Some schools have certain advantages over one another: small schools give a feeling of community, large schools have lots of resources, private schools are ripe for close academic relationships with faculty, state schools offer a good value, and so on. Well, UF is not your typical state school, and Gainesville is certainly not your stereotypical small town. Because this place is so big, we have all the libraries, dorms, athletics, courses, clubs, and services you could want at a good price, but if you put out just a little effort, you'll find that we also have more compassionate, down-to-earth professors, locals, and students that any small, private school could ever dream of having.
For an incoming student coming from a small town, however, this may all seem a little overwhelming at first. There are so many people here that sometimes things take a little time. For instance, you can't just waltz into your college dean's office and expect to see him instantly, like you could expect to see a high school principal. Just realize that at UF-or anywhere else you decide to go-there will be hard times. Nobody ever said college life was easy, but in a place like Gainesville, many of these hard times may often seem irrelevant-when you're meeting so many beautiful people, doing more cool stuff, going more places, learning more things, and having more fun than you have ever had in your life. That, my orange-and-blue friends, is why they call them "bright college days," and in your final days when you look back on your life, you may be hard-pressed to find any brighter memories than your time and experiences at UF.