Lorena Anderson

Professor and Environmental Champion Bales Retires, But Research and Advocacy Continue

November 10, 2025

Professors Roger Bales and Martha Conklin arrived in Merced in 2003, the first non-administrative faculty members at UC Merced. They came with a vision: to create a research university that would serve California’s future. Now, after more than 22 years of building institutions, mentoring...

Grad Students Shine on the International Humanities Stage

UC Merced Interdisciplinary Humanities doctoral students made a splash in Spain this summer, presenting papers at the XXXV International Congress of the Latin American Studies Association (LASA) in...

Young Artist Movement Making Room for More Art on Campus

Three enterprising Global Arts Studies Program (GASP) students saw the empty UC Merced Art Gallery on campus and, worried the space would be reallocated, wondered why they couldn’t volunteer to...

Campus’ Second Fulbright Student Scholar Prepares for a Homecoming

Violet Barton remembers her teenage years doing quadratic equations by candlelight to a soundtrack of bombs and bullets as the Salvadoran Civil War raged around her. She was forced to migrate to...

Prestigious University Press Signs Professor as Book Series Editor

Interdisciplinary Humanities Professor Arturo Arias was recently selected to edit a series of indigenous-studies books for the State University of New York (SUNY) Press. That makes him the first...

Professor’s Fellowship Allows Renewed Focus on Sociology of Race in South Africa

Professor Whitney Pirtle recently became the first researcher to win the prestigious Ford Foundation Postdoctoral Fellowship while employed at UC Merced — a grant that will help her finish...

Beattie and Graduate Student Awarded Research Grant to Study Teacher Retention

Professor Irenee Beattie and graduate student Melissa Quesada have been awarded a $40,000 research grant from the California Teacher Education and Research Improvement Network (CTERIN) to study the...

Shakespeare’s ‘Dream’ Delights Yosemite Visitors for Earth Day Weekend

“April ... hath put a spirit of youth in everything,” Shakespeare wrote in Sonnet 98. He might as well have been writing about this year’s Shakespeare in Yosemite production....

Researchers Examine Barriers to Organ Donation and Possible Remedies

Every 10 minutes, someone is added to the national organ transplant waiting list, and about once every hour, someone on the list is removed — either because they died while waiting or grew too...

Health Psychology Professor Wins Prestigious Award

The Society of Pediatric Psychology has recognized Professor Deborah Wiebe for her body of research on the psychology of adolescent health. Wiebe, the head of UC Merced’s Health Psychology...