<p>The OP is not a PoliSci major. FSU makes sense for PoliSci if you’re interested in a political career and want the internship experience that living in Tallahassee could provide. The reality is, however, that this internship experience is available everywhere. I am an intern in the district office of a leading state Senator (and also a UF professor), and I live hundreds of miles away from Tallahassee. Another reality is that the vast majority of PoliSci majors aren’t interested in political careers- they are essentially pre-law majors. For internship experience in the court system, it’s not necessary to go to Tallahassee either. You can get that in practically every town in the US. </p>
<p>Aside from that, once I toured FSU’s law school I knew it wasn’t for me. The library and facilities were the worst I’ve seen and I’ve been to a few law schools (Rutgers, Seton Hall, Campbell, Levin [UF]). My community college library is much more hi-tech than FSU law’s. It was archaic.</p>
<p>p2n, the reality is that UF definitely has a higher prestige level than to that of FSU. As a senior that goes to one of the biggest high schools in the nation, I can safely say, with the utmost assurance, that the student body wouldn’t even care to converse about such a matter.</p>
<p>and there is no point for me to state the evident higher-ranked school since you typically bash the “rankings” when it is not in your favor, and resort to “rankings” when it is, for the most part. </p>
<p>It seems that you hold an inferiority complex against the Gator Nation.</p>
<p>I think it is questionable ethics for Florida legislators getting “professorships” at Florida public universities when the colleges are really giving the legislators “jobs” with excessive pay that are a cover for them being lobbyists for the schools and assisting the college in getting state funding and favors. Does “Professor State Senator” have a PHD like most professors at UF? It is a conflict of interest stink that I can smell easily from hundreds of miles away.</p>
<p>Our state legislators are part-time. They have to have other jobs to support their families on the salaries we pay them. In addition to that, they’re subject-matter experts in the field of political science so most of them are qualified to teach. You could say “conflict of interest” all day long because their employer gets state funding, but since they have to work outside of Tallahassee you could say the same no matter what their profession was. If a senator was an engineer you could say conflict of interest because Harris gets tax breaks.</p>
<p>Not buying it. The only reason the state senator got the gig at UF is because of his influence in the legislature. How many classes has the senator actually taught in Gainesville at UF?</p>
<p>He teaches a few classes. Entry level PoliSci classes, etc. He was a professor at my community college for years before that. And it’s not just him, this is extremely common. I think both my State Representative and State Senator are professors (the rep teaches at community college). </p>
<p>It works out well for them because teaching is a seasonal job and it allows them to leave and work in Tallahassee when they’re in session. </p>
<p>Anyway I’m not sure why we’re having this conversation in this thread. It’s not a UF thing, I’m sure FSU employs elected officials as well.</p>
<p>The quality difference between the political science programs at Florida State and U Florida is more than mere internships, which is exactly what I mean when I suggest some rest assumptions on very superficial analyses when deciding on which university to attend. For example, Simon Hix of the London School of Economics ranked political science schools based on the quality and impact of the publications from each school in 63 main political science journals in a five-year period.</p>
<p>The result was a ranking of global polisci programs with FSU’s program ranked in the twenties and UF’s ranked in the 150s. Internships were not mentioned. I think the comments alone in this thread are a perfect example of some trying to gauge entire programs on the wrong thing.</p>
<p>With regard to law school resources, whatever you saw or did not see apparently does not affect the quality of the FSU Law academic resources as they recently came in at #23 (tied with Emory) nationally as ranked by Brian Leiter for scholarly production.</p>
<p>Here you go again using rankings when it’s convenient for FSU. </p>
<p>Other rankings have UF ranked 51st and FSU tied for 52nd with three other schools<em>. Another has Florida 40th and FSU 74th.</em>* </p>
