Student Experience

COTA Application Deadline: 12:00 noon, Friday, February 17, 2023.

Download the Application

About the Program
The USP program will make approximately 200 awards, university-wide, each year. These are distributed across all of the colleges on campus.

Eligibility Requirements
To participate, you may not graduate before Spring 2024.  The College of the Arts has an additional requirement for this award of a 3.25 GPA. If you plan to apply through another college, you must adhere to their requirements.

If you are eligible to apply, follow the steps below:

1. The first step is to find a research mentor who will support your application. This can be any UF faculty member who will commit to sponsoring you on the proposed project. This can either be a project you have developed, or you may join an on-going research project and team. To learn more about how to locate a research project, go to https://cur.aa.ufl.edu/university-scholars-program/. You do not have to restrict yourself to researchers in your home department or college. If you aspire to a professional school, you may choose to find a mentor in one of the many professional schools on campus.
2. Once you have identified a research mentor who will support your application, check out the USP requirements for the department and college of your mentor. The application will be submitted to the USP representative in the research mentor's college, not in your home college. Each department and college sets their own due dates and it is your responsibility to know the applicable date and meet that deadline. Your friends applying in other departments may have different dates so the only reliable place to locate this information is in the department to which you are applying.
3. Download the application and submit it and the required supporting documents to:  Dr. Sophia Acord at skacord@ufl.edu, Associate Dean for Research and Strategic Initiatives, College of the Arts. The DEADLINE for submission of applications in the College of the Arts is 12:00 noon, Friday, February 17, 2023.

Student Scholar Responsibilities and Awards
Those students receiving a USP award MUST attend a mandatory orientation on April 4, 2023 (time TBA). Scholars will be notified of the time of the orientation.  Scholars are expected to complete their proposed creative/research project following all stated guidelines and requirements. Each scholar will receive a $1,750 stipend disbursed in two phases. The scholars will receive their first stipend of $750.00 in the fall and their second stipend of $1,000.00 upon completion of requirements.

Important Note
If you receive Financial Aid, your scholarship could be affected, so please check with the Student Financial Affairs office to determine your Financial Aid status before you apply.