Athens, Ga. – Fall semester started on the University of Georgia campus today, and UGA President Jere W. Morehead opened the morning with a video message to students, faculty, staff alumni and friends.
Along with returning undergraduate and graduate students, the university welcomed more than 5,300 freshmen who have set a record for academic quality, with the highest GPA and SAT scores in the university’s 230-year history. The students have an average GPA of 3.91 and an average SAT score of 1301.
Around 1,550 transfer students also begin classes today.
UGA received more than 22,000 applications for fall admission, with an admittance rate of 52 percent of all applicants. Since 2010, the number of freshman applications has increased by 25 percent.
Morehead opened his remarks with a few points of pride: “The University of Georgia is truly a special place, a place defined by academic excellence, a place that generates new knowledge and inspires innovation, a place that transforms lives and communities.
“Every August, we are reminded of these treasured qualities as our campus springs to life with the beginning of a new academic year.”
He also welcomed new faculty members to campus-the university added several elite research and teaching faculty in the spring and fall semesters-and praised alumni and friends, who set an annual record in fundraising, donating more than $144 million.
“It’s a new academic year at the University of Georgia, one of the nation’s leading public research universities,” Morehead concluded. “What we do here matters.
“Let’s get started.”