Editor's note: In honor of Black History Month, the UC Merced newsroom is highlighting some of the organizations, services and people who serve or represent the Black community on campus.
UC Merced's Black Student Coalition has tripled in size in just the past year.
Editor's note: In honor of Black History Month, the UC Merced newsroom is highlighting some of the organizations, services and people who serve or represent the Black community on campus.
An organization that was created in a time of tragedy and crisis has been a force for good for UC Merced's Black community.
A study conducted by a UC Merced researcher found that people injured through violent acts have a substantially higher risk to die by or attempt suicide.
UC Merced civil and environmental engineering Professor Colleen Naughton has been included in the American Academy of Environmental Engineers and Scientists' (AAEES) 40 Under 40 Program.
According to the AAEES website, the program recognizes "talented individuals who have, either personally or as part of a team, been responsible for helping to advance the fields of environmental science or environmental engineering in a demonstrable way within the last 12 months."
Nearly 65 percent of UC Merced's undergraduate students are the first in their families to go to college. Being a college student of any kind can be a thrilling, confusing, challenging, exciting, overwhelming experience, sometimes all at once. When you're the first in your family to go to college, there can be an added degree of uncertainty, as well.
In advance of First-Generation Student Week activities, the UC Merced newsroom asked some first-generation alumni and current students to share some advice for those following in their trailblazing footsteps.
The new feature film "A Million Miles Away" is a universally relatable story of resilience and achievement, depicting Jose Hernández's journey from working the fields of the San Joaquin Valley to fulfilling his life-long dream of being a NASA astronaut.
But it's also a story with a very personal tie to UC Merced. Hernández, who went on to head an aerospace company and operate a vineyard, is a graduate of the University of California system and serves on the UC Board of Regents, and his son Antonio is a student at UC Merced.
Dozens of UC Merced students took their oaths as members of the College Corps recently. The program, which provides stipends to students in exchange for working with community partners, is in its second year.
The second cohort of UC Merced's College Corps was sworn in Sunday, Aug. 28.
It's more than just a way to help these students pay for college, explained Assistant Vice Chancellor for Student Engagement Brian O'Bruba, who administered the oath. It's an opportunity to develop a service mindset that will last a lifetime.
UC Merced public health Professor Maria-Elena De Trinidad Young has been awarded an R01 grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH).
The $3 million grant will fund Young's ambitious, five-year research project to understand how immigration policy influences health care access and the well-being of Latinos in rural California and Arizona counties, including Merced, Tulare, Imperial, Monterey and Napa.
For UC Merced students working to maintain the campus's Experimental Smart Farm this summer, the day's tasks can range from the high-tech to the grubby.
Kat Corti and Austin Mercado, both fourth-year students come fall, are spending their summer tending the farm and preparing it for what's next. Also working at the farm this summer is Adam Mercado, Austin's twin brother.
Here's a challenge:
Four weeks, five days a week and seven hours a day, you have to teach math to middle school students.
During the summer.
And you have to keep it interesting.
The Center for Educational Partnerships (CEP) has been doing just that for the past 18 years at several sites, including UC Merced.
How?
