Although club stuff is virtual, there are some things open on campus. We also saw a handful of club tents at various places on our last visit
so there is some club activity.

They had football games with very limited attendance. They allowed 3,000 students max, vs the normal 12,000. They are having basketball games now with limited attendance.

Shuttle buses, including the shuttles to other campuses, off-campus apartments, and Publix, are running.

Food outlets at Knights Plaza, the Union, and Williams Center are open. Other stores at all 3 locations (bookstores, etc) are also open.

Meal-plan outlets are open, but with limited hours, severely limited selections, and pre-packaged items. Meal plan reviews are WAY below “Awful/Don’t Even Think About It.” Really bad idea, from all reports.

Lake Claire, including canoeing and kayaking, is open.

The main RWC (gym/rec complex) is open by limited appointment, and the Knights Plaza RWC just re-opened for Spring. Many RWC classes are still remote, but some are live.

Greek functions are severely limited to non-existent. RUSH was virtual, if you can imagine that!

Many other activities, like staff support (including admissions and financial aid), tutoring programs, etc are “remote.” Large majorities of UCF staff, and the vast majority of faculty are working from home
or somewhere other than UCF.

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D18 who has Senior status only had 1 in person in the Fall and none in the Spring. She knows of 1 person who has an in person class this semester.

I personally think they are doing a terrible job of testing- because any school that doesn’t do mandatory testing has no idea how many Covid cases they have. D18 took it upon herself to test at a state site. She had a planned internship for Spring, so isn’t on campus and is glad she isn’t there. She loves UCF- just not paying for a dorm when her classes are online! No school has done a perfect job with Covid.

I’m sad that orientation is virtual, but hopeful that Fall will be better for everyone!

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One more thing- that probably won’t matter since all of you have never had it, but, they are cutting cleaning service for the dorm private bathrooms and cable TV. I believe the cleaning people are being reassigned. I understand the cable, but sometimes is the only way to watch football! My D and her roommates always watched the TV in the living room since there is no Ethernet.

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All of these things are just pushing us further from UCF. Not happy mine hasn’t received any merit notification, but they are still sadly cheaper then other schools shes gotten into WITH merit. But I have not been a fan of their communications and admissions.

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UCF is doing some mandatory random Covid testing, but it’s pretty hard to do when nobody’s in class.

They also still have their testing facility at Garage A, and it’s an easy matter to make an appointment and get tested. They do both rapid and PCR tests. The rapid result is back in minutes and the PCR is ready in a few hours. Our D gets tested before each trip home.

Also, for dorm checkin during Spring move-in, we parked in Garage D and the students walked over to the plaza in front of Addition Arena for their test. They walked back to the garage, and by the time they got to the car, we had the rapid result. Then we were allowed to go to the dorm. Very quick, very efficient, very easy.

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We’ve always had good customer service from undergrad admissions
and student accounts, which is a different office.

Financial aid, on the other hand, is a very frustrating group to deal with. They are simply going to do whatever they are going to do, when and how they want to do it, and nothing is going to move them one way or another. We found them to be the only UCF department that was consistently UNhelpful.

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I wonder if they are just overwhelmed as it is such a large school

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UCF is one of the biggest if not biggest public universities in the US. That comes with some advantages and some disadvantages. I have a D21, so I can sympathize with so many of the issues that all of you are facing. She wouldn’t even consider UCF because it was so big, but once you are there, I don’t think it seems that way!

UCF doesn’t do enough testing and in our college search, it seemed, the more testing, the more likely you would have in person classes. I don’t think UCF can afford the test the amount of population that they need to because they are so big! I also think Covid is a separate issue that is difficult for every school and there is no perfect answer!

Fall class schedules should be out in a few weeks- I will try to remember to post when they go out. Look up classes, see when they are offered and how many times a week they are offered. Classroom space is an issue here. Two day a week classes are common, online classes are common- especially in the business foundation classes! Traditional online classes at UCF rarely have a lecture- you teach yourself. This is the issue with being big! Honors kids can generally avoid this and when Covid isn’t a thing, most kids can avoid online unless they choose it. Surprisingly, many choose online for a lot of their classes- even my D18 has done a few so she can fit it into her work schedule.

