The campus Music Center opened in 1997 to great acclaim. The Seymour Marine Discovery Center at Long Marine Laboratory and the Wellness Center in the East Field area opened in 2000. The residential college is an important part of the Santa Cruz experience. The nine colleges divide the university into smaller communities, serving as a social and intellectual gathering place for 1,100 to 1,400 students and 40 to 90 faculty fellows from a variety of academic disciplines. Every undergraduate student affiliates with a particular college while participating in a campuswide academic program.
All academic majors are open to students from all colleges.
Each college has a distinctive quality derived from its core course and extracurricular programs, its faculty and their academic disciplines, and its architectural style. Detailed descriptions of the nine colleges begin in the Colleges section. A complete list of academic programs and detailed descriptions begin in the Programs and Course Descriptions section. The major programs are administered by departments. In most cases, departments are composed of faculty in the same field, but the interdisciplinary programs draw on faculty from several fields.