Polk State College - Lakeland Campus 3425 Winter Lake Road, Lakeland, FL 33803

"Personally, I can’t walk around at school in the early morning. From the hours from 8:00-10:30 it smells horrendous at school. All around the outside of the buildings and sometimes even in the parking lot the smell of feces and diarrhea infiltrates my nose. It’s disgusting. It drives me to dry heaving. Words cannot describe this smell. I am not alone. Many other students report this odor too. It honestly makes me rethink the cleanliness of the air in addition to the cleanliness of the school."

"My daughters went to Gateway at Polk State for one school year and switched back to their regular school. We thought it would be great for them to work towards their AA degree but the professionalism, communication, and care lacks tremendously with the principal and counselor that was supposed to help them integrate into this environment. It is a good idea in theory but the one running the school are not the correct fit. They could care less about these high school students taking on college courses. Unless they get new administration stay away!"

"This College has earned my 5 Star reviews and will be shared with family and friends affordable classes. Great financial assistance best Advisors, Professors, and Leaders including the President Dr.Falconetti. I have made success here and will encourage anyone else that wants to get fully educated and enter a good criminal Justice program to come to Polk State any job in Public Safety even. I’m blessed to call this my new home."

"The financial aid office is absolutely horrible. They rarely reply to emails and when you are able to actually get ahold of someone, they rarely answer all of your questions properly and frequently give you the wrong information. I’ve had classes dropped, financial aid amounts wrong, and disbursements received very late because of the large amount of errors they make and non-existent communication by the financial aid office. I survive off of my financial aid and would not be able to attend college without it, so it feels very personal and helpless when your education and ability to pay your bills and keep a roof over your head while trying to better yourself is in the hands of people so incompetent. I see from other reviews that this is NOT a new issue or one unique to my situation, either. The department needs a complete overhaul and trained on better communication. I am not sure why the school seems to think this is acceptable. I generally like my professors, many of them genuinely care and clearly put a lot of effort and passion into teaching, but the financial aid department is so awful and stressful that I am considering transferring to another school. I should not be more stressed out about disbursements than I am about my courses."

"Some professors are phenomenal and outliers. Overall, the school is sorry and lacking excuse for a educational institution. They are cheap, and if they did not have that, they would certainly have no students if not for their handful of instructors who perform beyond the obviously low standard of this college. Multiple staff "work" to resolve issues and you must hunt them down to get anything done. They accidentally and wrongfully charged me $1880.16, disallowing me from registering for classes needed for graduation. The school told me it was a mistake and that they were taking care of it immediately. Two weeks pass and classes I need are taken. This is completely their fault and border line fraudulent, yet it seems to take entire teams of staff to fix it. This is not the first ridiculous issue I have had with them. Another recent issue was a tenured instructor verbally attacking me and failing me in a class after getting a B in the final for reporting her to the dean after she ignored all questions through email and canvas for 4 weeks of a 6 week class. I have no doubt it would have been the entire term if not for getting the dean involved, and the repercussion for this blatant unprofessional conduct was nothing. I am paying to take that class again. There are some staff members and professors at this college that I hold in high respect, some I even consider mentors, but in important matters like professional conduct and financial management, they are grossly lacking accountability."