A new agreement will provide a seamless transition for community college students across the state to continue their education at UC Merced - with money to help pay for it.
The California Community Colleges Chancellor's Office, in partnership with UC Merced, announced the university is now participating in the Associate Degree for Transfer (ADT) program.
UC Merced's Hispanic Heritage Month celebrations got off to a lively, colorful start on Tuesday, with a performance by Mariachi Los Bobcats, food and tabling in the university's Conference Center.
Attendees received a Loteria-themed T-shirt and were entered into a raffle drawing for a special deck and player cards of the Mexican bingo-like game.
Hispanic Heritage Month, celebrated nationally from Sept. 15 to Oct. 15, recognizes the contributions and influence of Hispanic Americans to history, culture and advancement.
UC Merced's chapter of the National Society of Black Engineers was again honored as the Region VI Medium Chapter of the Year. It is the second consecutive year the organization received this recognition. The NSBE, established at UC Merced in 2007, provides support, guidance and advocacy for its members through their college journeys and beyond.
Frida Quinto Ruiz went to Sweden with a curious mind. She came home with a plan.
"Studying abroad completely reshaped the direction of my college career in ways I never expected," she said. "I went to Sweden already curious about the world, but I came back with a much clearer sense of where I want to go."
During a tour of the European Union in Brussels, Quinto Ruiz learned about the Fulbright Binational Business Program. The fourth-year economics major applied to the program and recently interviewed to join it after she graduates in May.
Kevin Arrieta got into robotics to avoid getting into trouble.
Arrieta said he joined the robotics club at Dominguez High School in Compton high school after Gloria Esiobu, the teacher who ran it, gave him an ultimatum.
"I had gotten in with the wrong crowd," he said. "I had a physics teacher who told me, 'Join my robotics club or I'm calling your mom.'"
In the club, Arrieta found he loved working with sensors and doing programming, and he was good at it.
"You have an engineering mind and you don't even know it," his teacher said.
More than two dozen educators from kindergarten through college converged at UC Merced to discuss the challenges they're facing and the opportunities ahead.
Fifteen years ago, UC Merced was designated as a Hispanic-serving institution. And though recent developments at the federal government have left what that designation means in limbo, the mission of serving the university’s largest demographic has remained unchanged.
More than 53 percent of undergraduate students are Hispanic, and 71 percent of enrolled students identify as first-generation (a student whose parents did not complete four-year college degrees).
Three professors are joining UC Merced’s Agricultural Experiment Station this fall, bringing more expertise and resources to the 3-year-old research center.
Pictures accompanying Professor John Abatzoglou's presentation on the 2025 fire season were blurry. That was intentional, he said, because so much about wildfire is unpredictable.
"There's a lot that we know, and a lot we don't know," he said.
What will California's fire season look like in 2025?
A panel of UC Merced experts, joined by the founder of a public safety information nonprofit organization, will conduct an in-depth discussion of the risks, repercussions and forecasts, and what communities can do to be prepared.
The Fire Resilience Seminar and 2025 Wildfire Outlook will take place from 1 to 3 p.m. April 17 in the UC Merced Conference Center. It is free and open to the public.
