1. Did you know that UCI’s mascot, the Anteater, was selected by the student body? The original options for mascots, given by first chancellor Daniel G. Adlrich, were: the Roadrunner, Seahawk, and Unicorn. The students wanted something unique that no one else had. Inspired by a comic book (B.C. by Johnny Hart), three students, Pat Glasgow, Bob Ernst, and Schuyler Hadley Basset III, began to promote the Anteater as an alternate option. After voting, the Anteater won by 56% as a write-in vote. Go student body!
2. There are 11,120 trees in Aldrich Park including 33 species of Eucalyptus. There are more than 24,000 trees altogether on campus.
3. In 1960, the Irvine Company sold 1,000 acres of the Irvine Ranch to the University of California for $1.
4. The city of Irvine has consistently ranked one of the top 10 safest cities in the country, with a population of 100,000 or more.
5. We are the only UC that has a school focused on Computer Science (Donald Bren School of Information and Computer Science) since all other UCs combine their Computer Science program with engineering. We also have double the female faculty ratio as the national average for the school of Computer Science.