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The University of California, Santa Barbara (commonly referred to as UC Santa Barbara or UCSB) is a public research university and one of the 10 general campuses of the University of California system. The main campus is located on a 1,022-acre (414 ha) site near Goleta, California, United States, 8 miles (13 km) from Santa Barbara and 100 miles (160 km) northwest of Los Angeles. Tracing its roots back to 1891 as an independent teachers' college, UCSB joined the University of California system in 1944 and is the third-oldest general-education campus in the system.
UCSB is one of America's Public Ivy universities, which recognizes top public research universities in the United States. The university is a comprehensive doctoral university and is organized into five colleges and schools offering 87 undergraduate degrees and 55 graduate degrees. UCSB was ranked 37th among "National Universities", 8th among U.S. public universities and 28th among Best Global Universities by U.S. News & World Report 's 2016 rankings. The university was also ranked 37th worldwide by the Times Higher Education World University Rankings and 41st worldwide (7th worldwide for engineering) by the Academic Ranking of World Universities in 2014. PayScale’s 2015-16 College Salary Report (ranking universities in terms of graduates’ salary potential), UCSB came in first in computer science 7th in engineering, 14th in Humanities and 30th in Social Sciences.
UC Santa Barbara is a "very high activity" research university with twelve national research centers, including the renowned Kavli Institute for Theoretical Physics. Current UCSB faculty includes six Nobel Prize laureates, one Fields Medalist, 29 members of the National Academy of Sciences, 27 members of the National Academy of Engineering, and 31 members of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. UCSB was the No. 3 host on the ARPAnet and was elected to the Association of American Universities in 1995.
The UC Santa Barbara Gauchos compete in the Big West Conference of the NCAA Division I. The Gauchos have won NCAA national championships in men's soccer and men's water polo.