New College of Florida
About New College Of Florida
With a total enrollment of 800 to 850 students and a student-to-faculty ratio of 10:1, New College offers a personal and collaborative learning environment, where faculty and students engage in in-depth exploration of ideas and subject matter, and where students have the freedom to chart their own academic course.
As the State of Florida’s legislatively-designated “honors college for the liberal arts,” New College is the only public college or university in the state whose sole mission is to provide an undergraduate education of the highest caliber to leading students from around the country. Located on a beautiful 110-acre campus on sunny Sarasota Bay, New College provides an ideal learning environment for intellectually curious, motivated students who thrive on active learning and are drawn to an intellectually rigorous curriculum.
Students complete seven contracts prior to graduation in lieu of credit hours. With your faculty adviser, you create a written agreement each semester and set criteria for measuring your success. Each contract usually includes three to five academic activities (courses, tutorials, internships, independent reading projects) that will develop your personal educational goals.
A cornerstone of the New College experience is your ability to work with faculty to design your own independent study and conduct hands-on research. During the four-week Interterm each January, you work one-on-one with your professor or in a small group on a research project, lab experiment or scholarly paper. Or, you can use this time to study abroad — from Antarctica to the Amazon — take part in an off-campus internship or even put together your own art exhibit or performance.The ISP Handbook and the workshop held in November of each year provide guidance to students as to the types of ISPs that faculty encourage. Projects may be carefully defined at the beginning or left open-ended and exploratory. Three ISPs are required for graduation.