Record Number of Freshmen

Admitted to UC for Fall 2006

For the second year in a row, the University of California admitted a record number of freshman students for fall 2006. A total of 55,242 California freshman students were offered fall 2006 admission, compared to 50,017 in fall 2005, an increase of 5,225 students. Overall, 78.2 percent of fall 2006 California freshman applicants have been offered admission to the University, compared to 76.3 percent in fall 2005 and 73.3 percent in fall 2004. Transfer data are not yet available.
In making year-to-year comparisons, it is worth noting that the fall 2004 admissions cycle was anomalous because state budget difficulties caused a reduction in the number of students the University was able to admit. These data reflect admissions as of March 30, 2006. Some campuses continued to admit a small number of students after that date. (See box at right.)

The University was able to keep its commitment to offering all eligible freshman applicants admission for fall 2006, and all campuses were able to offer admission to a greater number of applicants than last year — from 118 additional admissions offers at UC Merced to 3,507 more offers at UC Davis. An additional 3,534 students were offered winter or spring admission at San Diego and Berkeley, and another 6,257 were offered admission to a campus they had not selected on their application through a process known as referral.

In general, about nine out of every 10 admitted freshman students are California residents, and the data that follow are for California residents only. Admissions offers to out-of-state and international students numbered 6,143.
The growth rate in admissions exceeds the growth of California's public high school graduating class. For fall 2006, UC freshman admission offers grew by 10.4 percent. This is more than three times the California Department of Education's projected growth rate of 3.4 percent for the public high school class graduating this year.

Underrepresented Student Numbers Rise

Universitywide, all racial and ethnic groups registered increases in the number of admitted students, and most groups, with the exception of white/Caucasian, also registered increases as a proportion of the admitted class. The proportion of American Indian students remained unchanged. A breakdown of the change in proportion of the total number of admitted students for each racial and ethnic group is as follows: African-American/Black: 0.2 percent, Asian/Asian-American: 1.4 percent, Chicano/Latino: 0.7 percent, White/Caucasian: -2.1 percent.

Underrepresented students — African Americans, American Indians and Chicano/Latinos — make up 21.7 percent of admitted freshmen Universitywide, up from 20.6 percent for fall 2005. Six of the nine campuses — Berkeley, Davis, Irvine, Riverside, Santa Barbara and Santa Cruz — registered incremental gains in the proportion of underrepresented students in the admitted class, and three campuses — UCLA, Merced and San Diego — experienced small proportional declines, even though Merced and San Diego admitted a higher number of underrepresented students than in the previous year.
Systemwide, the proportion of admitted California resident students who are the first in their families to attend college increased slightly, while the proportion of those from low-income families and/or who attend a low-performing school remained virtually unchanged. The final makeup of the class will be known later in May, after students have informed the campuses where they plan to enroll.

Academic Excellence

The academic quality of the incoming freshman class continues to be outstanding. Admitted students are taking more college-preparatory courses than are required and continue to earn high grades. The average number of yearlong
"a-g" courses the admitted class completed is 23; the minimum requirement is 15 of these courses. The average gpa of admitted students Universitywide is 3.78.

In the first year of the new sat Reasoning Test, average total sat scores are lower among newly admitted UC students than in previous years. The University is still studying reasons for the decline, but it is believed that the combination of the Writing test with the Critical Reading and Mathematics tests into a single examination — and the University's policy of taking the highest total score from a single test administration — explain, in part, the decline in UC's reported mean sat test scores for fall 2006 admitted students.

Previously, students had the opportunity to take the sat I (Verbal and Mathematics) and the sat II: Writing examinations separately, and the University would use the best scores from each of these test administrations. As of March 2005, students take all three tests in a single administration, thus affecting test score averages by eliminating different combinations of scores.

The tables below show the preliminary figures for freshman admission by campus and by race/ethnicity. Students who were accepted by multiple campuses are included in the admissions figures for each campus. Unless otherwise noted, the universitywide totals are "unduplicated," meaning that each student is counted only once. A complete set of tables is available online.

Systemwide totals are unduplicated, and campus totals are duplicated.

Numbers in parentheses represent each group's percentage of applicants and admitted students.

also in ucnotes/NEWS

Record Number of Freshmen Admitted to UC for Fall 2006
The Orientation Express Boards New Students for Fall 2006
After SIR: Next Steps for Transfer Students
One-Stop Admissions for Fall 2006
Documenting LOTE Proficiency

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