Term change from Innovation Academy (Spring '13) to Summer B ('12)????

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Florida
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<p>The majority of IA students stayed home, a very small number actually stayed in Fall. It’s simply those that did stay in Fall during pre-enrollment semester DID have advantages. I can understand your concern about staying in Gainesville during the pre-enrollment Fall before the rest of the cohort moves in, but fact is that your daughter won’t be an outsider. Every IA student that stayed in Fall during their pre-enrollment Fall loved it. The club and campus involvement, or even on-campus job will prove to your daughter she is no outsider, she’s a gator. Every IA student that stayed in Fall during their pre-enrollment Fall semester will tell you they did not feel like an outsider because they were involved. I’m telling you this through the internet, but if we were at BackStage pass, the students that stayed in pre-enrollment Fall would have told you exactly what I’m telling you now. We have articles about IA that dismiss the concern you have now.</p>

<p>And again, you don’t HAVE to stay in Gainesville during the Fall. There are benefits, however it’s not mandatory for your daughter to be in Gainesville during Fall. Like I said before, the MAJORITY of inaugural students stayed home and did other things before they started in the Spring term. I would actually say about, 10-15 inaugural students stayed in Gainesville during the pre-enrollment fall. Not that many. The rest of the inaugural students got jobs back at home, did internships, traveled, did online classes, and etc. Your daughter’s options are open, it’s up to her what she wants to do during the Fall semester.</p>

<p>Also, for your comment where you say " But if that’s not the case, and everyone else has already been there a semester and knows one-another, that isn’t going to be great for her": I wouldn’t worry about that at all. It is for this reason that IA students transition together and get to know eachother. I suppose one wouldn’t truly understand until they came, but as an IA student you’re part of an exclusive community while also being a part of the gator nation. In IA, you feel like a student rather than another number in the 50,000 student count. A large reason students join fraternities and sororities is so that they can mainly be part of a smaller community within a large campus. However, in IA, that’s not necessary. There are still IA students who join fraternities and sororities, however, they do so for other reasons mostly; they already have a smaller community within a larger campus, one they have already connected with.</p>

<p>When the UF Class of 2016 was admitted last year, everyone was on facebook talking, meeting, and asking about eachother’s majors…then when they moved in, everyone was meeting eachother in person, making new friends…well today, the facebook page for the class of 2016 is basically another craigslist, and the Class of 2016 today does not have a huge “clique.” </p>

<p>The IA freshman experience is far better than the normal freshman experience because in the IA freshman experience, you are with a cohort, a small family while still being part of the gator nation. Transitioning is smoother, easier. You mentioned the “same boat” previously, well, that “same boat” will be the case come Spring 2013, except, it will be a bit more special.</p>

<p>One thing people are concerned with is “well, IA students won’t graduate the same time as the rest of their class.” Trust me when I say, that doesn’t matter. For the Class of 2017, roughly half the students within it will end up graduating early or late. Part of that class will end up dropping out and the rest will not graduate because they will end up going to pharmacy school or something. The Class of 2017 will not be together all the time, it will, very quickly disperse. That’s just how things are. It happened with the class of 2016, 2015, 2014, and etc. etc.</p>

<p>I honestly would advise you go to another BackStage Pass and stay for the Q&A session and address everything you are addressing in this thread because you can get face-to-face answers from the students, director, and faculty. The reason we have a break out session is because so many people have so many questions and while you may have wanted to hear everyone’s questions and answers, many other people are more concerned with just having ONLY THEIR questions addressed and answers given (many people don’t want to sit for a long period of time listening to questions and answers, from those around them, they don’t care to hear, because they only care about what concerns them). If we did a standard Q&A where we answered questions one by one, without a breakout session, then we would all be sitting in the auditorium for more than two or three hours. </p>

<p>The breakout Q&A session lasted as long as the interested students and parents stayed. For the first session, I believe the Q&A session lasted until 3 pm or so. We answered plenty of parents and students, and we answered on a first come, first serve type of style. We didn’t stay and answer questions for a set period of time then dismiss everyone; we stayed until the parents and interested students were finished.</p>

