Florida Institute of Technology — Attraction in Melbourne

I recently graduated from FIT in Spring 2012. Here is my review:

Pro's:

-Top notch education. All the professors I had here (business major) were WELL beyond qualified and had excellent resumes. From taking classes outside of my major and listening to other students this seemed like a trend at FIT. Also, class sizes are small.

-Location, Location, Location. Your 5 minutes from the beach, you cant beat that. However, beware of going east on university boulevard too far because it turns into a ghetto. -New Facilities: The newer Harris living quarters are awesome. They are clean and a great space to live in. However, the older dorms are generally hot and not great. Downtown Melbourne can be up and down since its an older crowd and not a college atmosphere.

Cons: -Women: FIT has very few girls. This is a major problem if your single because even the surrounding areas seem to have very few women. FIT needs to change this cause more women=more guys=more $ for FIT -Clemente Gym: I worked out almost everyday and the gym is small and packed. FIT needs to seriously upgrade their facilities past high school level; especially since their trying to start a football team. -Administrative Functions: This might be just a "normal" for most universities but most administrative offices didn't know much about their job or failed in getting things done. You have to keep nagging them and pressuring them to get paperwork done for you otherwise they will forget or put you behind in priority. -Jobs: There are very few pre-professional jobs for college students in Melbourne besides large companies like Harris, GE, etc. There is a high unemployment rate and it doesn't have the employment opportunities that other locations have. In its defense, Florida has a high rate of unemployment. -Diversity: There are a bunch of nationalities at FIT. The majority of foreign nationalities come from the Middle East. I put this as a negative because there seems to be a lot of separation between different races and nationalities at FIT. The Caribbean people have their own "club" and stay to themselves while the people from the Middle East tend to stay with their own group too. Additionally, a lot of the groups have not fully assimilated to life in the US and lack social skills and basic understanding of customs and courtesies. In my opinion, there is almost an over-population of people from the Middle East but they have money so the university loves to admit them; FIT loves revenue from non-US citizens.

Overall, these are the major pro's and con's of FIT from my years there. (2010-2012) If your looking for a great academic school and you dont require a normal social life than you will love FIT. However, if your more like me and focus on academics but wished to balance that out with more social events (sports, clubs, etc) than you will be wishing for more from FIT. I met some great people even though I didn't match up well with a majority of the population at FIT (generally more academic and less social) but you can always find your niche. The education you will receive is top notch but in my opinion not worth the $30k or more per year! At my graduation speech, the schools president wouldn't stop boasting about the improvements FIT is making and how were a Tier 1 research facilities and how were up there with "Harvard and Ivy League schools". In my opinion, FIT is growing and is still in its infant stage of development but there is a lot of improvement that needs to be done to make FIT the renowned school that the administration makes it out to be. In the end, I would NOT return to FIT but would instead go to a larger school that is more developed in its social atmosphere and provides a better balance of work, school, and play.

I hope this will help provide everyone more insight into...

Short Review (2024): Very decent a lot to still like and dislike but still a PARKING PROBLEM!

Long Review (2024): I have gotten used to Florida Tech campus now and it still doesn't make me feel "happy" to be a student but my overall experience with students have gotten better since I been avoiding a lot of people now.

After my problems in 2023, I have meet a different type of people and now really like being with a new group of people. I now have a better roomate now and better classmates with people in my major. (3 out of 5 stars)

Proffesor are still a gamble since now I am taking my major classes which only have one professor and some of them just dont help teaching classes (3 out of 5 stars)

I am taking a major in Meterology and a minor in Computer Science so my workload really sucks with 19 credit hours but if I just did my major, the STEM workload isn't horrible but I wouldn't reccomend to those who really don't like spending 80% of their day while awake doing homework in the library (3 out of 5 stars)

Food options still bad but in my opinion gotten a little worse with PDH removing food items I loved and quailty of food hasn't change but price had risen... (2 out of 5 stars)

Short Review (2023) : I don't like it. Expensive and been harassed by students with PARKING PROBLEM!

Long Review (2023): Florida Tech was an interesting new start of my life after what happened to me at the end of my senior year of highschool. I expected to be free from my parents' will, be more independent of my actions around people, and find a new friend group to enjoy college life as soon as possible. Unfortualenty, I may have gotten one of the more unlucky freshman life experiences.

Students here are still mentally still in highschool so I was harassed a lot by the fellow freshmen here. The sad thing though is that it is from black students teasing me and it sucked. They were mostly teasing me because of my experience with my roommate about telling them an incident that I thought was only private with me and my roommate. After that, no one treated me with respect and some even teased me of ending my own life because it was funny how sad and lonely I was. Students are very, very annoying if you don’t fit the norm. (2 out of 5 stars)

The professor is just a gamble to be honest. If you don’t research the professor, some of these professors find it so hard to get a C in their class while others easily give an A if you show up to class so it depends on your major or minor. Most professors do care about you if the class isn’t bigger than 20 students. (3 out of 5 stars)

The workload for being a STEM is challenging if you don’t prepare for it. Math classes may require you to self teach yourself what you need to learn for the midterms throughout the year. Chemical courses require you to look up answers for the homework since the GSA and tutors can’t help you and you can’t reach the professor since the office hours don't line up to your weekly schedule. Lab of main courses like Chemistry and Physics are worth 1 credit but have more work than your 4 credit classes of main Physics. (3.5 out of 5 stars)

Food options are REALLY BAD. Food is marked up to a crazy price and the reasonable price food is horrible. Monster in the vending machine is $4 while in normal stores it is half the cost. The “Rathskeller” is the worst spot for buying food in my opinion but it is the only local food store that is open after 9pm so you may only have them to eat something rather than going to bed hungry. (2.5...

This school is absolutely awful. The physics program is an utter embarrassment to the academic community. The aerospace program is a joke with some of the worst course structuring known to man. Not to mention, not a single professor in the school knows what a curved grade is. DO NOT bother going to your professors for help because they won't. There are no areas to study past midnight unless it's exam week. The campus is located in the middle of one of the sketchiest areas I've EVER been to, and at least half of the emergency stations they have around campus are broken. Tried to transfer to the flight program, and they told me it was "full" and that I was better off "going to another school". After two semesters, I can think of only two professors whom I'd genuinely recommend anyone take; the GSA's (TAs) are better teachers than the vast majority of professors at the school. They tenured a physics professor who is literally less qualified than most of the GSAs and put him in charge of BOTH of the physics labs at the school (lab design and equipment is HORRIBLE btw, ESPECIALLY for how much you pay.) as well as way too many lectures. Also, the facilities at the school haven't been touched since they were built 80 years ago, and you can tell, but hey, the dining hall is nice, so that's a plus, right??? This school is not worth a single penny of the ridiculous tuition costs and is a complete disgrace to the field...