The University of California, continuing a trend begun three years ago for budgetary reasons, accepted fewer in-state residents for the Fall semester than the year before while accepting more out-of-state and foreign students.

Acceptance of California high school seniors at UC schools dropped 2.2% for Fall 2013, according to university sources. Only 60.6% of those 99,132 students who applied for admission were accepted. Five years ago, the admission rate was 70%.

Conversely, 22,761 students from out-of-state, or 21% more than last year, were admitted. That is a considerably lower rate of gain than last year’s 43% jump in accepted out-of-state and foreign students, according to the Los Angeles Times.

Non-Californians pay almost three times as much for tuition ($36,078) as the $13,200 California residents pay. The nine schools that make up UC have aggressively pursued non-California students, with UCLA, UC Berkeley and UC San Diego leading the way. Around one-third of their admitted freshman class is from outside the state.

The admission numbers don’t necessarily reflect the actual enrollment in the Fall. In-state students tend to follow through on their application and acceptance at a higher rate than out-of-staters. Overall, out-of-state students are expected to be close to 10% of UC’s undergraduates in 2013.

All nine campuses increased their offers of admission to non-Californians.

UCLA, the national leader in freshman applications, was the toughest UC school to get into overall. Only 20.1% of 80,494 total applicants gained admission. Berkeley was the second hardest to crack, at 20.8%. They were followed by campuses at San Diego (36.8%), Santa Barbara (38.8%), Davis (39.4%), Irvine (41.1%), Santa Cruz (48.6%), Riverside (54.7%) and Merced (65.6%).

Asian Americans continue to make up the largest ethnic group admitted overall at 36%. They are followed by Whites (28.1%), Latinos (27.6%) and African Americans (4.2%).

–Ken Broder

To Learn More:

UC Admits More Out-of-State Students (by Laurel Rosenhall, Sacramento Bee)

UC Acceptance Rate of California Seniors at Record Low (by Larry Gordon, Los Angeles Times)

UC Accepts Fewer Californians, More Students from Out-of-State (Associated Press)

Record Number of Freshmen Admitted for Fall 2013 (University of California)

Student Workforce Data (University of California)