<p>About the 300 dorm-space thing for IA, here’s the idea: there are A LOT of statistics that goes into housing. The university overall houses no more than 10,000 (that’s probably too large of a number) undergraduate students. Now every year, housing knows a certain number of students will live off campus and a certain number will live on campus. Based off their statistics, the housing department expects about 300 students to need on campus housing, so they provide about 300 housing spaces. They expect 200 to live off campus. Now if I recall correctly, if there is a 301st (or more) student that needs housing, and there is no space in beaty, then the student will be housed wherever there is an open space on campus. NOW, normally that 301st (or more) student would’ve been the student who submitted their housing fee LATE. You and your daughter seemed to have sent it in on time. In that case, I wouldn’t worry about not getting on campus housing with other IA students, your daughter should be housed in Beaty East because she was not late with her housing fee. </p>

<p>And let’s say, as “what if” situation, housing saw 400-450 students needing on campus housing. What does this mean? They need to learn to do better statistics. However, the housing department has been housing students for decades on decades, they know what they are doing. </p>

<p>And to get it out of the way, why not offer 500 spots “anyways” in the Spring? Well, mainly because, if statistics are right, we will have 200 empty dorm spots come the Spring time. UF is a campus with limited resources and those 200 empty spots are resources not in use, in other words, kind of “going to waste.” UF is all about resource streamlining and maxamizing.</p>

<p>I hope I answered your questions, and again, I highly advise scheduling another BackStage pass session and staying for the Q&A session for as long as you may need. The Q&A sessions last as long as they need (it’s not possible to make them last longer when they last as long as the students and parents want them to last), and even by the time we finish answering parents and students, we stay for a little longer (and chit chat with eachother for like 10, 20 minutes) in case anybody comes back with a question. The only people who may need to leave after an hour or so of Q&A are the faculty and director (due to the fact they have meetings and a bunch of other stuff to do every day), however inaugural student representatives will stay as long as need be. I would even advise sitting in the front (we have empty seats in the front row often enough) then coming to a representative as quick as possible when the breakout Q&A session begins. </p>

<p>We ARE adding stuff to our BackStage Pass sessions however, piece by piece (but this is mainly via things we think of…for the most part, our evaluation forms are filled with positive reviews by the majority of students and parents).</p>

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<p>Lol, I actually managed to read all of that. Awesome.</p>

<p>Well, Alex23, I noticed you contradicted yourself a few times. Just as an example, you say you want the Q&A session to last so that you can hear EVERYONE’S questions and answers yet in the post before you express how one of the questions by the parents was rather ridiculous (quote: “‘If my daughter has a lot of AP credits, would they still transfer if she’s in Innovation Academy?’ (Like, really, why WOULDN"T they?”…emphasis on the “Like, really, why WOULDN"T they?”). Another contradiction was how you say a huge crowd of parents and students stayed for Q&A yet in the post before you said everyone was rushing out to make it to the tour. Not trying to criticize you but I am pointing it out. </p>

<p>It seems as though a lot of what you are saying could have been addressed at that Q&A session if only you and your daughter stayed longer. Plus, if you and your daughter were truly ambitous, you would’ve went out of your way to get your questions answered. I know for me, if I have questions on something I really care about, I make sure I go out of my way, no matter what, to get the answers. I don’t give up. And if the Q&A session lasted for as long as the students and parents made it last, then that only means one thing: </p>

<p>Q&A session that ends until questions end+you and your daughter giving up=your fault for not getting questions and concerns answers. </p>

<p>It’s not the fault of those that run the BackStage Pass. They stayed there for as long as they needed to stay and you and your daughter CHOSE to left without getting your questions answered. You guys CHOSE to leave without getting answers. Key phrase: CHOSE to leave. Key word: LEAVE. No one dismissed you, you left.</p>

<p>And my friends in IA that stayed in Fall didn’t feel like outsiders at all…they went to football games (had to get general admission tickets though, your daughter has it better because she can get student tickets by simply being enrolled in 6 credits online), used the gym, hanged out with friends that hanged out there in the Fall, did clubs and organizations…they weren’t outsiders at all, actually, I think they had a better Fall experience than anyone because they didn’t have to worry about waking up in the morning to go to lecture or something, their schedules were super flexible and they were able to get involved in so much more than the average UF student. Kind of makes me a bit jealous I will never be able to have a Fall to just get involved as much as I want and do as much as I want without the hassle of a full class load.</p>