For a big school it is newer, so it’s layout is great. The dorms are great- I have really had to stress to D21 that her dorms are not going to even come close! Orlando is a fun city and having so much to do at your doorstep is fantastic, especially during Covid. It’s big, but if you don’t mind that, it can be a great place to go to school.

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One thing I forgot on the Covid discussion above. UCF routinely does Covid testing on all of the dorm wastewater. I’m not sure what kind of results they’ve had, but that’s another thing they do.

They also have a Covid dashboard tracking all their cases and some kind of self-check thing on the UCF app.

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Does anyone know where to find the fall 2021 welcome week information? We are wanting to figure out when students need to move in. I tried the search engine but could not find it.

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Under housing, resources, move in information

They don’t have dates for Fall but in a typical non-covid year, it is the weekend before classes start. So August 20-22. Last year they had move in over several weeks.

Rush for sororities and fraternities usually happens the week before move in. So if kids want to participate they move in early.

We always stayed at the Comfort Inn Research Park because there is a back way into campus.

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I will agree with you on the size. It is huge but it didn’t feel big when you were there. I do highly recommend visiting if you haven’t as you’ll be pleasantly surprised.
But that said for mine out of all the schools she’s applied and been accepted to, UCF has given the least amount of communications and updates.

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I felt like that with D18 and she committed right away! Never got much communication, but it never ends once they are there. They email me constantly now! D18 has also gotten the run around a few times when she needed to do something, but overall she has had little problems. She has never seen an advisor past her freshman year. She just plans out everything in the online planner and gets it done.

I’m not surprised that UCF has come in as the cheapest for your daughter and it’s probably going to be cheaper than you think. We have never paid “sticker price” for our D since freshman year. Last year she took 12 credits in the Fall and 4 in the Spring and this year 12 for Fall and 7 for Spring. She only has 15 hours left that she will spread over 2 semesters next year. She has been able to do 2 full time internships the last 2 Springs that ended up covering the price of her tuition for those semesters.

In a way I am glad that she didn’t get a scholarship- she wouldn’t have been able to go part time with her internships without messing things up. We didn’t want her graduating early. DH and I graduated from Northeastern, so we are used to the semester you go to school, next semester you work- we encouraged her to do something similar. I thought it was crazy to take 15 hours of class and have to work a full time internship in her major- that is what UCF expected.

Paying by the credit hour is a game changer. Especially when you bring in a lot of credits. For those who got scholarship, the forcing of 15 hours is concerning to me. If kids bring in a lot of credit, they will graduate early and never see semesters of money they were supposed to get. It seems disingenuous to me.

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Wow this is great information! We have heard nothing as far as scholarships go yet!

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My oldest son goes to UTD on scholarship and I like the way they handle the required hours. They too require 15 hours a semester, but will allow you to replace some hours earned on AP exams. He is able to take only 12 hours the past 2 years. As far as graduating early and not make full use of the scholarship money, he is using it to get his MS degree as a fast track option. My second oldest will be going to UCF this Fall and is planning to Fast track as well to take advantage of the extra semesters.

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Glad he can take advantage of the Fast track- that is great!

I think the paying by the credit hour is a FL public thing??? Our in state charges the same tuition from 12 credit hour until 19 credit hours. So everyone takes at least 15 or they feel like they are not getting their money’s worth. I think that is pretty typical at most colleges.

D21’s #1 school gives 4 credit hours per class, and they consider full time to be 12 hours or 3 classes. I was surprised- that’s all she needs to take to keep her scholarship. The tuition fee is the same from 12 hours to 20. So you can take 5 classes for the same price as 3. If she goes there, we will have to sit down and figure out exactly how many classes she should take a semester to make the most of her scholarship.