UCSD admitted 17,151 students for fall 2004, down 2.4 percent from 2003. The University of California overall admitted 6.7 percent less students than last year.

The eight undergraduate UC campuses turned away 7,600 UC-eligible students. It is the first time in over 40 years the university has denied admission to eligible freshmen. More than 3,700 other applicants received offers for spots in the winter and spring of 2005, or a referral to an engineering program at UC Riverside, according to data released by the university.

“We don’t like turning away students,” UC Director of Undergraduate Admissions Susan Wilbur said at an April 20 teleconference. “It’s been a very difficult year for students. It’s been a difficult year for the university.”

The system offered admission to 73 percent of all applicants. UC Santa Cruz experienced the largest change compared to last year, falling by nearly 14 percent, with just over 67 percent of applicants for the fall receiving an offer of admission.

UCSD accepted fewer than four out of every 10 high school seniors who applied for fall admission, in addition to 775 students admitted for winter 2005.

Admitted students had higher marks and test scores than last year. The average grade point average rose to 4.05 from 4.04 and average SAT I scores increased by 12 points to 1,300.

The number of underrepresented minorities offered admission to UCSD fell by 4.9 percent.

Though the number of underrepresented minority students as a proportion of all admits rose for the UC system, the number at UCSD fell, down to 14.4 percent of all admits. It is a 4.9 percent drop for the campus in admission offers to underrepresented minorities compared to last year’s statistics.

The campus lags behind the systemwide of admissions to underrepresented minority students rate by more than 5 percent.

“I clearly think that, as a campus, we have a lot of work to do in terms of increasing the number of underrepresented students,” Mae W. Brown, the assistant vice chancellor of admissions and enrollment services said. “We’re concerned with the drop in underrepresented students, especially with the drop of African Americans on campus.”

Across all UC campuses, more than 15 percent fewer African Americans received admission, the largest annual drop among all ethnic groups. There was a 9.6 percent decrease at UCSD.

“Overall, it’s disappointing to see these numbers go down, especially since chronically, in our university and our system, there never have been numbers that meet the demographics of our state or our area,” A.S. Commissioner of Diversity Affairs Stephanie Aguon said. “It makes it difficult to create the kind of campus climate that we want, if students are being cut.”

Brown and Aguon blamed the poor number of underrepresented admits partly on tuition fees hikes and state cuts in funding for outreach programs.

“We absolutely need to look at the implications of the cuts in outreach. I think those programs are quite essential in maintaining the diversity of the campus,” Brown said.

Aguon said her office would continue work on the creation of a recruitment and retention center, like those at UC Berkeley and other universities. She believes the centers would help raise the numbers for underrepresented students.

The proportion of students who are first in their family to attend college, have a family income below $30,000, or come from low-performing schools rose slightly across the UC system. At UCSD, more than 23 percent of admitted students represented the first in their family to go to college, according to university data.

Females continued to outpace males at all campuses, occupying more than 57 percent of UCSD’s admission spaces.

This rising number of female admissions represents a “national phenomenon,” Brown said.

UC-eligible students denied admission in 2004-05 received a Guaranteed Transfer Option. It is a new program that promises applicants a spot at a UC campus after two years of community college. Under Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s budget proposal, currently pending in the Legislature, their community college fees would be waived.

African Americans comprised nearly a quarter of the GTO students, the second-largest ethnic group, behind Caucasians, to be offered the option.