<p>So I went to Transfer Preview yesterday and I just wanted to give everyone a little heads up on how it goes down. </p>
<p>Beforehand I suggest wearing some sunscreen if you’re easily burnt like myself and definitely some comfortable shoes.</p>
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<li><p>When you get there you check in with your family members in the Reitz Union and you each get a water bottle, poncho, and a paper fan. You also have the option to a nice breakfast with OJ, coffee, fruits, etc. While you wait for the welcome presentation there’s also a sort of campus resource fair that showcases different clubs and activities available at UF. </p></li>
<li><p>After this there’s a brief morning welcome and then you break up into several groups led by two student ambassadors. In my group there were about 13 people of all types of majors and we went to a small classroom and talked about ISIS, drops/withdraws, and grading scales. You can ask these ambassadors about any questions you have. You get this tote full of transfer stuff AND A CAMPUS MAP. We didn’t get time to go over what was in the tote so I had no idea where I was going nor was I aware that I had a map so I asked some students for directions and they were helpful. </p></li>
<li><p>Next, is the first of two breakout sessions and I HIGHLY suggest choosing one of yours to be a campus tour. I didn’t and I regret it. The options were campus tour, student activities, financial aid information, recreational sports, ROTC, Career Resource Center, Q&A with preview staffers, study abroad, off campus life, veteran success, preparing for law school, preparing for career in education, preparing for health profession schools, and undergraduate research. I personally chose the last two because I’m a Chemistry major looking into going to their pharmacy school. I wish there was a third one so that I could have gone on the campus tour. </p></li>
<li><p>Then, was lunch on your own. The only options in the Reitz Union were Pollo Tropical, Panda Express, Croutons, and Starbucks. I had Croutons, which was a salad bar and it was very good. I suggest also using this time to get your Gator 1 ID card because there’s not much time at the end because Wells Fargo closes at 5 and so does preview and you have no time to link your ID to your Wells Fargo card. (I made this mistake)</p></li>
<li><p>After lunch, we went back to the Grand Ballroom and listened to some more presentations on the Student Health Care Center, Counselling and Wellness Center, and The University Police Department. They said there was going to be time for questions but there wasn’t, the speakers were very informative though, especially the police officer. Then after that was a presentation on Academic Integrity and the Code of Conduct. Again informative, but no time for questions. </p></li>
<li><p>We were then broken into groups by our colleges i.e. CLAS, Business, etc. We were given an hour long presentation on what was expected by our college. It was here that we filled out this green form that removed our hold to register for classes.</p></li>
<li><p>From there we went to our department for individual advising. For Chemistry we went out to Leigh Hall and met with Dr. K and he told me what classes I needed to take and was super nice and helpful.</p></li>
<li><p>By this time, it was 4:15 and I had a hold so I walked over to Farrior Hall (second floor) for assistance with registering. Then I went and got my ID card and by the time I got to Wells Fargo it was 5:09 so I couldn’t link my card. After departmental advising you also get a choice of going on an hour long campus tour, but my advising ended too late.
I hope this is helpful with preparation for transfer preview. I felt like they tried to pack everything into one day, but then we miss out on certain things because we have to pick and choose what we want to learn about. It was a very informative orientation, but I didn’t get to hear about a lot of things like student activities and studying abroad that I wanted to because of the breakout sessions that I went to.</p></li>
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<p>If you have any questions just shoot.</p>