The University of Central Florida (UCF) is a public research university with its main campus in unincorporated Orange County, Florida, near Orlando, Florida, United States. It is part of the State University System of Florida. With 70,674 students as of the fall 2025 semester, it has the second-largest on-campus student body of any public university in the United States. UCF is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research spending and doctorate production."
UCF was founded in 1963 and opened in 1968 as Florida Technological University. The new state university was intended in part to train scientists and engineers for the growing aerospace and defense workforce around Kennedy Space Center and what is now Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. As the curriculum widened beyond engineering and the physical sciences, the school was renamed the University of Central Florida in 1978. It remains active in space-related research through units such as the Florida Space Institute and the NASA Florida Space Grant Consortium.
Most students attend the main campus, east of downtown Orlando. The university offers more than 230 degree programs through 13 colleges, including the Health Sciences Campus at Lake Nona Medical City, the Rosen College of Hospitality Management, and a campus in downtown Orlando. Since opening it has awarded more than 450,000 degrees.
The university's colors are black and gold. Its athletic teams, the UCF Knights, compete in NCAA Division I as members of the Big 12 Conference.
History
Founding
The Florida Legislature authorized a new public university in east-central Florida on June 10, 1963, when Governor Farris Bryant signed Senate Bill No. 125. Local officials had lobbied for the campus as the region’s population and the workforce around the Space Coast grew in the early 1960s. Former Senate President William A. Shands and Senator Beth Johnson were among the bill’s principal backers. The university was founded as a coeducational state university with the mission of educating students for space-age careers in engineering and other technological professions.
On January 24, 1964, the Florida Board of Regents bought of undeveloped land along Alafaya Trail in northeast Orange County for $500,000. Area residents later donated another and helped raise more than $1 million toward the site. In December 1965 the board appointed Charles Millican as the university’s first president. After consulting a citizen advisory group, Millican selected the name Florida Technological University and helped design the Pegasus seal. He also introduced the motto “Reach for the Stars” and the paired slogans “accent on excellence” and “accent on the individual.” Millican laid out the main campus as a set of pedestrian rings inside a loop road, a plan later compared to mid-century planned-community design.
Millican and Governor Claude Kirk broke ground in March 1967. Classes opened on October 7, 1968, with 1,948 students in 55 degree programs across five colleges, 90 instructors, and about 150 staff members. From the start the university drew students interested in engineering jobs tied to Kennedy Space Center and area defense contractors, but it opened with five colleges rather than as a federal laboratory school. The first graduating class, 423 students, received degrees on June 14, 1970. Astronaut and Orlando native John Young spoke at commencement.
Millican chose the school colors. An early unofficial mascot, the Citronaut — an orange-astronaut hybrid — did not last. After a short-lived “Vincent the Vulture” period, students in 1971 voted for the Knight of Pegasus as the athletic mascot. The teams later competed as the Golden Knights and then the Knights.
Expansion Entering office in 1978, the university's second president, Trevor Colbourn, recognized the diversification and growth of UCF's academic programs away from its strictly technological and scientific beginnings. As the university developed strong business, education, and liberal arts programs, Colbourn recognized that the university's name no longer reflected its mission. From its establishment the university was known as Florida Technological University, nicknamed Florida Tech, until December 1978, when Governor Reubin Askew signed legislation changing the school's name to the University of Central Florida.
Colbourn established the university's honors program, and started the university's first satellite campus. In addition, he was responsible for constructing the Central Florida Research Park adjacent to the UCF campus, founded in 1978. The park serves as a major focus of simulation for space and defense-related research. It was part of Colbourn's plan to make UCF a world-class partnership university. Among the university's first partners were Lockheed Martin and the United States Navy, and Colbourn led the push to found both the Institute for Simulation and Training and the Center for Research and Education in Optics and Lasers in 1986. During his tenure, enrollment increased from 11,000 in 1978 to over 18,000 in 1989. Colbourn also supported the university's athletic programs. He was responsible for establishing the school's football program in 1979, which began an era of growth for the university. In April 1979, UCF awarded its 15,000th degree.
Hitt presidency In March 1992, John C. Hitt became UCF's fourth president. Once known mainly as a small commuter and technology school, UCF administrators began to increase its academic and research standing while also evolving into a more traditional research university. When Hitt took office, UCF's enrollment was 20,302. As of 2014, 60,821 students attended classes on 12 campuses spread across central Florida. The university consisted of 13 colleges and employed more than 10,150 faculty and staff. During this time, UCF raised admissions standards, increased research funding, built new facilities, and established notable partnerships with major research institutions.UCF chief gets top pay in Florida St. Petersburg Times
The university's athletic program also grew with an on-campus football stadium, new basketball arena, more on-campus housing, and the development of the UCF College of Medicine at Lake Nona. Until 1999, the Knights were represented by a jouster from the Medieval Times dinner show in nearby Kissimmee, Florida. That same year, Knightro was introduced at the staple homecoming event, Spirit Splash.
