It was the first day back for thousands of students at the University of Central Florida — now the second largest school in the nation and the largest in Florida.
KnightNews.com decided to take a look at some common issues and questions surrounding the first week back to school.
Parking
Parking is always a problem for UCF.
Last year UCF sold more than 27,000 green parking permits — while having around 12,500 parking spaces available. While not every student is on campus at the same time, it can be tough for students to find parking spaces during peak hours.
Alex Vongchan, a junior at UCF, said his worst moment of the day was “trying to find parking.”
In order to help curb some of the strain on the first day of classes, UCF did set up an overflow lot for students to park.
Another parking garage is currently under construction near the Academic Village. That garage is expected to open in December and have just over 1,000 spaces.
Enrollment
According to UCF Spokesman, Chad Binette, enrollment is expected to settle in around 60,000 students.
Meanwhile, it is becoming more challenging to be accepted to the University of Central Florida.
“We expect the quality of freshmen to be equal to or slightly higher than last fall in terms of SAT scores (2012: 1244), GPA (2012: 3.9) and national merit scholars enrolled (2012: 241),” Binette said. “Last fall, UCF ranked 12th nationally among public institutions in enrolling freshman National Merit Scholars. Each of the universities that attracted more of these prestigious students opened its doors before 1900.”
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Being a freshman at a school as big as UCF can be tough for some people.
“I had trouble finding my first class. I was the last one in and everyone stared,” said Victoria Mancuso, a freshman majoring in Music Education. “My second class had 400 students in it. I heard rumors about having big classes, and those rumors are true.”
For many students, it is a just matter of learning to work in the new environment.
“Balance your time. Don’t do things at the last minute,” UCF junior Sarah Akram said.
Is the first day necessary?
Just how useful is the first day of school?
Most students who have been in college a few semesters know that the first day usually means going over the class syllabus and being let out early.
“While I wouldn’t advocate missing class, most of the day is about handing out syllabuses; still, there’s a lot of interesting information you can learn,” UCF student Chris J. Carlson said.
But sometimes, the first day is the most interesting day out of the entire semester.
“I went to my first class and my instructor was speaking entirely in German; he was using hand gestures and body language to communicate what he was trying to say. It was awesome,” student Robert Miller said.
How was your first day back? Send us tips at News@Knightnews.com or send us a tweet @UCFKnightNews!
Bernard Wilchusky, DeJanae Phillips and Miracle Rushing contributed to this article.
