Fall Classes Begin for Estimated 4,500 Freshmen and 2,200 Transfers at UC San Diego

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Freshman Edgar Villaruel, a military scholarship recipient who will be serving in the Air Force while attending UC San Diego.

Fall quarter classes begin Thursday, Sept. 27 for approximately ­­30,000 students at the University of California, San Diego.

At UC San Diego, there are an estimated 4,500 ­­incoming freshmen and 2,200 new transfers. The new freshmen students have an overall grade-point average of 4.0 and average SAT Reasoning scores are 608, 670 and 630, respectively, for Critical Reading, Math and Writing. The campus’s new transfer students bring with them a 3.50 grade-point average.

“I am very excited to start UC San Diego,” said incoming freshman, Edgar Villaruel. “I can’t wait for the college life—to live in the dorms and go to classes.”

Villaruel, who is from Downey, Calif., is a U.S. Air Force scholarship recipient who said he will be living his dreams serving his country and attending UC San Diego at the same time.

Villaruel’s scholarship covers his tuition while he is in college as both an undergraduate and graduate student. He is in an officer training program that requires him to serve in the Air Force for however many years he attends college.

“I feel like I have been preparing for college my whole life,” Villaruel said. “I know I will be very busy but I have always been the type of person to put a lot on my plate so I am up for the challenge.”

Kicking off the more than 150 Welcome Week activities is the new student convocation, a ceremony marking the official entrance to the campus community for UC San Diego students. The event will take place at 5 p.m. on Sept. 24. on RIMAC field and will feature a keynote speech from alumnus Donald W. Murphy, executive officer for the National Underground Railroad Freedom Center, a museum dedicated to relating the story of the nation’s struggle to overcome slavery.  Murphy also is a published poet and was former deputy director of the National Park Service, where he managed 390 national park units covering approximately 84 million acres.

Other Welcome Week events include such varied activities as the traditional “UnOlympics,” “Triton Power Hour,” an all-campus dance, a jog-and-see-UC San Diego, a scavenger hunt and Volunteer50 beach cleanup.

A total of 12,574 UC San Diego students will be living in the more than 400 buildings of campus housing for fall 2012, the largest number of students ever to be housed at UC San Diego.

Incoming freshmen will be the first class to receive a four-year housing guarantee­­––a first of its kind agreement in the University of California system.  In addition, all incoming transfer students will be guaranteed two-years of housing.

“This record number of students housed for 2012-13 is the culmination of a five-year building program in which the UC San Diego housing capacity has nearly doubled,” said Mark Cunningham, assistant vice chancellor of Housing and Dining at UC San Diego. “We are extremely gratified to have had the support of the campus to accomplish this and most importantly, the support from our students who have chosen to live on campus.”

Students returning to school will also be offered new undergraduate and graduate degree programs, including a Bachelor of Science in marine biology, Master of Advanced Studies in medical devices engineering and Master of Science in earth science.

Several new facilities, including the 183,000 square foot Structural and Materials Engineering (SME) building have been added to the campus. The SME building provides the first permanent home for the departments of structural engineering and nanoengineering at the Jacobs School of Engineering. Artists from the visual arts department and medical device researchers from the Institute of Engineering in Medicine will also share the space.

UC San Diego’s East Campus Parking Structure was completed earlier this year, adding approximately 1,245 new parking spaces. In addition, the second phase of the Rady School of Management was completed adding  80,000 gross square feet, which includes additional classrooms, an open class laboratory, faculty and administrative offices, conference rooms, an auditorium and student work and study areas.

For more information on the start of fall quarter at UC San Diego, go to: http://welcomeweek.ucsd.edu/.