New College of Florida Top Questions

Our school has a pass-or-fail mentality. Most students are internally motivated to do well and must be able to prove to their professors that they have learned the material.

New College has a unique grading system in that there are no grades and instead you receive satisfactory/unsatisfactory (pass/fail) and a narrative evaluation. I really like the way this takes focus off a number and it seems to take out a lot of the stress most people would ordinarily face. However, I think it's only good for the unique type of student who will know for themselves when they need to be doing better. You get from a class what you put into it. People told me before I came here that the academics here are super hard and nothing compared to AP or IB classes in high school. So far, in the introductory level science classes I'm in (physics and biology), I've found my AP classes to be more difficult, but that might have just been my high school and the fact that I'm passionate about biology. I'm in an intermediate political science class and the first test was a lot more difficult than I expected. New College definitely has unique course offerings. A class I'm in this semester is on Nabokov's Early Novels. I also enjoy the fact that if it doesn't offer a course you have the potential to make your own tutorial. I'm hoping to do a paleontology tutorial next year. Some of the most unique academic opportunities are during the January Independent Study Project (ISP) month. Some students this year are doing "Finding Atlantis ISP" which is actually a creative writing ISP where they will go sailing for two months and write ten interviews with Atlanteans. It's also a good opportunity to do lab research or internships.