The article describes the University of Central Florida’s (UCF’s) history and position within the Research Experiences for Undergraduates (REUs) program. REUs are research programs in the US for undergraduates studying science disciplines, sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF), and hosted by several universities, each specialized in particular fields such as mathematics, physics, biology, engineering, and so on.

The UCF Computer Vision group was a selected group in 1987, and since then has continued to be funded. The article reviews the features that qualified UCF and contributed to this success. The chief objective of the UCF program is to provide undergraduates with a range of experiences meant to build a bundle of valuable skills, such as the ability to understand research work, commitment and perseverance to fulfill research tasks, collaborative work, acquaintance with state-of-the-art approaches and important tools in computer vision, turning theoretical issues into practical yield, and preparing for a future career.

The article reviews the routines and the associated activities, and presents a record of the changes and evolution of the UCF program that occurred during the last three decades. Changes took place in the structure, the content of the program, and the representation among participants. For instance, the content and organization has to dynamically accommodate the fast evolution of the computer vision field and current technological tendencies, requiring familiarization with deep learning and new environments like Keras, TensorFlow, and Python.

The article is a decent and useful report of UCF’s contribution to the REU program, and therefore to the US economy.