<p>I’d take GatorWinner23’s advice and go to another BackStage pass session (well, that’s if you need to go at this point; I think GatorWinner did a good job at answering all of your concerns within this thread). Be a go-getter when the Q&A session happens, don’t give up. It’d be a shame if you and your daughter passed up the opportunity to attend the best university in Florida due to miniscule reasons. I personally view the IA route better than the normal route to a degree. The ONLY limitation really would be the limited amount of majors…if you want a major outside of IA, you have to either transfer out of the program or work to bring the major to the program. Otherwise, if let’s say you’re finance…it’s better to get a finance degree through IA than through the traditional calendar IMO, because you ge a small college experience at a big university, the innovation minor, and other opportunities regular students will not get.</p>

<p>I mean no offense to you in anything within this post. And I’m like 100% super serious, I really mean NO offense, if you have been offended, I’m going to feel like a terrible person and I owe you a super sincere apology. So again, no offense to you at all within this post, if you are offended, feel free to express it because I WILL write you an essay of apology; it doesn’t float well with my boat when I offend people I try to advise/help out.</p>

<p>Have a great day!</p>

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<p>Gatorwinner and Sabertooth, just to clarify, I STAYED for the Q&A session. I stayed for the Q&A session that I could HEAR. We left at about 2:30. At that point, the Q&A session had devolved into people clustered around the stage so that, even though people were asking questions, others could not hear the answers to the questions. Nonetheless, my daughter stayed until close to 3:00. At that point, she gave up on hearing or asking her question and went to meet us. All I’m saying is it would have been nice if the OFFICIAL Q&A session with the MICROPHONE had lasted longer. There was really no reason to stop that and go with the clustering around the stage format. Just trying to be helpful. Believe me, I will call UF and get my questions answered. But if they’d like fewer individual phone calls (and who wouldn’t?), they could accomplish that by answering more questions in the session.</p>

<p>As far as going again, I live 6 hours from Gainesville, so no, I’m not going to be able to pull my daughter out of school and devote another two days to this between now and May 1. Unfortunately, that was it. Her school is very strict about absences, and it practically took an Act of Congress with getting all her teachers’ permission to go ONCE.</p>

<p>However, Gatorwinner, it is helpful to know that the majority aren’t going to be in Gainesville (probably) in fall, and that if she registered on time, she should get into Beaty. So thanks. I definitely want her to be in with the rest of the group.</p>

<p>Sabertooth, I’m a parent asking a question about a school my daughter will probably attend, not exactly the enemy. So please don’t try to poke holes in my story. I did not “contradict myself.” There were 10 minutes of questions, about 2 of which were taken up with a super-dumb one that I can guarantee no other parent had. So, yeah, it would have been better to answer more obvious ones. And I did not CHOOSE to leave without getting an answer. I asked my question. The answer was inadequate. I had no reason to believe that, by staying an extra 15 minutes, a better answer would somehow materialize. It’s like that thing about the definition of insanity being to do the same thing and expect different results. But, as I said, we did stay. However, at some point, it became obvious we weren’t able to hear the questions and answers because it was just a big mob around the stage. I don’t do mobs. Were you there?</p>

<p>Anyway, thanks, Gatorwinner. That was informative.</p>

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<p>And, btw, I’m not exactly the ONLY person expressing reservations about IA. Most people on this thread are trying to figure out how to get out of it or talking about how horrible it is. We actually CHOSE it. I’m just trying to make sure it will work for our daughter. So don’t get all hostile.</p>

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<p>Alex23, look at the dates for most of the posts on this thread…this was all inaugural class before, and people only wanted out of it because they didnt know they applied for IA when they checked the box since it said simply “interest.” Many inaugural students thought it only meant “get more info.” Admissions fixed that for the new class, they made sure that they knew they are applying for IA. They had a separate section on the app. and everything. That’s how they get people who actually DO want it and therefore remove any miscommunication. Plus I know a user or two in the first few posts personally (lol). </p>

