UCF in the News

English faculty member Jamie Poissant's book got a favorable review in the New York Times. “His prose throughout is sure-footed and intelligent. Wincing scenes are leavened with moments of grace and mournful nostalgia. Poissant also leaves room for absorbing discussions of art, the socioeconomics of vacation property development, and religion," says the Times.

Salvador Almagro-Moreno, a UCF microbiologist and associate professor of medicine who studies pathogen emergence and evolution, says that taking advantage of social interactions is a major driver for the transmission of pathogenic organisms and, thus, their evolution and survival.

Sean Snaith, a UCF economist, is encouraged by the June jobs report, but he cautions that the path back to the pre-COVID economy will not be easy and will reflect the lifting of public health measures as well as consumers returning to their normal habits.

UCF has added many new safety measures around campus to help curb the spread of COVID-19 when students return.

Tom Cavanagh, the vice provost for digital learning at the University of Central Florida, oversaw the university's transition to online learning as the pandemic shut down all on-campus instruction in the middle of March. That included creating streamlined workshops and training in less than a week for thousands of instructors so they could teach their classes in a socially distanced manner.

The nationwide competition was set to happen in Las Vegas this year but due to the pandemic, it was played from the students' own living rooms. Despite being thousands of miles apart, UCF's E-Sports Club were crowned the reigning champions of June’s Collegiate Star League’s 2019-20 Counter Strike Global Offensive Season competition, winning $20,000 for landing first place among 160 other teams nationwide.

UCF will soon begin enlisting students to volunteer to work as contact tracers. That strategy is a key part of the university’s plan to reopen some in-person classes in the fall, which won approval from state officials last week.

Nash Turley with UCF’s College of Sciences launched a nationwide program with his app “Lawns to Wildflowers,” which shows people how to replace their lawns with native wildflowers.

UCF has added new features to its existing campus app to help with symptom screening on campus and assist contact tracers.