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May 25, 1998
May 25, 1998
By Terry Lightfoot
UC Office of the President
More than 27,000 high school seniors are planning to attend the University of California as freshmen in the fall, up by 1,331 students or nearly 5 percent over last year. This is based on Statement of Intent to Register (SIR) responses from high school seniors who had previously been admitted to one of the UC campuses. The university completed processing SIRs this week.
"We are pleased to welcome the Class of 2002 to the UC community and to congratulate these outstanding students," said UC President Richard C. Atkinson. "We are proud that efforts to encourage students to enroll at one of our campuses have helped maintain diversity in the university and hope for greater success in the years ahead."
Nearly every campus showed increases in the overall percentage of admitted students who decided to enroll at UC (see Table 1).
All campuses showed an increase in the percentage of underrepresented minorities (African Americans, American Indians, Chicanos and Latinos) who accepted an offer of admission: the Santa Barbara campus increased from 26.8 percent in 1997 to 33 percent in 1998; Irvine, from 20.8 percent to 26.7 percent; Riverside, from 25.3 percent to 31 percent; Davis, from 24.3 percent to 29.9 percent; Santa Cruz, from 20.7 percent to 24.9 percent; San Diego, from 25.1 percent to 28.8 percent; UCLA, from 40.6 percent to 44.3 percent; Berkeley, from 41.6 percent to 42.3 percent.
The above results indicate that UC has been successful in persuading underrepresented minority students admitted to UC to take the next step and enroll.
A separate issue is the actual number of underrepresented minorities planning to attend UC (see Table 2). The Berkeley, Los Angeles, and San Diego campuses showed significant declines compared to last year, but these declines were offset to some extent by increases at other UC campuses.
Systemwide, the proportion of underrepresented students declined 2.4 percentage points, from 17.6 percent in 1997 to 15.2 percent for next year (see next-to-last column of Table 2).
"This is an encouraging outcome in a year that presented new challenges brought on by Proposition 209 and changes in UC admission policy," said Atkinson. "It is an indication of the university's strong appeal to all students and a tribute to the effectiveness of UC's outreach efforts."
As noted above, the proportion of underrepresented students among all students planning to attend (including those who declined to state their ethnicity on the application form) is 15.2 percent next fall compared to 17.6 percent in 1997. Excluding students who declined to state their ethnicity, underrepresented minorities represent 17.7 percent of students planning to enroll next fall compared to 18.5 percent in 1997 (see last column of Table 2).
Asian Americans make up 35.4 percent of students planning to enroll in 1998; white/others 35.3 percent; Chicanos 8.7 percent; Latinos 2.9 percent; African Americans 2.8 percent; American Indians 0.7 percent, and students declining to state an ethnicity 14.1 percent.
"We are heartened that the declines in underrepresented students for UC as a whole were less than anticipated," said Dennis Galligani, UC associate vice president for student academic services. "Over time, we intend to increase the enrollment of underrepresented students at UC by working with K-12 schools to expand educational opportunity for young people of all backgrounds."