<p>does anyone know what the research opportunity for undergrads is like at UF?
also does anyone know what the classes are like and how big they are?
I have to pick between UF and UM for engineering and research opportunity, class size, academics, and getting into a great grad school are important factors </p>
<p>any help would be great! thanks!!</p>
<p>Some classes are very large, but higher level ones are smaller. I think UF is ranked in the top 5 for published undergrad research. As far as choosing, I would say it’s up to the weather. I might be going to UF myself, living in Florida, and I think it’s a great school.</p>
<p>Partially it comes down to department, not all engineerings are created equal. If you chose one of the really crowded ones, you’re going to have huge classes the whole way through.</p>
<p>Everyone I know who has tried to do research has succeeded, the college of engineering has a lot of research money.</p>
<p>jcarrillo7, here is one of the many research opportunities offered to undergraduate engineering students:</p>
<p>[University</a> of Florida - Integrated Product & Process Design](<a href=“http://www.ippd.ufl.edu/]University”>http://www.ippd.ufl.edu/)</p>
<p>When you look at the past research projects you will see IMMEDIATELY the kind of high-tech work undergrad engineering students work on. The best part is that these projects are corporate funded and mentored so you will get real-world experience working on real-world applications.</p>
<p>IPPD is not research: it’s more akin to a university-mediated internship. When I worked as an undergrad in a lab (which was right after I finished IPPD) the nature of the work was very different.</p>
<p>Coming up with unknown solutions to solve known problems is research, which is exactly what IPPD accomplishes. Product development is implementing known solutions to known problems – which IPPD is not. These companies DON’T want UF students to just turn the crank but to actually provide them with projects to have the students come up with their own solutions that actually solve these corporations’ real world problems.</p>
<p>When I was taking IPPD, the corp sponsor I was paired with actually provided a project to UF that came DIRECTLY out of the research (not development) group. The corp research group decided to offer this project to IPPD because they didn’t have the staff for it at the time.</p>
<p>The work might be different between IPPD and work in a lab, but they are both research in different settings. IPPD is more corporate while the lab you worked in was probably more academic.</p>
<p>We had very different experiences, then. I worked with a local company and designed a small circuit or two as my component (it wasn’t a project in my major, however).</p>
<p>IPPD is for seniors only though right?? what about your freshman through junior years?</p>