When it first opened its doors in 1869, the University of California had just 10 faculty members and 38 students. Today, the UC system includes more than 209,000 students and more than 170,000 faculty and staff, with more than 1.4 million alumni living and working around the world.
From its inception 20 years after the California Gold Rush, UC faculty and students have looked to cross the horizons of what we know about our selves and our world, and what we can do in it. That was the vision of the pioneers living at the farthest frontiers of the American continent when they created a University for the Golden State. As we chart our course through the 21st century, the University of California is still at the frontier.
UC researchers are pioneers in agriculture, medicine, technology and the environment. Thousands of California jobs, billions of dollars in revenues, and countless everyday household items – from more plentiful fruits and vegetables to compact fluorescent light bulbs – can be traced back to UC discoveries. Similarly, many of the state's leading businesses have connections to UC. Those companies were either based on technology developed by the university, were founded by our faculty or alumni, or are headed by UC graduates.
UC's ten campuses at Berkeley, Davis, Irvine, Los Angeles, Merced, Riverside, San Diego, San Francisco, Santa Cruz and Santa Barbara provide exciting environments that foster world-class educational and research opportunities and generate a wide range of benefits and services that touch the lives of Californians every day.