<p>Also, first you said you and your daughter gave up at the Q and A session, THEN you say, you asked your question but got a bad answer? Something doesn’t add up. You gave up which is why you left or you didn’t get an answer you wanted so you left…that’s a contradiction. Now lets just go ahead with scenario B: you didn’t get an adequate answer…how about asking everyone else there instead of leaving simply?</p>

<p>I’m not looking for holes, I’m just…finding them. Again, no offense, but I thought I’d bring it up. On the CC forums, I mainly hang around to try to make sure information here is at least somewhat viable/clear for other users reading. </p>

<p>I’m not getting hostile, if I am, I don’t mean to come across like that. How I can prove that to you, idk.</p>

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<p>Here’s a timeline, since it’s apparently hugely important to you to know the exact details (though I wasn’t looking at my watch the whole time, so all times are approximate) and, apparently, I wasn’t clear:</p>

<p>1:00: Session Started
1:50-2:05 (approximately): Q&A. I asked my question about housing (The same one I asked Gatorwinner, “What happens if more than 300 people want IA housing?”). I asked this question to the three people onstage. The answer was, “We’ll do something.” THE REASON I DIDN’T STAY AND ASK MY QUESTION TO “EVERYONE ELSE” was because I asked it of the three people in charge there and, there being no one from Housing there, it was obviously the only answer they had to give. Who the heck is “everyone else” that I should have asked? Was someone from Housing (or from the Future) going to materialize and come up with a better answer?
2:00: Tour begins. Half the people in the room disappear, but we stay because we already took the tour at 10:00 and are interested in hearing more about IA considering we drove 6 hours to Gainesville, stayed in a hotel, and will drive 6 hours back.
2:05: Someone on stage says, “We’re going to have to let you go now.” People don’t want to leave and start clustering around the stage. Yes, my main specific question is answered, but I’m still interested in hearing more about the program, and our daughter says she has a question. Therefore, we stay until:
2:30 Unable to hear anything, we go to the food court to get a drink. Our daughter stays in mob to try to get her question answered.
Somewhere between 2:45 and 3:00: Our daughter gives up on asking her question because she is 5 feet tall, weighs 90 lbs and isn’t aggressive enough to fight the mob. Therefore, people keep cutting in front of her.</p>

<p>Man, all I was saying is it would have been nice if the whole thing had been 1/2 an hour longer, since obviously, people had more than 10 minutes of questions. What is your problem? Finding holes . . . sheesh. </p>

<p>I know that people on this board think that Gainesville is the center of the universe. It’s not. For those of us in South Florida (or, presumably, extreme Northwest Florida) or out-of-state, it is the middle of nowhere, the sticks. We drove very far to get there. Why not make it 90 minutes? Our friends whom we met there thought the same thing. I’m guessing they didn’t fill out their comment card since they left to make the tour. I know that it’s apparently not allowed, in your world, to make a suggestion, so just ignore me. I was making my big, terrible suggestion to Gatorwinner: You might want to start at 12:30 and make it 90 minutes. That way, people can hear all the Q&A and still make the 2:00 tour. Just a suggestion.</p>

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<p>Gatorwinner, another question that did occur to me after we left: Are IA students required to attend both summer sessions each year? Meaning if my family wanted to take a vacation together sometime in the next 4 years, could my daughter cram her courses into one session and go with us, or is she required to go to both all four years? Thanks.</p>

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<p>Okay, I just had to start a CC account to post this. ive been following sabertooth’s posts since back in may…all the way at MAY, and he’s the one user that actually keeps this site at least a little legit. i was an avid reader, and IMO, sabertooth is probably the most helpful guy around these forums and one of the nicest. there was this one user, called ilovethe47…and alex23, you’re acting a lot like that user.</p>

<p>thing is that, sabertooth isn’t asking for details. He just said he notices them. And that would make sense since he near always looks for detail. Alex23, even I noticed some weirdness to your posts, how they were off. I couldn’t put my finger on it, but sabertooth did beforehand…you contradict yourself!</p>

