Your exam schedule makes NO sense. Why would you schedule my exam for 1 p.m. for a class that meets at 3 p.m.? I have a job. I have things to do. I can’t just leave these responsibilities because it is impossible for the second largest university in the United States to make a logical schedule. 

In a push to save money and force students to finish their studies as fast as possible, Florida’s public universities have doubled the fee they charge students who take more classes than they need for graduation.

Starting this school year, students will pay an “excess hour” fee that’s equal to tuition on all courses they take after they complete a certain number of credit hours — 115 percent of what’s necessary to earn a bachelor’s degree.

So if a degree program requires 120 credit hours, for example, students would pay twice as much for classes after they’ve racked up 138 credit hours. That means if a three-hour course costs $310 in tuition, students would end up paying $620 once the fee is tacked on.

Robert Siegel talks with Jeff Selingo, editor of the Chronicle of Higher Education, about why the federal Pell Grant program, aimed at helping students pay for college, has become a hot-button issue in the debt ceiling debate.

Florida’s Class of 2011 scored better on the ACT than its recent predecessors but still lagged the nation when it came to leaving high school ready for college’s challenges, according to results released today by the national college admissions exam.

The percentage of Florida students meeting the exam’s four “readiness benchmarks” inched up to 17 percent this year, compared to 25 percent nationally, the ACT said. Both the state and the nation’s readiness scores were one percentage point higher than last year, an encouraging sign given the number of ACT takers increased from 2010.

But Florida students fared worse than their counterparts in most states when it came to showing they were ready to tackle college courses. Their scores on the four ACT tests – English, math, reading and science – were among the lowest in the nation.

I am offering advice to a community college president who wants to start a student newspaper. Their school used to have one, but an old president shut it down. Since I know tons of you have worked for student papers while in high school, college and graduate school I thought it’d be great to get your thoughts.

Please feel free to reply to the post here, send me a message or send me an email at jerriann.sullivan@gmail.com.