2000
Letters and Science begins to prepare for another major surge in enrollment. The UC Davis campus is scheduled to increase its student body from the present 26,000 to 30,000 students over the next decade, and the majority of those additional students will be served by Letters and Science.
2001
Film Festival at UC Davis, which features all student created work, is first established by faculty in the Department of Theatre and Dance. It has remained a collaboration between students and faculty from art departments within Letters and Science.
Psychology professor Leah Krubitzer receives MacArthur fellowship.
2003
Winston Ko, chair of the physics department, is appointed dean of the Division of Mathematical and Physical Sciences. He would retire in 2013 after completing two terms as dean and 41 years on the faculty. He passed away in 2019.
2004
The Middle East/South Asia Studies Program (ME/SA) was founded as an undergraduate minor in response to the demands of UC Davis students and the urgent need for understanding this crucial area of the world. In its first year, 1,052 students enrolled in ME/SA courses. The program would launch an undergraduate major in 2008.
Chicano/a Studies becomes a department.
2006
The Communication M.A. program started in Fall of 2006, graduating its first cohort in 2008.
2009
George R. Mangun is appointed dean of the Division of Social Sciences.
The Asian American Studies Department at UC Davis, which was born out of struggle in 1969, becomes an official department at UC Davis.
Taller Arte del Nuevo Amanecer (TANA) is founded by Malaquias Montoya and Carlos Jackson.
2011
The UC Davis Center for Poverty Research, a broad collaboration among faculty from Letters and Science, the School of Education and the School of Law, was first established with core funding from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services as one of three federally designated university-based poverty research centers whose mission is to facilitate non-partisan academic research in the United States. Currently funded by Letters and Science as the Center for Poverty and Inequality Research, the center continues to provide training in research focused on social inequality and to provide policy-relevant research to stakeholders nationally.
The Communication Ph.D. program starts this year and will graduate its first cohort in 2015.
2015
Center for Quantum Mathematics and Physics established with the hiring of new faculty members through the Faculty Hiring Investment Program
2016
The College of Letters and Science was reorganized to combine the three historical divisions into a single entity led by a single dean. This new structure was under discussion for several years with a work group and consultations that produced a 20-page report recommending the appointment of a single dean to administer the college.
Temporary Building 9, where UC Davis faculty made art history, is placed on National Register of Historic Places.
The African American and African Studies Department (AAAS) receives full departmentalization, 47 years after measures called for it.
The American Studies program becomes part of the College of Letters & Science.
2017
Elizabeth Spiller is named dean of L&S. She is the first dean of the college after the decision to move back to the single-dean model.
2021
UC Davis appoints Estella Atekwana as Dean of Letters and Science.
L&S receives a $1.5 million gift from alumni Lois ('85) and Darryl Goss ('83) to establish the Austin and Arutha Goss Presidential Chair in African American and African Studies. It is the first endowed chair in the Department of African American and African Studies.
2023
The Institute for Psychedelics and Neurotherapeutics is established.
The Global Migration Center administratively joins Letters and Science.
Letters and Science hosts its first Research Celebration.
UC Davis approves the undergraduate business major.
2024
Philanthropist Maria Manetti Shrem pledges more than $20 million to create the “Maria Manetti Shrem Arts Renaissance” at UC Davis. This is the largest individual gift in the history of Letters and Science and the largest gift ever to the arts at UC Davis. This pledge benefits the Department of Art Studio, the Department of Art History and the Department of Design.