One of the University of California’s most important economic contributions is training well-educated, skilled graduates across a wide spectrum of disciplines. Improving the quality of human resources is critical to economic innovation and productivity, especially in a global, knowledge-based economy. UC graduates provide an important source of the highly skilled workers that power California’s knowledge-based economy. It is no coincidence that the excellence of UC’s research and academic programs occurs in the same places where private-sector growth and innovation appear strongest.

UC is a crucial player along the whole continuum of workforce training – from college preparation and teacher development in our K-12 schools to undergraduate and graduate education on its campuses to continuing education and professional development programs that help workers upgrade their skills.

UC provides education in more than 150 fields, one of the broadest ranges of study of any university in the world. More UC academic programs are consistently rated among the top 10 nationally than any other public or private university. UC graduate programs inspire independence and innovation in the pursuit of knowledge. With approximately 42,000 graduate students, UC produces 7 percent of the nation's Ph.D.s.

Because education is a key foundation for individual earning capacity, UC’s role in workforce preparation can also influence economic opportunities for women and minorities through access to education and training.

Keeping Today’s Worker Productive
Rapid technology advances create frequent changes in the economy, and require that workers constantly maintain and update skills and knowledge. With fluid economic directions, career movement has become more common. The average person will change jobs about 15 times and careers three to five times. One of the world's largest providers of continuing education, UC Extension offers some 17,000 courses each year with about 300,000 enrollments. Each UC campus’ extension program varies in course offerings and academic levels according to the needs of the surrounding community and economy. There are sizeable enrollments in fields related to California’s key industry clusters in information technology and science and engineering.

Engineering and Computer Science
Physical and Biological Sciences
Business Schools
Law Schools
Medical Schools
Graduate Studies
Continuing Education
Teaching the Teachers
Preparing K-12 Students for College