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University of California-Santa Cruz

University of California-Santa Cruz's course descriptions average 69.1 on the 100-to-0 ruler: clearly left of center. Across all 100 schools, the average is 67.5, so University of California-Santa Cruz reads 1.5 points further left.

ShowCompared withDepartments

Liberal (100)center (50)Conservative (0)

University of California-Santa Cruz: 69.1 (likely range 68.0 to 70.1) All 100 schools: 67.5 each other school in the comparison

Where its courses fall

3%Far left92–100

24%Left75–91

70%Center-left59–74

4%Center42–58

0%Center-right26–41

0%Right9–25

0%Far right0–8

257 plotted courses (the ones with a political framing). 100 = far left, 50 = the average American, 0 = far right.

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Framing Subject

Underlined: words the model quoted from the description when we asked it, after scoring, to explain its score.

Furthest left

CRES 118 · Abolitionist Futures100

Ethnic & African American Studies

Grounded in local, national, and global prison abolition movements, this course explores through feminist political frameworks creative strategies that imagine and work to end all systems of domination and exploitation. Looks at…

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ARTG 143 · Ecofutures95

Art & Art History

Students study the fields of ecofeminist art, climate fiction, virtual environmental art, Afrofuturism, Latinx futurism and Indigenous futurism, and create digital art relevant to these fields. The dual global crises of climate change and…

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CRES 70U · (Un)docu Studies95

Ethnic & African American Studies

Deconstructs the common perception of immigration as strictly a Latinx issue in order to develop solidarity among different groups of students and to explore a range of narratives surrounding undocumented status and migration with the aim…

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Furthest right

None. University of California-Santa Cruz has 257 left-framed courses and not one right-framed course.

Why this number, in plain words

Political lean of course descriptions. Average Framing score (0 = far right, 50 = center, 100 = far left) of the scored courses in the group.

50 is the survey-anchored center of US adults on each issue (the "moderate" place of the ANES/GSS/PRRI seven-label ruler), not the cohort midpoint; scores above 50 read leftward, below 50 rightward.

Counted: courses with a Framing score (categories L/R/B/C). The likely range (95% interval) is 68.0 to 70.1; a comparison whose range overlaps this one is not a reliable difference.

Most course descriptions carry no political lean at all and are not in this average; the "share described from the left" view counts them.
Readings are of catalog description text, not of teaching, syllabi or individual professors.

University of California-Santa Cruz by department (share of courses described from the left)

Department	Left-framed share	Courses
Women's & Gender Studies	42.4%	85	view
Ethnic & African American Studies	38.6%	184	view
Sociology	15.9%	145	view
History	11.6%	406	view
Psychology	9.3%	162	view
Art & Art History	7.5%	321	view
Anthropology	7.3%	247	view
Political Science	6.0%	133	view
English & Comparative Literature	3.6%	385	view
Economics	0.8%	131	view
Philosophy	0%	87	view

Lean (mean Framing score) is not published per department within a school; only the left-framed share is. Department rows carry no interval.

Details: exact rows, definitions and method

Name	Metric	Value	95% interval	n	scored
University of California-Santa Cruz	mean_bias_score	69.1	68.0 – 70.1	2,286	257
All 100 schools	mean_bias_score	67.5	67.4 – 67.7	124,290	10,124

Formula: SUM(bias_score) / COUNT(bias_score)
Interval: normal approximation: mean +/- 1.96 * sd / sqrt(n), sample sd (n-1); undefined when n < 2
Model / prompt / snapshot: gpt-5.6-sol · r12 (2026-10-16-le49-r12) · 6df50b10
Metric caveats: Scored courses only (L/R/B/C); N and I carry no score and are excluded, so n here is smaller than the group's course count. Scores are model readings of catalog description text against a fixed anchored definition, not teaching or syllabi. The interval covers sampling noise in the mean only; it does not represent model reading error. Every value carries a `method` label: exact_rows or histogram_midpoint.

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