UCSD admitted almost 25,000 incoming freshman to the 2017 graduating class, an 8.1-percent increase of last year’s total numbers. The 24,792 admitted students represent a record number of admits for the university, which also saw its largest pool of applicants this year, with 67,392 altogether.
With a 36.8-percent acceptance rate, UCSD regained its status as the third-most selective UC campus after UCLA and Berkeley. UCSD lost this ranking last year to UC Irvine, whose 2012 acceptance rate of 36.3 percent jumped to 41.1 percent this year. UCLA is the most selective UC for the first time, its 20.1 percent acceptance rate edging out Berkeley’s 20.8 percent.
The three most popular majors of the incoming class are biology, economics, and electrical/computer science engineering. The Jacobs School of Engineering has already announced impacted status for freshman electrical and computer science engineering programs. The admitted students also have an average GPA of 4.11, up from last year’s 4.07, and SAT scores of 642, 692 and 659 for Critical Reading, Math and Writing, respectively.
First-generation college students make up 31.7 percent of the freshman class, a 2.8-percent increase from last year. An additional 27.9 percent come from low-income families, a number that remained steady since fall 2012.
Assistant Vice Chancellor of Admissions Mae Brown highlighted the overall diversity of the incoming class.
“The makeup of this year’s new freshmen represents one of UC San Diego’s most ethnically, geographically and socioeconomically diverse classes to date,” Brown wrote in a press release.
UCSD continues to see a drop in admits from high schools with low Academic Performance Index scores.
The API scores indicate a school’s performance, factoring in individual students’ socioeconomic status, race and other categories. UCSD admitted 14.5 percent of students from low-performing high schools, the lowest amount of any other UC campus and a low for UCSD itself.
Students who identify as Asian-American make up the largest ethnic group at 46.7 percent of the admitted population. Pacific Islander students represent the smallest, with a total of 33 admitted students, or 0.2 percent of the total.
UCSD also admitted 422 African-American students, a 12.5-percent increase from last year.
The university has faced criticism in the past for its relatively low percentage of African-American students. Since fall 2009, black students have made up about 2 percent of the total undergraduate population.
An analytical article on Voice of San Diego explains the situation in part on how few African-American first years choose to attend UCSD after they have been accepted. Seventeen percent of black freshman enrolled in UCSD in 2009, or 41 out of 3,566 total California residents.
Female students make up 53 percent of the total, or 12,767 admitted students, while males total 11,645, or 47 percent.
Students have until May 1 to decide whether or not they will attend UCSD. Transfer student applicants will receive their admission letters by the end of the month.
