We report a novel method to fabricate fluorescent polymer (F-CPA) based on the esterification between acrylate copolymer (CPA) and fluorescein using N, N-dicyclohexylcarbodiimide (DCC)/4-dimethylaminopyridine (DMAP) as catalyst. The resulting copolymer was characterized by Fourier transform-infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR), gel permeation chromatography (GPC), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), thermogravimetric analysis (TGA), ultravioletvisible
spectroscopy (UV-Vis) and fluorescence spectroscopy. In addition, the influences of concentration, solvents, pH and metal cations (Cu2+, Fe3+ and Zn2+) on the fluorescent behaviors of F-CPA are discussed in detail. All those observations suggest that the synthesized F-CPA is an excellent luminescent macromolecular material with simple synthesis method and excellent solubility. Moreover, its sensitive fluorescence response behaviors to solvents, pH and metal cations make it to become a polymer-based probe.