<p>you’re getting so defensive when sabertooth isn’t even trying to offend you. Maybe you should learn to actually PRESENT your story right the first time or DON’T LIE. Contradictions either mean one of two things…one, you lied or two, you didn’t present your info right.</p>

<p>And idk if Gatorwinner will even post back…from the looks of it, they are more of a “professional,” and all this thread looks like now is a big fat flame war. A huge mess. And that’s your fault Alex23, you just HAD to start with the insults/rudeness. That Gatorwinner guy was packed full of info., super helpful. But even then, why are you still here trying to get info.? this is the INTERNET, let alone forums…not exactly a source of info., thats why you dont see people quoting and citing from forums</p>

<p>i think we are starting to see another ilovethe47; well good thing there’s sabertooth, borntobeagator, and all the other cool guys</p>

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<p>Anyone have the UF IA 2017 facebook page?</p>

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<p>Gatorwaiter, this is a ridiculous conversation that has gone on too long already. I honestly didn’t tell the whole long story (above) right off because I thought it was long and boring and no one would want to read that long a post. So if all the details weren’t clear, that’s why, but believe me, what I said above is all that happened. It’s not “contradictory.” WHY WOULD ANYONE LIE ABOUT SOMETHING LIKE THIS??? Anyway, the whole long, boring story is up there. I don’t really have time to debate this any more. I agree that Gatorwinner was quite helpful and non-accusatory. However, I really don’t recall any insults/rudeness on my part other than my saying I wish the session had been longer and not all crowded around the stage. The session I went to was the first one, and I thought perhaps they would be open to constructive (and easy-to-fix) criticism. If you’d like to point out any specific insults of insults that weren’t that, please PM me with them. Otherwise, I’m done conversing about whether or not all those details were important. I have no reason to lie. It’s ridiculous. Therefore, I’m done. Parent with a question, concerned for her child. That’s all. No hidden agenda, no ulterior motive of taking down the Innovation Academy. Get a grip.</p>

<p>Hipsterinparis, <a href=“Facebook - log in or sign up”>Facebook - log in or sign up;

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<p>I just realized you can’t PM me because this was your first post ever. When someone says s/he has created a user name after reading but never posting for months because s/he had to tell someone off, I usually assume it is someone who actually was already involved in the conversation, going in under an assumed name.</p>

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<p>Alright, let’s all press the “restart” button. We gotta relax. College confidential, is a joke. These forums, are a joke. No need to let emotions run high, on either or any side.</p>

<p>Gatorwaiter, thanks for defending me, however, we gotta relax. I’ll be the mediator for this situation I suppose.</p>

<p>I’ll see what I can do to “fix” this thread, and basically just answer Alex23’s question about IA students and picking summer. Alex23, based off what I know of IA, the students in IA can pick the summer session they want. A, B, or C. C is both A and B combined. Your daughter will have to take C regardless, if one of her classes are offered only during C, and that class is mandatory for the semester. What your daughter CAN do is get really creative with the advisor and map out really busy Spring semesters and really relaxed Summer semesters.</p>

<p>However, just keep in mind, this is indeed college. Even during the “vacation terms,” students aren’t normally expected to go on vacation. They are expected to do some resume enhancing experience, getting involved on campus, OR taking additional classes to get a little ahead or something. In other words, your daughter should focus on getting resume enhancing experiences or something during her “off-term” which would be Fall. I’m just talking from experience as a student and giving my advice, I’m not saying you HAVE to agree with me…these are forums, a lot of stuff on forums are subjective.</p>

<p>And @hipsterinparis, it’s <a href=“http://www.facebook.com/groups/ufia2017[/url]”>http://www.facebook.com/groups/ufia2017&lt;/a&gt;. Another user, Lightsabertooth (no relation from me to him, he had to add “light” in front of sabertooth since i already took the user way long ago) posted a thread about it some time back.</p>

