Validating the Princeton Review’s party school rankings, UF students reported in a survey conducted earlier this year that they spend less time studying than their peers.
Forty-six percent of students said they spent 11 or more hours hitting the books each week, compared with 59 percent at five similarly classified universities.
The party-school ranking considers time spent studying as well as drug and alcohol use and the popularity of the Greek system.
The survey, conducted by UF, was a little more scientific.
The Student Experience in the Research University survey was open to most undergraduates at UF and had to be completed in order to remain eligible for football tickets. As a result, UF had the highest participation rate — 69 percent, compared with 26 to 39 percent at the other schools surveyed.
More than 22,000 students participated.
According to the survey, UF students said they spent less time in class and noted “allow[ing] time for other activities” as “very important” when selecting a major more often than other students.
Only 48 percent of UF students said they felt graduating in four years was important, compared with 57 percent at other schools.
UF also ranked No. 1 among the six schools surveyed in educational value for the price.
Addressing the Faculty Senate Thursday, UF President Bernie Machen said the Florida Bright Futures Scholarship Program had a lot to do with students wanting to stick around, noting that students take fewer than 13 credit hours on average per semester.
“[It] makes me feel like there is room for increasing the rigor of our undergraduate experience,” Machen said, “if we can only figure out how to get them to register for more classes.”
The Senate also discussed a proposal that would change how faculty can be laid off.
After a proposal submitted by the UF administration met widespread disapproval in May, the Senate was asked to recommend its own. The Senate’s proposal made it clear that UF should not be able to target individuals when making layoffs.
Instead, only units, such as a department or a program, could be targeted.
UF’s desire to make the change to its layoff rules came after two professors were reinstated by an arbiter who determined that UF violated university regulations when laying them off.
