UC Transfer Compendium Enrollment Reports on the Transfer of Students from California Community Colleges to the University of California An Introduction and Notes Regarding Compendium Data The UC Transfer Compendium has been designed to present, to the extent possible given current data collection procedures, information regarding California community college students who have transferred to a University of California campus, in a format allowing individual community colleges and UC campuses to track the success of their specific transfer efforts. This Compendium contains enrollment data beginning with academic year 1994-95. Background The Transfer Compendium was developed to support UC and community college efforts to enhance the “transfer function” as described in the Master Plan for Higher Education (1960). 1 The Master Plan specifies that students interested in earning a baccalaureate degree, but whose high school records do not qualify them to enter a four-year public higher education institution, enter a California community college, complete a lower-division program, and then transfer to a UC or CSU campus. Thus, in addition to providing students with a low-cost and geographically convenient entree to higher education (since there are over 100 community colleges in California), the transfer function provides students with a “second chance” to earn a baccalaureate degree. To support these transfer goals and to encourage greater numbers of students to use the community colleges to begin their postsecondary education, UC President Atkinson and California Community Colleges’ Chancellor Nussbaum signed an historic memorandum of understanding (MOU) in 1997 agreeing to increase transfers to UC by 33 percent by academic year 2005-06.2 Both leaders understood that in order to accommodate California’s burgeoning population, in which as many as 400,000 new college-age students are expected by the end of this decade, the community colleges would need to play a larger role in educating students at the lower-division level and in preparing them for eventual transfer to a UC or CSU campus. In the summer of 2000, UC and the California Community Colleges, in partnership with Governor Davis, expanded the scope of the original MOU. The California Community Colleges agreed to significantly increase the number of “transfer-ready” students it prepares, while UC agreed to increase by 50 percent the number of transfer students it would enroll by 2005-06. The enrollment increases specified by the 1997 MOU and the 2000 Partnership Agreement require both UC and the California Community Colleges to coordinate transfer activities and to streamline transfer processes for students throughout California. Such collaboration can only be successful if each partner understands its obligations and can clearly measure its progress. For UC, this means admitting and enrolling UC-eligible students from California’s 108 community colleges. For community colleges, this means preparing UC “transfer-ready” students and assuring that all interested and willing students apply to one or more UC campuses. The data in this Compendium are designed to allow policymakers to assess the extent to which these goals have been met. Notes Regarding Compendium Data The data in the following tables have been obtained from the University of California’s Corporate Student Data System. This database is maintained at the UC’s Office of the President (UCOP) and contains data on all individuals who have applied to, been admitted by, and have enrolled in, a University of California campus. In past years, transfer student data have been presented in a variety of publications, including the University’s Information Digest (produced annually by UCOP) and the California Postsecondary Education Commission’s Student Reports. These reports, while vital in measuring the success of the transfer function, suffer from three problems that limit their usefulness: 1) Data are generally presented in an aggregated format (i.e., as systemwide data), which is not especially useful for UC campuses and individual community colleges wishing to track the success of their specific transfer efforts; 2) Data are presented for the fall term only, which underreports transfer efforts anywhere from 10 to 30 percent since UC campuses admit students in the winter and spring terms in addition to the fall; and 3) Data on the number of students transferring from each California community college to UC, regardless of residency status or class level, are generally not reported. Given the limitations of the data presented in other publications, enrollment data on this website have been gathered and presented with the following characteristics: 1. Data refer to all students who attended a California community college and applied to a UC campus. This includes California residents as well as non-residents. It also includes lower- and upper-division transfer students from California community colleges. While the University’s focus is on the recruitment of upper-division transfer students who are California residents, up to 5 percent of all transfers do not fit this profile. 2. Data are presented by full academic-year. Academic year information is vital since the most often reported measure of transfer – fall term data – underreports UC transfer efforts anywhere from 10 to 30 percent per year. 3. Data are presented that show the number of students that have enrolled in a UC campus. This information is presented by academic year, allowing UC and community colleges to assess the effectiveness of their outreach efforts. 4. Data are presented from an individual community college perspective, although UC campus-specific data are presented as well. This allows community colleges and UC campuses to assess their individual outreach efforts. 5. Data are presented beginning in academic year 1994-95 because it represents transfer enrollment in California one year before the signing of UC/Community College MOU. Thus, it serves as an unofficial baseline to measure transfer efforts. One final note: Community college transfer staff often ask how a community college receives “credit” for a student that transfers to a UC campus. While this has always been an important accountability measure for community colleges, it has become increasingly salient in the last several years given that the State Legislature now links funding to community colleges based in part on the number of students it transfers to CSU or UC. UC’s reporting practice grants credit to the community college in which the student earned the greatest number of units. That is, community college X would receive credit for transferring student Y if this student earned most of his or her units at community college X (regardless of the number of community colleges the student may have attended before transferring). This Universitywide reporting practice has been in place since 1994. It is our hope that the data presented in this Transfer Compendium will serve faculty, staff, and students throughout California’s educational community and, in doing so, enhance the transfer function. Stephen J. Handel, Director Robert J. Tacconi, Principal Analyst Transfer Enrollment Planning and Undergraduate Outreach Office of the President University of California November 2003 1 A Master Plan for Higher Education: 1960-1975 (February 1, 1960). Sacramento: California State Department of Education. 2 See Enhancing Student Transfer: A Memorandum of Understanding between the California Community Colleges and the University of California (November 1997).     Back to SAS | UC Office of the President   ©Copyright 1997-2003, The Regents of the University of California. Last modified November 24, 2003.