March 31, 2006

UC San Diego Ranks Among Top 10 of the Nation’s Best
in Science, Engineering, and Medicine Graduate Programs
According to Annual U.S. News Survey

By Denine Hagen

In the survey of graduate education programs released March 31 by U.S. News & World Report, six UC San Diego Ph.D. programs in the biological sciences, physical sciences and computer sciences were ranked among the top 10 in the nation. UCSD also excelled in the professional school rankings and is one of only five research universities to have both a medical school and engineering school ranked in the top 15.

UCSD received top 10 rankings for its interdisciplinary programs in neurosciences and neurobiology, which ranked 2nd in the nation, as wells as bioinformatics and genomics, which were ranked 6th. The UCSD Division of Biological Sciences also ranked highly in cell biology (10) and 12th among biology programs in the nation. The UCSD Division of Physical Sciences ranked 2nd in the nation for discrete mathematics and combinatorics and its biochemistry program ranked 7th (up from 15th in 2002, when Ph.D. programs in the sciences were last ranked by U.S. News). UCSD also ranked 5th in geophysics and seismology; and overall ranked highly for its programs in physics (16), chemistry (18) and mathematics (21).

“We are thrilled to see the work of our stellar faculty and student achievement reflected in these rankings,” said Chancellor Marye Anne Fox. “UCSD strives to promote interdisciplinary programs as a primary pillar of excellence.”

UCSD’s Computer Science and Engineering Department rose significantly in the rankings to 13th in the nation, up seven places since 2002. The department’s program in computer systems was ranked 9th.

In addition to excelling in computer science, UCSD Jacobs School of Engineering’s Department of Bioengineering ranked 2nd in the nation for the third year in a row. Overall the Jacobs School ranked 11th in the nation, 6th among public engineering schools, and 3rd for research expenditures per faculty member. The UCSD School of Medicine ranked 14th overall, 5th among public research-focused medical schools and 1st in the nation for research grants per faculty member. In addition, the School of Medicine’s program in AIDS ranked 6th and in drug and alcohol abuse ranked 8th.

The professional school rankings are based on surveys of peers and of professionals who hire new graduates, and objective criteria such as research activity and student selectivity. The ranking of Ph.D. programs in the sciences result from peer assessment surveys.

The rankings appear in U.S. News’ 2007 America’s Best Graduate Schools guidebook and in the April 10 edition of the U.S. News weekly magazine. The survey results also appear on-line at www.usnews.com.

The current U.S. News guidebook includes surveys from past years, in which UCSD excelled in the ranking of Ph.D. programs in the social sciences, and arts and humanities. In those surveys, UCSD ranked 7th in the nation, and 3rd among all public schools, for political science, with top ten rankings for the specialties of comparative politics (3), American politics (6), international politics (6), and political methodology (7). UCSD economics was ranked 2nd among public universities, and 10th overall in the nation, with high ratings in the specialties of econometrics (2), microeconomics (12), macroeconomics (16) and international economics (16).

In the psychology and sociology specialties, UCSD ranked 2nd for behavioral neuroscience, 3rd in cognitive psychology, 6th in experimental psychology, 6th in sociology of culture, and 16th overall for psychology. From the humanities, Latin American history ranked 7th, and Asian history ranked 10th in the nation. UCSD's programs in multimedia/visual communications were ranked 6th in the nation. The Master of Fine Arts programs in the Department of Theatre and Dance are ranked 3rd in the nation.

The magazine's rankings for graduate programs in science, engineering, and medicine were based on new surveys conducted in Fall 2005, the social sciences and humanities rankings were from a 2004 peer assessment survey, and the arts rankings were derived from a 2002 survey.

Media Contacts: Denine Hagen, 858-534-2920, Kim McDonald, 858-534-7572