University of California, Berkeley

Key Takeaways:

• UC Berkeley offers a wide range of undergraduate and graduate programs across multiple disciplines, including STEM fields, social sciences, humanities, and professional degrees.
• UC Berkeley has a diverse student population, with students from all over the world. The campus culture is known for its activism, intellectual rigor, and creativity.
• It is highly selective, especially for out-of-state and international students. Successful applicants typically have strong academic records, extracurricular involvement, and high test scores.
• The city of Berkeley is located in the San Francisco Bay Area, known for its progressive culture, beautiful landscapes, and proximity to Silicon Valley.
• UC Berkeley has a vast and influential alumni network that includes entrepreneurs, politicians, artists, and scholars. Graduates of UC Berkeley are highly sought after by employers worldwide.

Degree Options at the University of California Berkeley

University of California, Berkeley appears in our ranking of the 30 Best Colleges for Young Democrats.

Students can enroll in more than 150 different programs of study at the University of California Berkeley. The university is known for giving its students a rigorous curriculum that requires extreme academic dedication and high academic achievement for successful admittance. Popular degrees at the university include those in the social sciences, engineering, biology, and conservation.

The university offers several simultaneous degrees where students can earn undergraduate degrees in two distinctive areas at the same time. Options include a business degree paired with a biology or mechanical engineering degree, or a business administration degree alongside a bioengineering, civil engineering, or electrical engineering degree. Students can also earn a degree in industrial engineering with a degree in operations research.

Students may also consider dual or concurrent enrollment through the Extension Concurrent Enrollment program, which allows students to enroll in classes at the university without completing the full and formal application process. Students are invited to check out the university’s summer sessions, as well as the Extension International Program if they live outside the united states. Students who enroll in the summer can actually qualify for housing support while enrolled in the Extension Concurrent Enrollment program.

Prospective enrollees at the University of California Berkeley who already have a bachelor’s degree may consider more than 100 graduate programs at the university, where concurrent degrees, exchange programs, and interdisciplinary doctoral programs are available. Some of the graduate programs offered at the university include those in architecture, biostatistics, education, Hispanic languages & literature, and linguistics.

Students should note that enrollment in one of the concurrent degree programs requires a special application and that students can only apply to one concurrent degree program or a single degree program when they send in their application. Students can also enter some programs where study for a Ph.D. will also reward the student with a master’s degree before the program is finished.

For example, students can earn a Master of Arts in Biostatistics while enrolled in the Ph.D. program on that subject. Similarly, students can earn a Master of Science in Computer Science if they enroll in the Ph.D. program in CS.

About the University of California Berkeley

The University of California Berkeley is a public research institution in the city of Berkeley, California. The school is considered the flagship institution of the University of California system, which has ten campuses around the state. There are more than 42,000 students at the university with around 11,600 of those students studying at the graduate level. The large campus covers more than 1,200 acres, and the university’s official colors are called California Gold and Berkeley Blue.

In their NCAA Division I FBS games, the university’s sports teams play as the Golden Bears, and the school’s mascot is named Oski the Bear. The university has been the site of several groundbreaking discoveries, as well as an incredible number of Turing Award winners, Fields Medalists, and Nobel laureates. Researchers at the university have discovered a large number of the elements on the periodic table.

University of California Berkeley Accreditation Details

Campus accreditation was first earned by the University of California Berkeley in 1949, and the institution has reaffirmed its accreditation every ten years since with the Western Association of Schools and Colleges. The next accreditation cycle for the university will occur in 2024 and will measure student learning, graduation and retention rates, and other institutional sustainability factors. In addition to institutional accreditation, the university also boasts many programs, departments, and degrees that are accredited by various agencies.

Some of the agencies to have accredited programs at the university include the Society of American Foresters, the American Bar Association, the Planning Accreditation Board, and the Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business. Other agencies to have given accreditation to the university include the Council on Education for Public Health, the American Psychological Association, and the American Optometric Association.

University of California Berkeley Application Requirements

Basic application requirements at the University of California Berkeley are the same as the overall University of California school system. The average student will have an unweighted GPA between 3.89 and 4.00, an ACT score between 30 and 35, and an SAT score between 1350 and 1540. The university receives more than 87,000 applications each year and admits around 14,600 of those applicants for first-year study. The acceptance rate is between 16 and 17 percent each year.

Minimum standards for graduate study at the University of California Berkeley include having a bachelor’s degree from an accredited institution, a GPA of at least 3.0 on a 4.0 scale, and an appropriate undergraduate curriculum to indicate likely success in the study of similar topics at the graduate level. Most departments have higher requirements, as well as additional application materials beyond the standard application, standardized tests, and transcripts.

Tuition and Financial Aid

The University of California Berkeley charges $14,184 for tuition to all students, and non-residents also pay supplemental tuition of $29,754. The student health insurance plan adds $2,994, room and board charges add $17,110, and books add an estimated $870 to the total. The university also expects students to spend about $400 on transportation and $1,876 on personal expenses. The total cost for undergraduate residents is $29,078, and the estimated cost for non-residents is $66,426.

For graduate study, there are standard tuition rates that are applied to some academic programs, as well as college- and school-specific tuition rates. For example, general academic programs cost $5,721 for tuition with non-residents paying an additional $7,551 for non-resident supplemental tuition. In all, residents should expect to pay a minimum of $9,808.25 for tuition and fees, and non-residents should expect to pay $17,384.00.

Students can qualify for financial aid and scholarships when they attend the University of California Berkeley and must submit a FAFSA form in advance of enrolling at the university to qualify for aid. More than 65 percent of undergraduate students at Berkeley receive some type of financial aid, and students can use an online calculator hosted by the university to estimate costs.

Students interested in obtaining a scholarship to help with the costs associated with the university will work with the Financial Aid and Scholarships Office to apply for programs like the Berkeley Undergraduate Scholarship, which is funded by 750 donors to the university and provides 2,500 students enrolled at the University of California Berkeley with scholarships based on financial need and academic merit.