UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO - KOREAN GRADUATE STUDENT ASSOCIATION

UCSD: The Institution

Innovation is our tradition: Nestled along the Pacific Ocean on 1,200 acres of coastal woodland, UCSD is a powerful magnet for those seeking a fresh, next-generation approach to education and research. Since its founding over four decades ago, UCSD -- one of the ten campuses in the world-renowned University of California system -- has rapidly achieved the status as one of the top institutions in the nation for higher education and research. UCSD’s interdisciplinary ethos and tradition of innovation and risk-taking, underlie its research strength and ability to recruit top scholars and students.

Budget: UCSD’s annual revenues are $1.9 billion. (33% of this total is from the federal government for research; 14% is from the State of California for education.)

Students: UCSD received over 40,000 applications for fall 2005 admission (the second highest application rate in the University of California system and possibly in the nation). The average high school GPA of enrolled freshmen for fall 2005 was 3.93 and average SATI score was 1251. Total campus enrollment for fall ‘05 was approximately 26,140. UCSD ranks 2nd nationally among major research universities sending students abroad in full-year programs, and 3rd among University of California schools in graduation rates at 83%.

Economic Impact: UCSD is an engine for regional economic growth. UCSD faculty and alums have spun-off close to 200 local companies, including over a third of the region’s biotech companies. In addition, UCSD is San Diego County’s largest single employer, with a monthly payroll in excess of $76 million, and over 23,500 employees.

Specialized Resources: UCSD’s graduate and professional schools include Scripps Institution of Oceanography; School of Medicine; School of International Relations and Pacific Studies; Center for U.S. ? Mexican Studies; Skaggs School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences; Jacobs School of Engineering (graduate and undergraduate), and Rady School of Management. The campus is also home to the San Diego Supercomputer Center; California Institute for Information Technology and Telecommunications (Calit2); Center for Research in Computing and the Arts; Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation; and Institute of the Americas.

Academic Rankings

The 2005 Academic Rankings of World Universities conducted by Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China ranked UCSD 13th internationally.

UCSD was named the “hottest” institution in the nation for students to study science by Newsweek and the 2006 Kaplan/Newsweek College Guide.

The National Research Council ranks UCSD 10th in the nation in the quality of its faculty and graduate programs.(The top ten, in rank order, are: UC Berkeley, MIT, Harvard, Princeton, Stanford, CalTech, Yale, Chicago, Cornell and UCSD). The NRC ranks oceanography and neurosciences 1st in the nation.

UCSD was ranked the 8th best university in the nation by the Washington Monthly’s 2005 College Guide, based on the positive impact the university has had on the country.

UCSD ranks 6th in the nation in National Academy of Sciences membership. (The top ten, in rank order, are: Harvard, UC Berkeley, Stanford, MIT, Yale, UCSD, CalTech, Princeton, Cornell and Chicago.)

U.S. News and World Report ranks UCSD as 7th best public university in the nation, and 32nd among the nation’s top 50 universities.

The journal Foreign Policy ranked UCSD 9th in the nation for international relations studies and 10th for international public policy studies.

2005 global rankings compiled by The (London) Times Higher Education Supplement placed UCSD 42nd in a table of the world’s 200 best universities.

Research Impact

UCSD’s total research funding for 2004-05 was $728.3 million. The National Science Foundation ranks UCSD 7th in the nation in federal R&D expenditures. (The top ten research universities, in rank order, are: Johns Hopkins, UCLA, Michigan, Wisconsin-Madison, Washington, UCSF, UCSD, Stanford, Pennsylvania and Cornell.)

The Institute for Scientific Information (ISI) ranks UCSD the 9th most-cited institution in the world, based on its published research in science and the social sciences from 1995-2005.

ISI also ranks UCSD 5th highest impact research institution in the nation for economics and business, 2nd in the nation for the most cited clinical medicine research papers, and 3rd in the nation for the most influential research in pharmacology from 1995-2005. Science Watch lists Michael Karin, Mol.Bio./Genetics, as 12th among the 20 most cited researchers of the past two decades.

In the 2005 survey of graduate programs by U.S. News, the Jacobs School of Engineering and the School of Medicine both ranked 2nd in the nation for research expenditures per faculty member. Total federal, state and industry research support at the School of Medicine is $242 million, and at the Jacobs School, $138.3 million.

Current Faculty Honors

Graduating Faculty Member Nobel Prize: George E. Palade, 1974, physiology/medicine; Renato Dulbecco, 1975, physiology/medicine; Harry Markowitz, 1990, economics; Paul Crutzen, 1995, chemistry; Mario J. Molina, 1995, chemistry; Sydney Brenner, 2002, medicine; Clive W.J. Granger and Robert F. Engle, 2003, economics.

Fields Medal: Professor of mathematics Efim Zelmanov.

Balzan Prize: Freeman Gilbert, SIO professor (1990), and Wolfgang Berger, SIO professor (1993).

National Medal of Science: Astrophysicist Margaret Burbidge and oceanographer Walter Munk (1985); physician/scientist George Palade (1986); nuclear physicist Marshall N. Rosenbluth (1998); and bioengineer Yuan-Chen Fung (2000).

National Humanities Medal: Latin American history scholar Ramon Eduardo Ruiz (1998)

Pulitzer Prize: Roger Reynolds (1989) Music.

Kyoto Prize: Oceanographer Walter Munk (1999)

Enrico Fermi Award: Physicist Herbert F. York (2000).

MacArthur Foundation Awards: Guillermo Algaze, anthropology; Nancy D. Cartwright, philosophy; Patricia Churchland, philosophy; Michael Freedman, mathematics; Ramon Gutierrez, history and ethnic studies; Edwin Hutchins, cognitive science; Russell Lande, biology; Michael Schudson, communications, and Emily Thompson, history.

Prepared by: UCSD University Communications Office, 12/13/05