University of Central Florida
public university in Orange County, Florida, United States
The University of Central Florida (UCF) is a public research university with its main campus in unincorporated Orange County, Florida, near Orlando, Florida, United States. It is part of the State University System of Florida. With 70,674 students as of the fall 2025 semester, it has the second-largest on-campus student body of any public university in the United States. UCF is classified among "R1: Doctoral Universities – Very high research spending and doctorate production."
UCF was founded in 1963 and opened in 1968 as Florida Technological University. The new state university was intended in part to train scientists and engineers for the growing aerospace and defense workforce around Kennedy Space Center and what is now Cape Canaveral Space Force Station. As the curriculum widened beyond engineering and the physical sciences, the school was renamed the University of Central Florida in 1978. It remains active in space-related research through units such as the Florida Space Institute and the NASA Florida Space Grant Consortium.
Most students attend the main campus, 13 miles (21 km) east of downtown Orlando. The university offers more than 230 degree programs through 13 colleges, including the Health Sciences Campus at Lake Nona Medical City, the Rosen College of Hospitality Management, and a campus in downtown Orlando. Since opening it has awarded more than 450,000 degrees.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “University of Central Florida” as public university in Orange County, Florida, United States. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the places & architecture register because the source frames it as public university in Orange County, Florida, United States. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
Maps, plans, fabric surveys and administrative records can establish how the site’s name, extent and function changed over time. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 16, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q143451. VIAF identifies the subject as 131843503. The Library of Congress control number is n79003786. Authority coordinates are 28.602, -81.201. 4 of 5 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 2025, 1963, 1968 and 1978.
Modern boundaries and familiar names can conceal earlier jurisdictions or structures that do not align with the present site. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Treat names, boundaries and functions as historically changeable. Maps, plans, inventories and administrative records can clarify what the place meant at different dates.
- Historic place names
- Jurisdictional context
- Routes into maps and plans
Contemporary maps, plans, listed-building records, estate papers and the responsible local or national archive.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “University of Central Florida”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow University of Central Florida primary sources, University of Central Florida archive and University research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “University of Central Florida”?
- What physical evidence or contemporary plan supports the description?
- Which authority defined the place, boundary or structure at the relevant date?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “University of Central Florida” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.