To comply with requests from the Board of Governors to stifle enrollment for the fall, UF may be left with only one option: cutting transfer students. And that news did not sit well across town at SFCC.
In an e-mail sent out to UF administrators Thursday, Provost Janie Fouke wrote that in order to respond to the request from the board, the State University System's highest governing body, UF would likely accept fewer transfer students this year.
All freshmen and several graduate student admissions decisions have already been announced, Fouke wrote. And while UF awaits guidance from the board, the Florida Legislature and UF's Board of Trustees, the release of transfer-admissions decisions will be delayed until at least April 15.
Lawrence Keen, SFCC's assistant to college President Jackson Sasser, made a flustered call to Sasser when asked about UF's proposal, saying that was the first he had heard about it.
Keen said it's unfair for UF to solve its budget dilemma by penalizing transfer students.
"This is very, very serious to us," he said.
Because UF and SFCC work so closely together, he said SFCC students might not be affected as much as other transfer students across the country.
"We are by far the largest source of students for the University of Florida," Keen said. "We are woven into the same fabric."
UF President Bernie Machen briefly addressed the issue Thursday at a UF Faculty Senate meeting.
"We're going to have transfers," Machen said. "The questions is, can we take as many as we have historically taken?"
Richard Wooley, a second-year SFCC student, said if the number of transfer students admitted to UF is cut back, he might have wasted a lot of time.
Wooley said he transferred to SFCC from the University of Central Florida last semester to increase his chance of being accepted to UF.
"I changed my whole life to be here and try to go to UF," he said. "Everything I've done since October could be for nothing."
Katelyn Witsell, a first-year SFCC student, said students shouldn't rely on just one university to accept them but added a reduction in transfer student admissions would be a cause for concern for her, although she doesn't plan on transferring to UF until 2009.
"By then, it might be a total mess and impossible to get in," Witsell said.
Alligator writer Deborah Swerdlow contributed to this report.