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<p>Thanks. No, she I wasn’t planning on slacking. She would be attending classes this coming fall at our local college, and either there or at Santa Fe the fall after her first year (Neither math nor chemistry are her forte, so she’s hoping to get those classes out of the way in a smaller setting rather than the big weed-out classes at UF), and she would definitely do a study abroad program one year, as that is a dream of hers, and I told her she could definitely do that if she attended a state university instead of one of the more expensive colleges she was considering before she got accepted to UF. So that would be three years of attending in fall, so taking off half a summer doesn’t seem that bad. She’s already met one of the professors from the UF Agricultural Extension in Homestead (near Miami), so she hopes to be able to intern/work there at some point.</p>

<p>And yeah, she knows all about doing something for your resume during off terms. That’s likely how she got into UF in the first place. I was just telling a friend of mine she should stop worrying too much about her son’s SAT score (which is over 2000 with really high grades in IB) and have him do something meaningful during the summer. But everyone takes a week off sometimes and, unfortunately, the IA schedule combined with having another kid who is on a “normal” school schedule doesn’t provide any way to do that together.</p>

<p>Thanks for explaining what summer C is. I have seen people talking about it, but I only saw two summer sessions listed </p>

<p>Peace.</p>

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<p>Hooray! My answer about IA housing arrived in my e-mail today with Innovation Academy News. “UF Housing already has more than 110 Innovation Academy students with completed housing contracts!”</p>

<p>Which, presumably, means that they have received fewer than the 300 housing spots reserved in Beaty for IA. So students who have already completed contracts, such as my daughter, should definitely get a spot in Beaty. This was pretty important to me, and to her, so that is a relief.</p>

<p>Wonder how many enrollees they’ll get total for IA?</p>

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<p>I should get to that housing lol…</p>

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<p>Alex23, I am trying to ascertain answers to your question as well: “I also wonder how many enrollees UF will get total for IA and for housoing?” </p>

<p>We are currently waiting for an appeal to go through for IA although I personally hope they longer they take the better, as more students may decline to enroll again this year due to the economy and we are hopeful to pick up one of the empty spots. Keep us posted on when the program fills up and when people hear back about their appeal.</p>

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<p>If you guys didn’t want IA…you shouldn’t have applied. You basically gave up the fall/summer spot to someone else to go to IA when that box was clicked. I can understand last year IA students not knowing they were applying to something when they checked the box but this year was given huge notice and proper information beforehand when applying to uf.</p>

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<p>Sabertooth - I don’t necessarily disagree with you, but I do feel the info about IA is not as clear as it could/should be. My son had never heard of the program when he applied, and he thought cheking the box meant he would have the “option” of choosing IA once admitted to UF. Once he ultimately decided he wanted to slect an engineering major not supported by IA, he was out of luck. And honestly, no one at UF (admissions, IA, department personnel) seemed to really care about his situation. Sour grapes? Perhaps. But when you’re making a decision as important as what to select as a major or course of study, it would be nice to not have your concerns brushed off as “Sorry, you won’t be able to major in what you want since you selected IA.”</p>

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<p>I spend a lot of time with admissions; they are probably sour given that they put an acceptable amount of info on the app about IA. When your son applied, there was an IA website and team you guys could have called for your questions. I know LAST YEAR the info was not clear because things were getting started, but this year is a different story. If your son thought he’d get the option to choose, he should have called to make sure. These are details the university expects students to call for. You can’t just assume it. In admissions mind, they most likely think your son was not careful enough/didn’t do the responsible thing of making sure. I myself am not trying to point any fingers or criticize, but from what I know about admissions and UF, that’s probably what went through their minds. Small details like that cannot be assumed, you have to make sure. That’s why there’s a whole IA team ready to answer those types of questions (and admissions is ready to answer those as well)</p>

<p>Edit: the above about admissions is just an assumption based off what I know</p>

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<p>No matter how much information is out there, parents and students will feel there is not enough if it does not answer their specific question (or answers it, but not the answer they want).</p>

<p>The first IA class started their second semester (summer) today. Is there any statistics as to how the program is working? Adjustment (grades, staying on track, life in dorms and meal plans, etc.) to the Spring / Summer cycle? Transfers? </p>

<p>We walked through the Preview Welcome Center and there was plenty of leaflets and brochures explaining different programs.</p>