Campus Community

UC Merced Named the 14th Best College in the Nation by Wall Street Journal

October 1, 2025

Following recognition as a Top 25 university by U.S. News & World Report, UC Merced has once again earned national acclaim, this time from the Wall Street Journal. In its 2026 report of the Best Colleges in the U.S., the highly respected media outlet has named UC Merced the 14th best college in...

Center Promotes Student Self-sufficiency

Students who visit the UC Merced Students First Center (SFC) in the lobby of the Leo and Dottie Kolligian Library will see it’s different from other student services offices. For one thing, the...

Graduate Student Uses Llamas to Continue Research in Yosemite

Graduate student Kaitlin Lubetkin and several sure-footed assistants spent much of the summer in Yosemite National Park. Her frequent hiking companions were Toronado and Bravo — llamas who shouldered...

Campus Bunnies Still at Home Here

They sleep in secret, fuzzy beds and have questionable dietary habits. They prefer to be active in the evenings and early mornings. They are easily startled and can, if the situation calls for it, do...

New Grant to Help Prepare Grad Students for Faculty Careers

UC Merced is one of only seven universities nationwide to receive a grant from the Council of Graduate Schools to develop new approaches for enhancing graduate student skills for assessing...

Inaugural Managers to Lead New Vernal Pool Reserve

MERCED, Calif. — The effort to create a natural reserve out of nearly 6,000 acres adjacent to UC Merced has been jump-started by the hiring of two people to share the management duties. Sierra...

Program Gives Students a Window on the Nano World

More than two dozen UC Merced undergraduates spent the summer exploring a tiny but hot topic — materials 100,000 times slimmer than a human hair that are poised to revolutionize sensing, data...

Graduate Student Finds Unexpected Home in Merced

Zhijiang “Justin” Ye wasn’t expecting to attend the newest campus in the UC system. He just wanted to work with Professor Ashlie Martini. When Ye, then a student at University of Minnesota, connected...

Campaign 2012 Academic Seminar Gives Students Perspective

When UC Merced first announced it would be sending students to the national political conventions through The Washington Center program, senior Chelsea Coe never expected she’d be one of the lucky ...

New Endowment Supports Transfer Students

Students transferring to the University of California, Merced, from California community colleges can apply for financial support thanks to a new endowed scholarship fund from The Bernard Osher ...