I got an e-mail with some good news today from Tonya Luiz from the Office of Communications at UC Merced. She says that more than 1,000 freshmen have declared their intent to register for classes at UC Merced this fall, an increase of 46% compared with the previous year.

In January, University of California officials announced that more than 9,000 freshmen had applied to UC Merced for the fall 2008 semester – the university’s largest applicant pool yet. Campus officials expect to enroll about 900 new students for fall 2008.

UC Merced also seems to be making good progress toward another of its goals, which is to help create a college-going culture in the Valley. Here are some more good numbers.

* The number of Central Valley students who have applied to UC campuses has increased 19% since UC Merced first opened its doors in 2005 (3,668 in 2005 vs. 4,379 in 2008).

* Admission rates have increased 21% (2,794 in 2005 vs. 3,388 in 2008).

The rise in applications and admissions among that population is even more dramatic – 41% in applications and 45% in admissions -- when compared to the statistics from 2004 – when students did not have UC Merced as a choice (3,100 applicants and 2,344 admitted in 2004 vs. 4,379 applicants and 3,388 admitted in 2008).

Want to know more about UC Merced? To see the Web site, click here.