UC San Diego Receives Record 78,056 Freshman and 16,144 Transfer Applications for Fall 2015

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The University of California, San Diego has received a record 94,200 freshman and transfer applications for fall 2015. The university had the third highest number of applicants among the University of California campuses. Within the last decade, UC San Diego has consistently been one of the nation’s top five universities to receive the most applications.

UC San Diego received 78,056 freshman applications for fall 2015, up 6.4 percent from last year. Transfer student applications increased by 2.1 percent from 2014, with a total of 16,144 transfer students applying for admission. The mean high school grade point average (GPA) for freshmen is 3.80; and the average SAT Reasoning scores are 599, 647 and 613 respectively for Critical Reading, Math and Writing (up slightly from last year’s applicant SAT scores which were 591, 644 and 607). The average GPA among transfer applicants was from 3.37.

“UC San Diego continues to attract the best and the brightest because of its reputation as one of the top ranked universities in the world, as well as its accessibility and affordability,” said UC San Diego Chancellor Pradeep K. Khosla. “Year after year, the academic quality and talent of UC San Diego’s applicants is impressive and inspiring.”

UC San Diego continued to see an increase in diversity among student applicants. At the freshman level, the campus had a 7.9 percent rise of historically underrepresented students for fall 2015, with the largest increase coming from African-American high school seniors (up 13.5 percent compared to last year), followed by Mexican-American (up 7.1 percent) and Latino (up 7 percent) applicants.

“This campus is committed to ensuring students of all backgrounds have access to a UC San Diego education,” said Juan González, vice chancellor for Student Affairs. “More than half of our students receive financial aid, and across the University of California, more than half of all California resident undergraduates continue to pay no systemwide tuition or fees.”

González added that UC San Diego students continue to graduate with lower than the national average student debt.

Nearly 90 percent of transfer applicants are from California Community Colleges. This year, UC San Diego had a record number of resident freshman applicants apply for admission, with the largest number coming from Los Angeles (27,273 or 34.9 percent) which was followed by San Francisco (13,216 or 16.9 percent).

The most popular majors chosen by freshman applicants are in social sciences, engineering and biology. Almost 50 percent of UC San Diego’s transfer applications are social science majors. Other selected majors among transfers include engineering and biology.

UC San Diego continued to see more women than men among freshman applicants, with 51.8 percent females compared to 46.6 percent males and 1.7 percent of applicants not reporting their gender. This year, more males (54.7 percent) applied as transfers compared to females (44.1 percent).

Overall, the University of California received more applications this year, compared to last year. Data shows that 193,873 students applied for admission to at least one of the nine undergraduate UC campuses—158,146 of them as freshmen and the remainder as transfer students. These combined numbers represent an overall increase in applications of 5.8 percent over fall 2014.