Sept. 03--The ranks of UC freshmen from other states and nations will rise substantially this fall at the Irvine, Davis and San Diego campuses, even as the controversially high numbers of non-Californians will remain about the same as last year at UCLA and UC Berkeley, new enrollment numbers show.
The share of the incoming freshman class who are not state residents is expected to increase from 27.4% last year to 33.3% this fall at UC San Diego; from 20.3% to 27.1% at UC Irvine; and from 17.1% to 26% at UC Davis, according to preliminary counts of students who have indicated they will enroll.
The overall number of California freshmen will dip somewhat at the Davis and Irvine campuses but will increase at San Diego, where the incoming class appears to be expanding the most of the nine UC undergraduate campuses.
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In the past few years, UC boosted recruitment and enrollment of students from outside the state to offset cuts in state funding. This year, those students will pay $24,700 in extra tuition on top of the regular $12,200 UC tuition, a 5% increase.
However, the fast increase in the ranks of those non-Californians at UCLA and UC Berkeley triggered protests from families and lawmakers concerned about access to the two campuses where admission is the most competitive.
In March, UC President Janet Napolitano promised to cap out-of-state enrollments at UCLA and UC Berkeley, and that promise appears to have been kept. According to statistics released Thursday, freshmen from other states and countries will comprise 29.2% of UCLA's incoming class, the same share as last year. At Berkeley, that share will drop slightly from 29.2% to 28.9%.
Napolitano's promise did not extend to other campuses that have increasingly attracted international applicants, particularly those from China and other parts of Asia. The numbers of international students are up substantially at Irvine, Davis and San Diego but not at Merced, Riverside, Santa Barbara or Santa Cruz.
State funding for UC is up this year, but UC officials contend the increase is not big enough to cover large increases in California students. However, with the lure of an additional $25 million bonus from the Legislature, the system is working to increase the number of California students by 5,000 in the 2016-17 school year, they said.
Meanwhile, tuition for in-state students will remain frozen for the fourth year in a row this fall.
Across all nine UC campuses, 34,047 freshmen from California have said they will attend, 1,121 fewer than last year; they will comprise 77.5% of freshmen, compared with 80.5% last year.
Non-Californians are expected to increase by 1,403 to 9,910, rising from 19.5% of freshmen to 22.5% systemwide, the figures show.
Continuing a trend of the past few years, the Latino share of UC freshmen from California continues to rise, from 29.8% last year to 30.2% this fall. Asians from within the state make up the largest ethnic group of first-year students, 39.2%, compared with 39.3% last year. Whites are 22.3%, down from 23.1% and blacks remain at 4.1%.
The relatively low enrollment of African Americans at some UC campuses has been a matter of concern to campus administrators and the black community. And Thursday's numbers likely will add to ongoing discussions about how to bolster black enrollment. UCLA's freshman class will have the highest share of African American students: 5.8%, up from 5.1% last year. However, UC San Diego has the lowest share, just 1.9%, down from 2.3%.
UC San Diego is studying why black students who are offered admission there are not enrolling, according to UC regents. Five years ago, the campus was riven by several racially divisive incidents, including an off-campus party that mocked Black History Month.
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