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Contact us to schedule a discussion with a current student.
How to Apply
For information on graduate admissions, financial aid and deadlines, please visit the UC Berkeley Graduate Division.
About UC Berkeley
The University of California is the highest tier in the state's system of public education, and admission to the Berkeley campus on both the undergraduate and graduate levels is extremely competitive. Many regard UC Berkeley as the premier public university in the world.
The Berkeley undergraduate body (about 21,000 students) is characterized by diversity of ethnic background: there is no majority group. Most of the undergraduates are from California, but most other states and many nations of the world are also represented. The experience of teaching an undergraduate class at Berkeley is apt to be quite different, in positive and invigorating ways, from that at many other institutions.
The graduate body (about 10,000 students) is also diverse, and represents a much wider range of national and international places of origin. The AHMA program generally has between 20 and 30 enrolled students at any given time. In recent years new graduate students have come into the program from Austin, Berkeley, Boston, Brigham Young, Chicago, Columbia, Cornell, Maryland, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pomona, Princeton, Sarah Lawrence, and Yale, as well as Brazil, Germany, Great Britain, Greece, Italy, Israel, New Zealand, and Japan.
The Berkeley campus is a lovely, park-like setting enhanced by glades, plazas, and a wide variety of architecture, including some graceful examples of the Beaux Arts style. The campus is surrounded on three sides by residential and commercial neighborhoods of the city of Berkeley, a lively part of the conurbation that stretches along the eastern shore of the San Francisco Bay. The fourth side rises into the Berkeley hills and a regional park. The climate is temperate year-round. Campus resources incorporate a wide range of athletic and cultural events and facilities, many either free or discounted for students.
Public transportation serving the campus area is good. The Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) system operated trains that provide direct access to downtown Oakland, adjacent to Berkeley on the south, and under the bay to San Francisco. Buses provide access from the campus area to many intermediate destinations. Most of the formidable array of cultural and recreational resources available in the Bay Area is accessible by public transit. These resources include the museums, theaters, sports arenas and concert-halls of Oakland and San Francisco, as well as an abundance of fine ethnic restaurants, bookstores, cinemas, a renowned repertory theater, and an unparalleled range of musical events offered by the city of Berkeley itself. There is also an excellent network of hiking, bicycling and horeback-riding paths in the East Bay hills.
The rental market has traditionally been very tight in Berkeley though tough conditions have improved in recent years. There are several housing options suitable for graduate students. The local airports are Oakland International (closer, smaller, and with more convenient public transit connections) and San Francisco International (with more non-stop and international flights).