Campus watch

University of Florida cuts back on jobs and enrollment.

Students who have their heart set on becoming a Gator at the University of Florida (UF) might want apply to some safety schools.

In response to the $47 million loss in state money, the UF is cutting back on admissions by 4,000 students by laying off 138 faculty and staff members and reducing the number of courses and degree programs offered.

Transfer students will take the biggest hit, according to the Orlando Sentinel, the leading newspaper in Orlando.

With so many students shut out, it’s likely that community colleges will see enrollment increases, UF President Bernie Machen said.

The UF is the first of the 11 Florida state universities to announce a plan for the next academic school year in response to decreasing state revenues.

“Our priority is to protect the quality and education at the University of Florida,” Machen said Monday. “But clearly, we cannot take reductions this large without making difficult choices.”

For students who do get into the UF, it will be a bittersweet feat. They will see fewer internships, study-abroad opportunities, multicultural pro-grams and a longer wait for financial aid.

“The message is [that] this is a significant reduction,” Machen said in an interview with The Associated Press. “It’s no secret we need more resources.”

Community service and broader degrees to be made mandatory at Macquarie University

While some students might put in hours of community service to impress their future employers, students at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia will soon do mandatory volunteer work.

“You learn tolerance, you learn teamwork, you learn communication skills, you learn to see the world through other people’s eyes,” said vice-chancellor professor Steven Schwartz in an interview with the Australian Broadcast Corporation.

The university will be partnered with Australian Volunteers International (AVI), a nonprofit organization that recruits volunteers from Australia to work with partner organizations in Asia, the Pacific, Africa and the Middle East.

Dimity Fifer, the chief executive of AVI, said she does not want volunteering to merely be an elective students have the option to choose.

“It’s actually a whole part of the philosophy of Macquarie University and I think students get that,” she said.

In addition to making volunteer service mandatory, further changes will be made to the curriculum during the next two years. Students majoring in science, for example, will need to take art courses, while art majors will need to take science courses.

“What we really wanted to prepare them for was a lifetime of learning rather than for that very first job after university,” Schwartz said.

U.S. colleges scramble to deal with higher food costs

College campuses are struggling to make ends meet as the cost of food increases in the United States.

Harvard University, San Diego State University and University of Massachusetts in Amherst (UMass) are among the several colleges that have implemented alternative measures to save on food costs.

While Harvard reinstated most of its usual food items in response to student protests when whole-grain pasta was pulled from menus and cherry tomatoes were replaced by wedges, most other colleges have stuck with their changes.

In September, San Diego State University eliminated the use of trays in one of its dining facilities, hoping that students would grab less food if they had to carry it with their hands. The shift has saved 4.2 percent on food costs, and has cut back on soap and energy coasts, according to the Herald Tribune.

“People would tend to grab as much stuff as they could so they didn’t have to go up again, and I know from experience people would waste a lot of food that way,” sophomore Stephanie Savoian said.

UMass has also developed a “small plate/big flavor” program, said Ken Toong, executive director of dining services. Rather than a 6 ounce piece of chicken, students now get a 4 ounce piece instead.

UMass additionally implemented a computer program to analyze traffic flow so cooking can be done based on need.

Food prices rose more than 4 percent in the United States last year, according to the U.S. Department of Agriculture. A similar increase is predicted for this year.