Undergraduate Degree Requirements

Earning Your Bachelor’s Degree at UC Santa Cruz

To earn your degree at UC Santa Cruz, you must complete at least 180 credits, maintain the required GPA, and fulfill all university, general education, college, and major requirements. Grades of C (pass) or better are required for academic requirements, including university, GE, and major/minor courses.

You can use your Degree Progress Report to track your progress and check the General Catalog for full requirement details. See below for a breakdown of what’s required.

UNIVERSITY REQUIREMENTS:

• American History and Institutions, 
• Entry Level Writing (English composition)
• Residence requirements

GENERAL EDUCATION REQUIREMENTS:

• CC Cross- Cultural Analysis
• ER Ethnicity & Race
• IM Interpreting Arts & Media
• MF Mathematical & Formal Reasoning
• SI Scientific Inquiry
• SR Statistical Reasoning
• TA Textual Analysis & Interpretation
• PE — Perspectives (choose one from the following):
• PE-E — Perspectives: Environmental Awareness
• PE-H — Perspectives: Human Behavior
• PE-T — Perspectives: Technology & Society
• PR — Practice  (choose one from the following):
  • PR-E — Practice: Collaborative Endeavor
  • PR-C — Practice: Creative Process
  • PR-S — Practice: Service Learning
• C Composition 
• DC Disciplinary Communication (5 credits across 1 – 3 courses, as approved by CEP and a student’s major)

ADDITIONAL REQUIREMENTS:

• College Requirement (usually completion of the core course or equivalent)
• Earn at least 180 credits. Credits are earned through completion of the course with a grade of D or better (or Pass).
  • Transfer students may be able to use some of the courses they completed at other schools to help meet the 180-credit requirement. (Semester-system credits can be multiplied by 1.5 to derive equivalent quarter-system credit.) A total of 70 semester credits (105 quarter credits) of lower-division credit toward a university degree may be earned at other colleges/universities. Only subject credit will be granted for lower-division courses taken in excess of that cap.
• Satisfy the requirements of at least one major.
  • Some majors require grades higher than C to qualify to qualify and declare. Letter grades may be required for all courses in the major; see the General Catalog for details of your chosen Bachelor’s Degree plan.
• Earn minimum GPA of 2.0  in all letter-graded courses taken at UCSC and other University of California campuses.
• Have no more than 25 percent of your UCSC credits graded on a Pass/No Pass basis.
  • This includes any credits completed in the Education Abroad Program or at another UC campus in an intercampus exchange program. Departments may require that some or all courses used to satisfy the major must be taken for a letter grade.
• Meet the Residence requirement: be registered at UCSC for a minimum of three quarters, with special restrictions on the senior year coursework. 35 of the final 45 quarter credits must be in regular courses of instruction taken as a registered student at UCSC (including during the summer session).