UC Santa Barbara has offered a place in its fall 2008 entering class to a record 23,140 high school seniors. The prospective freshmen were selected from a pool of 47,025 applicants. The fall 2008 entering class will be approximately 4,200.

Applications from 8,846 students seeking to transfer to UCSB are under review, with decisions to be announced in May. An estimated 1,400 transfer students are also expected to enroll in the fall.

Both the academic qualifications and the diversity of the class of applicants accepted are at record high levels.

Chancellor Henry T. Yang said success in attracting an outstanding applicant pool was the product of the efforts of every department on campus. He noted that UCSB was now focused on working to ensure that the class it enrolls in the fall will be the campus’s most talented and diverse ever. Over the past month, Yang hosted UCSB receptions in the Bay Area, Orange County, and Los Angeles for high-achieving applicants and their family members.

Christine Van Gieson, director of admissions, encouraged admitted students to visit the campus and surrounding communities. “We welcome them,” she said. “This is a very exciting time, as students explore their college choices and prepare to make important decisions about their future.”

UCSB freshman acceptance letters were mailed in mid-March. Applicants also were able to learn if they were admitted via a protected Web site. Applicants who have been accepted by any UC campus have until May 1 to submit a Statement of Intent to Register.

The UC Office of the President has posted systemwide statistics on its Web site at <http://www.ucop.edu/news/studstaff.html>.

The average high school Grade Point Average of applicants admitted by UCSB was 4.03, compared with 3.98 last year. The average total score on the required SATR Test was 1872 out of a possible 2400, up from 1866 last year.

Of all applicants admitted, 49.9 percent identified themselves as members of a racial or ethnic minority group—up from 47.2 percent last year. Individual applicants to UC are not identified to the campuses by race or ethnicity until after all admission decisions are made.

Of those admitted, 92.3 percent, or 21,367, are enrolled in California high schools, and among those students, members of underrepresented minority groups (African-American, American Indian, and Chicano and Latino students) account for 24.5 percent, up from 21.6 percent last year. Total California applicants from all underrepresented minority groups accepted by UCSB was 5,246, an increase of 18 percent from last year.