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No Pet Peeves. Students at Eckerd College love going home to their hairy, scaly, and feathered roommates. Snakes, ferrets, guinea pigs, and fish are allowed in any dorm, and cats and dogs are permitted in the Kappa and Zeta on-campus housing units. While the collegiate critters may not have to write admissions essays, they do have to meet the approval of a student-run Pet Council that evaluates complaints and writes pet-related policy. There’s also a table for students to register their pets when they sign up for classes each term. A $5 pet fee goes towards pooper scoopers and a leash-free pet run area, says Melissa Wolfman, a Pet Council member.

Deepest Thoughts. Part of Florida Atlantic University’s campus has gone underwater. While most of its students remain dry, ocean engineering students are submersed in SeaTech, a world-class ocean engineering research facility opened near the Atlantic Ocean last fall. Located just south of Fort Lauderdale in Dania, the facility focuses on "building machines that can work in a marine environment," according to Lynn Laurenti, associate vice president of university advancement. Along with educating ocean engineering students, the facility’s research will benefit the U.S. Navy, American companies, and consumers. Among SeaTech’s first initiatives is the development of Autonomous Underwater Vehicles that can explore the continental shelf and of devices to measure ocean pollution.

Best New Service Project. At Florida Southern College, students tutor local middle-schoolers in a new service program that’s earning raves. Founded in 1998 by FSC senior Matt Grieves, Project Uplift recruits 30 college students to help "underprivileged and underserved middle school kids," Grieves says. "We offer tutoring, mentoring, and a sports clinic. For the first hour, we’ll help them with a weak academic area. Then the next hour, we’ll do a sports clinic—rules, coordination, skills. We get them excited about the sports, and hopefully that will carry over to academics. We want to build them up—my main motive is to impact lives for Christ."
     Grieves and his team spend two hours on Tuesdays and Thursdays helping nearly 100 Lakeland kids. As FSC’s Vice President for Enrollment Services Bob Palmer says: "This program has received national recognition. It’s Matt’s brainchild, and he has recruited a multitude of our students. It’s literally going to be a state, if not federal, model."

Best Song. Don’t be surprised when you hear Florida Memorial College students raising their voices. The Miami college is the birthplace of the Negro National Anthem, "Lift Every Voice and Sing." Written in the early 1900s by FMC faculty members and brothers J. Rosamond Johnson and James Weldon Johnson, the lyrics include messages such as, "Sing a song, full of the faith that the dark past has taught us…full of the hope that the present has bought us." Dr. Marty Pinkston, FMC’s director of scheduling, says, "To me it’s like a prayer. It’s about where we were at that time and the hope that things would get better."

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