During its spring 2010 graduation ceremonies, UCF awarded its 200,000th degree, less than five years after awarding its 150,000th.
Colbourn Hall scandal In August 2018, the state university system's board of governors and the Florida legislature opened an investigation into the university for misuse of state funds. On September 13, 2018, UCF admitted to misappropriating money intended for educational and operating expenses to build the new $38 million Trevor Colbourn Hall, leading to the resignation of CFO Bill Merck. In January 2019, UCF severed ties with President Emeritus John Hitt after the investigation proved that UCF had misspent or planned to misspend over $85 million between 2013 and 2018. Newly appointed president Dale Whittaker, who was a provost at UCF during Hitt's tenure, resigned in February 2019 after just seven months in office over allegations that he also knew about the misappropriation of funds. Board of trustees chairman Marcos Marchena also resigned that month. In August 2019, the final report into additional UCF construction projects revealed the balance of misdirected funds between July 2010 and August 2018 was $99.61 million (equivalent to $ million in ). The report found that key people in the university leadership were aware of the misdirection of the funds. UCF was fined by the state for 120% the cost of the misused funds.
Cartwright presidency Alexander Cartwright is the fifth and current president of UCF. He became the president on April 13, 2020, succeeding acting president Thad Seymore, who took over following Whittaker's resignation in February 2019.
Campuses
Main campus The University of Central Florida main campus is located in the University census-designated place, along Alafaya Trail east of Orlando, Florida.
The campus is designed to be pedestrian-oriented, with a series of concentric circles. The outermost circle is Gemini Blvd, which is also the main road for vehicular traffic on campus. Inside of Gemini, there is Apollo Circle, Mercury Circle, and finally Pegasus Circle as the innermost circle.
Pegasus Circle contains the student union, with the John C. Hitt Library located directly to the south of it. All academic buildings are located inside of Gemini, with the circle divided up into pie-shaped sections for each college. As there are very few roads inside of Gemini, many buildings' loading docks are accessible only by sidewalks and thus receive most deliveries at night. The University of Central Florida campus is one of only two in the nation with a concentric circle design, the other being the University of California, Irvine. Newsweek ranked UCF as having the 20th most beautiful university campus in the country in 2011.
Student housing is provided along the perimeter of the campus. Outside of Gemini, the campus is divided up into different themed sections. The northwest side of campus includes Greek communities and on-campus residences.
The north side contains Knights Plaza, an uptown style athletic village with stores and restaurants, the east side contains the Arboretum of the University of Central Florida and the engineering wing.
The south side contains student recreation and wellness facilities, leisure pool, recreation park, and more student housing. Also located directly south of the main campus is Central Florida Research Park, which is the seventh largest research park in the nation and the largest in Florida, housing over 116 corporations. The park provides more than 10,000 jobs to over 500 students and thousands of alumni.
Main Campus is one of the safest branches nationally in comparison of all branches in the US. The percent of crimes in Main Campus decreased from 0.12% (in 2010) to 0.07% (in 2014) crimes per year.
Regional campuses In addition to the Orlando campus, the University of Central Florida has several other campuses to service the Central Florida region.
In Orlando, there is another campus, located in downtown Orlando: the UCF Health Sciences Campus located at Lake Nona, Orlando, Florida. In addition, the Rosen College of Hospitality Management is located away from the main campus, in close proximity to the heart of Orlando's tourism industries near Universal Studios and Disney Parks, Experiences and Products.
Downtown Campus
In 2019, a campus was opened in Downtown Orlando in collaboration with Valencia West. It includes the Dr. Phillips Academic Commons, Union West student housing, and the UCF Center for Emerging Media buildings.
Health Sciences Campus at Lake Nona
The UCF Health Sciences Campus at Lake Nona includes the UCF College of Medicine and the Burnett Biomedical Sciences Building. The Burnham Institute for Medical Research, a Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Nemours Children's Hospital, M.D. Anderson Cancer Research Institute, turning the area into a medical city. The campus will also serve as the future home of the UCF College of Nursing and the newly approved UCF College of Dental Medicine. The College of Medicine welcomed its charter class in August 2009.
Upon completion of construction, the campus could accommodate as many as 5,000 upper division, professional, and graduate students and faculty members in the health-related programs, and include up to two million square feet of research and instruction space.
Administration