UC admits record number of out-of-state freshmen

More University of California freshman applicants from outside the state were invited to attend this fall than ever before, while the number of Californians admitted continued to drop, UC said Thursday.

“Every year, we offer admission to exceptionally talented students who work hard to gain admission to Berkeley, but this year was definitely more competitive than years past,” said Amy Jarich, UC Berkeley’s director of undergraduate admissions.

Because of the high demand, we are the most selective public university in America, excluding the military academies.

University observers say economics are a driving force behind the nonresident increase, since nonresidents pay $24,000 more tuition and fees per year than residents.

[...] many of those students were offered admission to traditionally less sought-after campuses such as UC Merced, while out-of-state admissions to the premier campuses in Berkeley and Los Angeles remained high.

Steve Deutsch of San Francisco, whose daughter Audrey is a senior at Lowell High School and is planning to apply to UC, said he was concerned by the increasing numbers of nonresident freshmen and how that may affect his daughter’s chances of being admitting to her preferred campus at the public university.

[...] Deutsch took out his calculator and figured that if 15,000 nonresident freshmen pay an extra $100,000 in tuition and fees over their four-year UC careers, the university stands to take in an extra $1.5 billion.

The proportion of Asian American and Latino freshmen increased, the number of blacks stayed about the same, and the proportion of whites declined.