The United States are home to 28 Jesuit colleges and universities, institutions grounded in Catholic heritage that share a common mission - to educate and care for the whole person and to prepare students to make the world a better place. While the Jesuit institutions are rooted in Catholic tradition, they are open to students of all faiths. Santa Clara University is one of three Jesuit institutions in California, the other two are University of San Francisco and Loyola Marymount University. Santa Clara is located in the Silicon Valley and is California's oldest operating institution of higher education. Here are 5 fun facts about Santa Clara University:
1) The Santa Clara campus was built around the Mission Santa Clara, which was the 8th of the 21 original California missions. It still serves as the center of spiritual life on campus and is a recognizable hallmark of Santa Clara. About 50% of Santa Clara students identify as Catholic and 50% are non-Catholic - either following other faiths or no faith.
2) Santa Clara's location has made it a prime partner with Silicon Valley companies like Google, Apple, Amazon, Cisco, Salesforce and Facebook. These top employers heavily recruit Santa Clara grads and they are not just looking for tech students either. The median salary for 2019 Santa Clara graduates was $62,500. What about students that were interested in graduate school? 100% of then were accepted into at least one full-time graduate program.
3) Santa Clara is comprised of 6 schools, 3 that offer undergraduate degrees - The College of Arts and Sciences, The School of Engineering and the Leavey School of Business. The top 5 most popular majors at Santa Clara include communications, economics, psychology, finance, and computer science & engineering. Students can take classes in all 3 schools and pursue multiple majors and minors. When you apply to Santa Clara, you apply through one of these 3 schools and can apply as undecided/undeclared or with a designated major. About 55% of students enroll in the CAS, 30% in Business and 15-20% in Engineering.
4) Experiential Learning for Social Justice (ELSJ) is a required component of Santa Clara's core curriculum. Students participate in community-based activities to complement their academic learning in the classroom.
5) Santa Clara's REAL program is another experiential learning opportunity for students in the College of Arts and Sciences. Students are given stipends of up to $5,000 to engage in research, pursue an internship, or work on a creative project. Check out a few REAL experiences here.
Santa Clara follows the quarter system, giving students ample opportunity to take a variety of courses of interest. Santa Clara will be test optional for Fall 2022. Visit campus here! The sun shines 300 days out of the year!