The University of California (UC)

The University of California (UC) is a public university system in the U.S. state of California. Under the California Master Plan for Higher Education, the University of California is a part of the state's three system public higher education plan, which also includes the California State University system and the California Community Colleges System.

As of spring 2015, the University of California has 10 campuses, a combined student body of 238,700 students, 19,700 faculty members, 135,900 staff members and over 1.6 million living alumni.

Its first campus, UC Berkeley, was founded in 1868, while its tenth and newest campus, UC Merced, opened for classes in fall 2005. Nine campuses enroll both undergraduate and graduate students; one campus, UC San Francisco, enrolls only graduate and professional students in the medical and health sciences. In addition, the independently administered UC Hastings is located in San Francisco but is not part of the UCSF campus.

The University of California's campuses boast large numbers of distinguished faculty in almost every field and it is widely regarded as one of the top public university systems in the world. Eight of its undergraduate campuses are ranked among the top 100, six among the top 50, and two among the top 25 U.S. universities by U.S. News & World Report. Among public schools, two of its undergraduate campuses are ranked in the top 5 (UC Berkeley at 1 and UCLA at 2), five in the top 10 (UC Davis and UC San Diego at 8, and UC Santa Barbara at 10), and all in the top 50 (UC Irvine at 12, UC Santa Cruz at 32, UC Riverside at 46), with the exception of the newly opened UC Merced (U.S. News Rankings 2013). UC Berkeley is ranked third worldwide among public and private universities and two others—UCLA and UC San Diego—are ranked among the top 15 by the Academic Ranking of World Universities.

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