Study Overseas

With nearly 900 miles of beaches and a climate that even the Egyptian sun god Ra would envy, Florida offers an ideal setting to immerse in a university and prepare for a challenging and rewarding career.

Career-focused university with 14 campuses throughout Florida and classes available online.

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The Sunshine State, a major tourism destination for people from around the globe, offers natural wonders and environmentally rich lands along with major metropolitan areas teeming with nightlife and high culture. It offers the wonders of Orlando and Tampa, with such attractions as Walt Disney World, Universal Studios and Busch Gardens. It dazzles with the rocket launches from Cape Kennedy, and tantalizes with the pulsating late-night rhythms of Miami's South Beach nightclubs.

It offers the serenity of crystal springs that stimulate the senses so much that Spanish explorer Ponce de Leon believed one of them had to be the fountain of youth. It soothes with the Everglades, a river of grass so large and important to the ecosystem that is has gained federal protection and worldwide recognition.

In abundant ways, Florida is a state of many countries, a place where diversity is not an ideal, but a reality. As the fourth largest of the 50 United States, Florida and its 15 million residents represent a cross-culture of contemporary life, making the state a living experiment on many issues, ranging from educating diverse populations to caring for elders. For many academic disciplines, the opportunity to observe and study real-life applications often rests within the classroom. With a history begun by Native Americans, shaped by European explorers, molded by the settlers who followed, and polished with the recent immigrants from northern states and foreign countries, the state offers something for every student from every culture.

The State University System has 11 public institutions offering undergraduate, graduate and research opportunities for all types of student, from those seeking the intimacy of a smaller campus, to advanced researchers looking for cutting-edge technology. The system includes some of the best universities in the nation, and one of the newest: Florida Gulf Coast University is just one year old, with an emphasis on technology and distance learning.

The 220,000 students in the system represent all 50 states and 192 countries. The state also boasts of nearly 200 private colleges with enrollments totaling about 121,000.

The State University System has also recently adopted a five-year master plan that classifies universities, challenges them to reach for greatness, and outlines how the system can produce the highly skilled graduates who will be needed in sunrise technologies so important to the blossoming electronic age.

The comprehensive universities, the smallest in the system, primarily emphasize undergraduate education, though they have continuing research missions. They are the University of North Florida in Jacksonville, the University of West Florida in Pensacola and Florida Gulf Coast University in Fort Myers. Florida A&M University in Tallahassee, the state's capital, is the state's historically black institution, and classified as a comprehensive/doctoral university because of its development of masters and doctoral programs.

Research II institutions are the system's fast-growing urban universities. They are the University of Central Florida in Orlando, Florida International University in Miami, and Florida Atlantic University in Boca Raton. Research I universities are charged with becoming the best in the nation. They are the University of Florida in Gainesville, Florida State University in Tallahassee and the University of South Florida in Tampa.

Research opportunities abound through such endeavors as the Brain Institute recently designated by the U.S. Department of Defense at the University of Florida. The National High Magnetic Field Laboratory at Florida State University is a collaborative effort with the University of Florida and the Los Alamos National Laboratory. The Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute at the University of South Florida has achieved national prominence.
Professional studies are available in such fields as law, medicine and engineering, and the system is on the verge of launching the Virtual Campus, a joint effort with the state's 28 community colleges to market the nearly 2,000 courses offered through distance technology from the state's public higher education institutions.

Academics may be the primary reason for attending a university, but campus life is also important, and Florida's public universities have nationally ranked athletic teams, tropical settings for leisure activities and a host of activities to satisfy most interests. Tuition is among the lowest in America, yet quality continues to improve each year.

Detailed information can be accessed through the Internet with system wide information available at http://www.flbog.org/ The site includes links to each of the universities.

Author
By Keith Goldschmidt