<p>The most interesting to me is from ILRG.com which has the average starting salary for graduating law students going into the private sector. In 2006 (most recent data available), UF grads made 80k on average while FSU grads made 68k***. </p>
<p>Two wrongs don’t make a right. State Senator Haridopolos got a job at UF and Senator Lynn got a job at FSU. State Representative Ray Sansom got a job at a community college in the Florida panhandle–look what happened with him. There are other questionable arrangements with other colleges and politicians. These incestous sweetheart jobs with legislators and public colleges dilute the academic integrity of the colleges each time they occur. They at the least tick off hard working faculty working at this time of layoffs and tight college budgets. Florida’s public colleges have a twisted connection with politicians that too often holds back colleges from being better. Allowing business as usual between Florida legislators and colleges with these “jobs” is not the best arrangement.</p>
<p>Access. When Bernie Machen phones, I doubt Haridopolos would answer the phone as fast if Haridopolos didn’t have the cushy well paid part time job at UF. It’s a conflict</p>
<p>In fairness to Senator Lynn, she did eventually turn down the $120,000 pay from FSU and worked as a volunteer. Senator Haridopolos is still paid at UF. If I were a student in any of UF’s political sciences classes, and I worked for Haridopolos, I wouldn’t tell my professors about it seeing how some of them might be still hacked off about Haridopolos’ hiring.</p>
<p>@ parent2noles, I hear you. It’s best to use rankings carefully, etc. etc. </p>
<p>While there certainly is no “agreed upon method of ranking universities” the fact is that US News and World Report is the commonly accepted standard for ranking universities annually. If you go on another forum here at CC (neither UF or FSU’s), and you ask students where each university is ranked, you are going to be told that UF is #47 and FSU is #102. Why? Because US News and World Report is the standard. </p>
<p>You can tell your prospective employer all about how webometrics (the source YOU provided) has FSU ranked #59 in the country (and UF #25)*, but if they’re familiar with rankings at all they will be familiar with US News and World Report.</p>
<p>It’s just like AP poll for the BCS. I’m sure someone will tell you that FSU is top 25 material, but it’s not in the AP so it doesn’t matter.</p>
<p>Personally, my goal is law school. I toured both campuses and law schools and thought UF was a better fit for me. In addition to that, there’s consensus that UF as a university provides a more prestigious degree than FSU. It is certainly a more selective institution and so my peers at UF would be of a higher academic caliber than potential peers at FSU. There are a thousand reasons to choose UF over FSU. </p>
<p>That would mean my entire high school senior class, including those going to FSU, are sold on UF marketing, because if one was to argue FSU is equal, let alone superior to UF, they would be laughed at, barring few majors (Fine Arts and Poly Sci) that most people don’t know about anyways. </p>
<p>Seriously, arguing with p2n that UF is better than FSU is like arguing with somebody who believes 2+2=5 </p>
<p>You can show them rankings, you can show them the fact that every Floridian besides FSU alumni perceive UF as more prestigious, and you can show them that the student caliber between the schools are one sided, and they will simply put their head in the sand. </p>
<p>After nearly 4,000 posts of taking the same stance over and over, it is not surprising that p2n has convinced herself that 2+2= 5, dismissing everything else as a “sweeping generalization”. </p>
<p>A more telling debate in my high school senior class is whether FSU is better than UCF, as many students from my school are now relegating to UCF over FSU.</p>
<p>“A more telling debate in my high school senior class is whether FSU is better than UCF, as many UF rejects from my school are now relegating to UCF over FSU.”</p>
<p>I’ve experienced the same thing. Most of my friends didn’t apply to FSU as they had no interest in attending. They figured if they’re going to attend a second-rate university it might as well be the closest one to home. If I was rejected at UF I probably would’ve gone to UCF or USF for the scholarship money.</p>
<p>“I’ve experienced the same thing. Most of my friends didn’t apply to FSU as they had no interest in attending. They figured if they’re going to attend a second-rate university it might as well be the closest one to home. If I was rejected at UF I probably would’ve gone to UCF or USF for the scholarship money.”</p>