The low admission rate reflects UC regents' decision in January to reduce freshman enrollment by 2,300 students, or 6 percent. Enrollment will be cut at the Davis, Irvine, Riverside, San Diego, Santa Barbara and Santa Cruz campuses; remain the same at Berkeley and UCLA; and grow at Merced.

The number of students applying for undergraduate admission for the fall 2009 term increased by nearly 5 percent to almost 127,000, up from 121,000 applications for fall 2008.

Admission offers to California residents increased 2 percent for African Americans, 4 percent for Latinos and 21 percent for American Indians. Offers remained relatively unchanged for Asian Americans and declined 6 percent for whites. About 35 percent of admitted California students are Asian American, 33 percent are white, 22 percent are Latino, 4 percent are African American and 0.7 percent are American Indian.