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USF Opens With Classrooms At Capacity

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By ADAM EMERSON

The Tampa Tribune

Published: August 26, 2008

TAMPA - From business to ballet, classrooms at the University of South Florida filled to capacity Monday with students returning for the start of the fall semester.

At a time of unprecedented budget belt-tightening, administrators are making use of every available space while they drastically overhaul the way they schedule courses.

USF leaders acknowledge they need more faculty members to reduce class sizes and more academic advisers to alleviate the long waits students endure when they plan their route to graduation.

"It can be pretty crazy," said Dustin Clark, 19, an accounting major who waited an hour to meet with an adviser Monday after returning from a crowded economics class that had more students than available seats.

Enrollment at the Tampa campus stayed flat at about 38,500 students compared with the first day of fall classes last year, but $50.4 million in budget cuts have eliminated 170 vacant faculty positions.

With fewer faculty members, students chose from fewer course sections, though administrators say they made optimal use of their existing classes. They even redrew the semester's schedule by adding a full day of undergraduate classes on Friday, a day typically devoid of instruction.

Even so, enrollment was at or near capacity in many classrooms, including those in the university's core College of Arts and Sciences. By this time last fall, 17 percent of all the college's seats were still available. On Monday, that availability was 13 percent, which means most course sections were filled.

Students didn't only fill the seats in core courses. Freshman Jessica Rahter found 32 students in her Monday ballet class. She was used to about 15 in the dance studios she attended in her home state of New Jersey.

"I've never been in one with this many people before," Rahter said. "It was a little crowded."

She and others can expect some relief as the week goes on - students often drop courses, making some seats available. For now, USF plans to hire eight new advisers to help students map out their path toward graduation.

One of those will go to the College of Business, where Clark spent an hour waiting.

The first day of classes is always busy with students seeking a change in their schedule. Nevertheless, a new adviser is "sorely needed," said Jacqueline Nelson, the business college's undergraduate advising director.

Currently, Nelson can provide one adviser per 900 students. The ratio recommended by the National Academic Advising Association is 1 to 400.

"This has become a focus," Nelson said.

Long waits and large class sizes are an issue though the university denied admission to more than half the freshman applicants for this fall.

Admissions officials, ordered to freeze freshman enrollment at about last year's levels, toughened requirements for entry despite heightened demand from a record number of graduating high school seniors throughout Florida.

Because of the selectivity, the average grade-point average of freshmen reached a record 3.73 and the average SAT score was 1159.

As an alternative, the university offered an expanded number of seats to prospective freshmen at its St. Petersburg campus.

Although the freshman class in Tampa stayed flat at about 3,500 students, the number of freshmen in St. Petersburg grew 57 percent to 349 students, according to university figures.

Despite slowing growth in Tampa, the university has undertaken more than $282 million in construction on its flagship campus.

The newest building to open to students was a new Marshall Center student union. The $65 million student center is four stories and features a 57-foot atrium, computer centers, study lounges, 10 eateries, a 710-seat theater and a ballroom 3 1/2 times larger than the one in the old Marshall Center.

Junior Renelle Whyte said she was "blown away" by the structure.

Reporter Adam Emerson can be reached at (813) 259-8285 or aemerson@tampatrib.com.

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