Higher Education Problem

Executive summary

Over the past five years, UC San Diego has experienced a steep decline in the academic preparation of its entering first-year students -- particularly in mathematics, but also in writing and language skills. Between 2020 and 2025, the number of students whose math skills fall below middle-school level increased nearly thirtyfold, reaching roughly one in eight members of the entering cohort. This deterioration coincided with the COVID-19 pandemic and its effects on education, the elimination of standardized testing, grade inflation, and the expansion of admissions from under-resourced high schools. The combination of these factors has produced an incoming class increasingly unprepared for the quantitative and analytical rigor expected at UC San Diego.

The Senate–Administration Working Group on Admissions (SAWG) concludes that this trend poses serious challenges both to student success and to the university’s instructional mission. Admitting large numbers of underprepared students risks harming those students and straining limited instructional resources. The report offers a series of recommendations to improve the alignment between admissions practices, student readiness, and available support systems.

https://senate.ucsd.edu/media/740347/sawg-report-on-admissions-review-docs.pdf