7A – Testing the Hypothesis, Part 1

On Campus Parking for UF Students who live Off-Campus

• Opportunity:
• Every day of the week, thousands of off-campus students are faced with long bus commutes to their classes that can be combined with poor weather conditions, with a final result of being late to work or class.
• The who: All UF students who live off-campus.
• The what: They are victims of being late to class or getting rained on.
• The why: The use of off-campus parking being limited to only parking at the museum.
• Testing the who: The who in this opportunity is pretty obvious. It is any student who cannot afford to live on-campus or any student who has an apartment that is more convenient to them for other reasons. The majority of the "who" is students who have been riding the bus for years and are tired of this boring commute in either cold or rainy conditions.
• Testing the what: Students living off-campus are faced with a twenty minute bus ride towards campus or even longer depending on traffic. As a result, a student has to be prepared to leave an hour to an hour and a half earlier in order to arrive to class on time. 
• Testing the why: The answer as to why the University of Florida will not provide additional parking for off-campus students may never be answered. There are currently new ways of allowing off-campus students parking by expanding lots and building new garages through the very expensive tuition we pay just to gain an education. This opportunity helps create additional monetary value for UF because students are able to pay more money to be able to park on campus. 
• Interview #1: In this interview, I concluded that people who have been riding the bus to get to campus for more than just three months feel very fatigued with their school work after coming home from a day of class because of the long commute that takes up a lot of their day. This student is my friend who is a girl, a freshman, who was provided an apartment off campus from her parents when moving to UF that requires a twenty minute bus ride onto campus. She regrets living off campus and is most likely going to live on campus next semester to avoid this hassle of no parking for students who live off-campus.
• Interview #2: This interview was conducted with a first year graduate student who has been attending UF since the beginning of this year. He is annoyed with the limitations of parking that is offered to off-campus students and is thinking about transferring colleges! I asked if he would be willing to pay a premium to be able to park where his class is and he immediately said yes. He thinks that UF is losing money from limiting off-campus students from parking spots on campus. This interview proves that there is a definite need of more parking for students who do not live on campus.
• Interview #3: I was able to interview an professor on this opportunity that exists for UF to make more money. She claims that she has even received parking citations during normal hours at her day of work. She believes that it is essential to make friends in a students class and to be able to park at their place if they happen to live on campus in order to avoid having to ride the bus every single day. However, she did bring up a very important point of cost of living on campus, it is much cheaper to buy a place on archer road than in the heart of campus. This really made me hinder my strong belief on this opportunity and that it is essential to be grateful that the bus is free and not a cost.
• Interview #4: My fourth interviewee was my oldest sister who goes to UF currently. She agrees that living off-campus is a pain but she does not mind the bus ride. She says its a great time to gather her ideas and reflect on her day. This was a very different response than the first three that I received.
• Interview #5: My final interviewee was a random student that I asked on the bus on the way back to the parking lot by the Harn Museum. She said she has been riding the bus for only a couple of weeks and has told me some of the horrible experiences she has had. She said she would love to be able to park on campus to avoid the very far walk from the Hub to the business school. She thinks bus routes should be more accommodating for students and most importantly thinks having to ride the bus is a pain and takes a lot of energy from her daily

Given your interviews, what do you know about the opportunity that you didn't know before? 

• All five interviewees gave me new perspectives on this opportunity that exists. My favorite idea is to find friends that live on campus, which will boost your social skills and overall make you long lasting friends that you can count on in the future! However, some people contradicted my opportunity belief in that, for example, my sister enjoys riding the bus because she can gather her thoughts. One thing that surprised me during each of the interviews was how much easier it became to talk to strangers for example the women on the bus. Overall, 4/5 interviewees believe that the university should offer more parking locations for off-campus students and would be very able to pay a premium for this.
• This assignment has led me to believe that the ideas combined from each interviewee has created a stronger bias against UFs parking system. This is a very controversial opportunity that UF should definitely address in the near future to keep their students happy who pay lots of money just to attend the school.