Students protesting
UCF appropriations

(KRT) Students last week protested a lack of open courses and resources needed to graduate on time while the University of Central Florida boosts spending on its sports program and administrative pay raises.
More than 200 students signed a petition asking administrators to slow student growth and put more emphasis on education rather than sports. They cited millions of dollars UCF spent recently to fire the football coach and hire a new one and to join a different sports conference.
Andrea Lewis said she attends UCF to get an education, not to subsidize the athletic department’s growing budget.
“This is a place of education, and I really think that should come first,” she said.
Lewis, 18, was part of a small group that held the “Rally for Students’ Rights” in front of the administration building on UCF’s campus Jan. 21.
But top leaders said UCF actually increased department budgets and offered only slightly fewer course sections campuswide compared with last year. State law prevents steering athletics fees and booster donations into classrooms, they said.
Organizers passed out a “Disorientation Manual” that spelled out their disgust with the way the administration spends money. Their complaints included new football Coach George O’Leary’s $700,000-plus salary, the approximately $800,000 UCF will pay to buy out the contract of former football Coach Mike Kruczek and the $2.6 million the UCF Athletic Association will pay to move all sports into Conference USA in 2005.
“Part of me does think switching conferences is a good idea, but $2.6 million is a lot of money,” Scott LeMaster, a senior who was upset he had to change his graduation date when he found out UCF would not offer the summer classes he needed, said.