Brenda Ortiz

Founding UC Merced Staffer Wraps Up 45 Years in Law Enforcement

August 28, 2025

A collage of photos depicting Tamela Adkins and other staff during the past 20 years.

On Aug. 12, 2005, less than one month before UC Merced opened its doors to undergraduate students, Tamela Adkins joined the campus’s Police Department as support services manager. Intially, her role included managing records and evidence, overseeing the police dispatch center and hiring....

Buhach Valedictorian Pursues Environmental Engineering at UC Merced this Fall

This is part of a series of profiles of new UC Merced Bobcats enrolled for the fall 2025 semester. Drake Ledford was an exemplary high school student, earning a 4.29 GPA. The Merced...

Interdisciplinary Humanities Ph.D. graduate Nicolette Lecy and her 4-year-old son, Alejandro

Humanities Grad Student Advocates for Student Parents

When Nicolette Lecy began her graduate studies at UC Merced, life was anything but typical. It was August 2020, in the heart of the COVID-19 pandemic. Lecy’s classes were held remotely, and...

Two UC Merced graduate students wearing blue

Students Awarded Prestigious NSF Graduate Research Fellowship

Two UC Merced graduate students and an alum from the School of Natural Sciences were recently awarded fellowships from the highly competitive National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship...

Top nine Grad Slam finalists with graduate dean and associate graduate dean with R1 prop

Chemistry Ph.D. Student Wins Campus Grad Slam Top Prize, Advances to UC-wide Final

Adekunle “Kunle” Adewole isn’t a stranger to the spotlight, having grown up singing at family functions and performing in theater productions. He also has fervently watched “...

Group of five female graduates at commencement

Carnegie Recognizes UC Merced for Student Access, Grad Earnings

UC Merced has earned two 2025 Carnegie distinctions, the Student Access and Earnings Classification “Opportunity Colleges and Universities” and the Institutional Classification by the...

Sociology Ph.D. Student Examines Why Workers Protest in El Salvador

UC Merced Sociology graduate student Luis Rubén González Márquez has a new first-authored article titled “The Glocal Foundations of Threat-Driven Labor Resistance to Authoritarian Capitalism,...

Three Engineering Programs Ranked in Top 100 by U.S. News

UC Merced’s School of Engineering and its programs continue to be recognized by U.S. News & World Report as demonstrated in the release today of its 2025 Best Graduate Schools rankings....

Two female standing in front of a poster

Center Engages Campus, Community with Africa and its Diaspora

This story is part of a series for Black History Month. Read more stories highlighting Black excellence at UC Merced. The brutal deaths of African Americans George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery and others...

Give to UC Merced Campaign Tops $1.4 Million, Breaking Record for Third Year

Give to UC Merced, the university’s annual year-end fundraising campaign, was the most successful of its 11-year history, garnering nearly $1.43 million from 647 donors. The tremendous show of...