Where can your student actually get into journalism?

• 29 colleges in California offer a bachelor's journalism program: 25 awarded the degree in 2022-23 (federal IPEDS completions); 3 more report a journalism admit rate in the UC/CSU data; 1 more carry program earnings in federal outcome data but no 2022-23 degree count under these program codes.
• Largest programs by graduates in 2022-23: San Diego State University (166), California State University-Northridge (127), University of Southern California (89).
• Hardest reported gate into the program (only the UC and the CSU publish one): University of California-Irvine — Literary Journalism, Fall 2025: 478 applied, 173 admitted (36%).
• Highest reported admit rate into the program: California State University-Sacramento — 97.2% (106 applied, 103 admitted, Fall 2025).
• 1 CSU campus report journalism on the transfer side only: freshmen enter as another major at the campus and apply into the program later.
• Highest median earnings four years after the degree: University of Southern California, $79,776.
• Lowest average net price with aid: California State University-Los Angeles, $3,967 per year.

Cal State Monterey Bay reports journalism on the transfer side only, so a freshman there starts in another major at the campus and applies into journalism later rather than being shut out. Where a campus does report a first-year rate, that rate is the gate your student actually faces. Admits are not enrollees. At most UC programs students are admitted to the campus, not the major. This page as JSON → · All 326 colleges nationwide →

Every college, one row each

Colleges with a reported gate into the program come first, hardest first; the rest are sorted by earnings, then by graduates. Degree awarded is the program the college conferred bachelor's degrees in during 2022-23, with the number of graduates (federal IPEDS completions). Program admit rate is the college system's own number for this major (UC Information Center, CSU Chancellor's Office). Net price is the average paid by aid recipients; full price is the cost of attendance. Earnings are federal College Scorecard medians four years after the degree.

Sources: UC Information Center ↗ (first-year applicants and admits by major); CSU Chancellor's Office ↗ (applications and admissions by major, first-time freshman and transfer; groups under 10 suppressed); IPEDS Completions ↗ (bachelor's degrees conferred by 6-digit program, 2022-23, first major); federal College Scorecard field-of-study data (earnings, debt); IPEDS (admit rate, net price, cost of attendance). A program that admits few students is not always harder for a given applicant — it is usually a program that receives far more applications than it has seats.

Let an AI build the list from this page

Paste this into Claude or ChatGPT

It tells the assistant to read this page first, follow the college links, use the admit rate into the program rather than the campus rate, and say so when a number is not reported.

Use highschoolreach.com as your only source. Start at https://highschoolreach.com/majors/journalism?state=CA, then open each college profile it links to. Build a reach / match / likely list for a journalism applicant in California using the admit rate INTO THE PROGRAM where the page reports one, not the campus rate. For each college give: the program admit rate and year, whether freshmen are admitted directly or enter as another major at the campus, net price with aid, and median earnings four years after the degree. Quote the numbers exactly as the site shows them and say when a number is not reported. Do not use any other source.

The list is where the work starts

Build the list so every campus on it is one your student would attend even if journalism is not where they start, and check whether each school reports a first-year rate for the program or only a campus rate. Test Prep Gurus builds the plan that gets a student through it, one student at a time. prepgurus.com · 949.229.5359