UF’s class is weighted very heavily towards in-state students, particularly when compared to other elite public universities. We’re about 90% in-state. By comparison, UNC is about 80% (they have a cap on out-of-state enrollment at 18%), Cal is also about 80%, UVA is about 70%, and Michigan is about 50%. The average percent out of state/international for public AAU members is a bit above 30%.
I suspect that one of the issues with these students with huge numbers (it should be noted that UF reweights GPAs because some areas are ridiculous in their weighting) is that UF, at least historically, has always highly rewarded students who took the most challenging academic path. So, for example, if your county has IB, they will view AP students from that county as a touch worse than AP students from a county without IB.
When SCOTUS nuked affirmative action Trump and DeSantis touted it as "now its based on merit." So yeah, it's racial and political.
I wouldn't mind that. But UF admissions has been a crapshoot for a while even removing affirmative action from the equation. I think it's natural for people who attended a school they are passionate for to want the school to prioritize legacies. Not saying it's a good thing overall, but the sentiment makes sense. I think the randomness of UF admissions is what irks people most about it. I was lucky, but I know people more credentialed than me at the time I applied that didn't get in as well as people less credentialed than me who did. I also understand that's not how life works. There's no "magic formula" that gets you that dream job you've always wanted. But people like to get that sense when it comes to college admissions. Believe me, I understand. I am one of those people. I like knowing exactly what I need to get what I want.
There are pros and cons to legacy admissions. If merit is all you're considering, your students will be better. If you consider legacies, you will probably get alumni who are more likely to donate to the school. If it is just a "business," and not a "family tradition," people are less likely to spend their hard-earned cash on a university that stops doing anything for them 5 years after graduating. UF has this weird hybrid where merit isn't all they consider, but they don't value legacies.
In theory I 100% agree. 100%. But that's not really practical, as you know. Unless they want to base admissions off 1 single metric that can uniformly applied to everyone (like SAT) then you're always gonna have to wing it on a hodge podge of qualifications. What's a GPA worth from a kid in Wyoming private school vs Florida Public school vs IB vs Home school? Who knows. And if your and my kid have identical qualifications and you pledge 8 million for a new biology lab, we all expect your kid to get in. As you said. That's just kind of how life works.
I live in a community that is largely (probably over 90%) transplants/retirees from mid-Atlantic, the Northeast, and some Mid-west. Heck, there are even a few from Cali. I know of four instances where these transplants moved to this Florida community ...... because their child attended UF as an out-of-state student and decided to stay in Florida after graduation. So it does happen.
Come on gator_lawyer. You know race-based discrimination is not the same as other forms of discrimination. SCOTUS has acknowledged that for a long time, as is the implicit case of the Civil Rights Act of '64, which notably does not restrict all forms of discrimination. As to "why legacies." It makes sense for the family because they have a personal sentimental connection to the university that spans generations or has the potential to span generations. It makes sense to the university because alumni are more likely to donate to a school that's a "family tradition" rather than a 4-year "business transaction."
I remember that Floridians who obtained a two year degree or comparable credits used to be able to transfer with less strict standards. Multiple people I know did that years ago. Is that still an option?
the story is from a THFSG poster, from their daughter, from her friend, from her boyfriend all in HS so I’m sure it’s sound info.
Read just now on another gator site. My daughter was not accepted into UF. She has a 4.48 GPA. She already has 48 college credit hours. She has over 400 volunteer hours and is the President of three campus organizations including National Honor Society. Her mother and I are both alums. Don’t ask me for another dime. And this Buddy’s daughter had 4.8 GPA, graduated from a Cambridge program, tons of extracurricular and volunteer, both parents are UF alums, and mom is a tenured professor working at UF and she still didn’t get in. Went to FSU. Makes me puke
What is student size now for UF? A few different numbers come up in researching. Some might be older.
GPAs are so inflated (and so wildly inconsistent from school to school) as to be near meaningless. As a result, those aren’t particularly informative anecdotes without test scores included, in part because test scores are the most likely explanation for why those kinds of candidates wouldn’t be admitted.
UF values AP over duel enrollment if that’s where the college hours came from. Duel enrollment doesn’t help, it might even hurt. Every year that’s the same complaint and people still take that path. And notice SATs weren’t mentioned, I’m sure that wasn’t by accident. As mentioned, UF doesn’t care as much about volunteer hours total as they do that someone found a cause and stuck with it for several years. If that 400 hours was among 20 charities UF probably treated it as a negative not a positive. They see that as a kid trying to pad a resume and not dedicating themselves to something. Not to mention there are a few schools UF knows grade inflate and treat accordingly. So putting two or three metrics up doesn’t begin to tell the story. Parents need to really look at what UF cares about, they list it all out. But to the larger point, yes good kids are getting rejected. There have to be when 70k plus apply, which is what they have this year for probably 15k slots. I have a friend whose daughter got into Brown and got rejected by UF. It sucks for the families, but what is UF supposed to do? Randomly draw kids for spots? Purposely lower their reputation to get apps down? Create an oligarchy where kids are admitted based on someone else’s (their parents) achievements? Even if it were only Florida kids getting every spot we would still have these stories. UF is just that competitive now.
My kids are fortunate enough to attend the #4 high school in the state. My oldest daughter was one of several valedictorians in her class in 2018 and was accepted into UF. She graduated Summa Cum Laude from UF with an engineering degree in 2022. Her sister, with identical grades and SAT of 1450 found out last night she was not accepted. She's heartbroken and I feel her pain but I'm not going to let this define her. She has been accepted to other schools that are throwing scholarship money at her so UF's loss will be another school's gain. As poster above mentioned, the number of applications has surged just between the time my two applied. In 2018 it was around 40,000. Today, most likely 70,000.
All correct plus folks forget that the instate applicant pool is much larger than when most of us attended UF
