When I was in Gainesville this summer, I spent some time at the University of Florida. It wasn't an official tour of the campus, but the parts that I did see were impressive. I told Cameron about my experience and he decided to look more into the college. The more he researched, the more he liked it, and decided that it would be worth an official visit.
We started our visit today in the UF welcome center where we watched a slideshow of the university and listened to a presentation from the head of admissions. The stats that were given were impressive. The University of Florida was recently ranked #5 in public universities in the nation and 30th overall. The time and money that they put toward research was incredible. Gatorade had just donated $950,000 million toward that endeavor. I was a little intimidated by the woman from the admission's department. Until today I hadn't really thought about how hard it would be to get into the university. They only except 36% of applicants which was half of IU's recent acceptance rate. They were also extremely strict about deadlines which was really good for us to know this early.
Our walking tour was with a University of Florida senior. We visited the library, chem building, and dorm on our tour. The guide was knowledgeable about UF and gave us some unique information including the first Gatorade flavor developed in their research labs - coffee. Cameron was impressed with the tour and the amount of students studying outside in the beautiful sunshine. We both liked the common outdoor green space where students and faculty gathered throughout the day and food carts were brought in for lunch. The official tour ended at "The Swamp", home to the Florida Gator football team. The stadium was massive with 1/3 of it reserved for the student section during football games.
After the official tour Cameron and I walked through campus for a little while longer, taking pictures and revisiting some of the highlights of the tour. We also stopped at the campus bookstore for some Florida gator merchandise. I found a top ten list of restaurants near campus. Cameron read through them and picked "The Relish" for lunch. It was directly across from the university and we both really enjoyed our burgers.
On the way back to Ocala we drove past the Tom Petty childhood home. I told Cameron that if he attended Florida that he would have to learn the words to "I Won't Back Down" as the students section sings the Tom Petty hit in between the third and fourth quarter of each home football game. He said that wouldn't be a problem as he had heard it enough during his childhood. Cameron definitely was impressed by his first college visit and could see himself becoming a member of the Gator nation. He did have other schools in mind that he wanted to visit as well. We made plans to see those soon. What an exciting time in Cameron's life. I was glad to be a part of it.
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