Social Justice

From Soil to Climate Solutions: Berhe Leads Sierra Nevada Research Institute into its Next Chapter

September 11, 2025

When Professor Asmeret Asefaw Berhe arrived at UC Merced in 2009, she and her husband, Professor Teamrat Ghezzehei, were leaving major research institutions to join a brand-new campus in California’s Central Valley. It was a leap of faith — one made easier by the Sierra Nevada Research...

UC Merced’s Black Excellence Symposium to Honor Legacy and Inspire Future

"A Legacy of Triumph and a Vision for the Future" is the theme of this year's Black Excellence Symposium at UC Merced. The event, part of the university's Valuing Black Lives...

A fluorescence microscope image of one kind of active matter being studied. Image courtesy of Amanda Tan, UC Merced

UC Awards Support Tackling Big Questions in Health, Physics, Agriculture and Climate

Faculty members at UC Merced are taking the lead on four Multicampus Research Program Initiatives (MRPI), working with colleagues around the University of California system to address challenges...

Ending Health Disparities Starts with Good Data, National Authority Says

Solid and sharable research data must go hand in hand with collaboration and caring to tackle the health gaps that trouble minoritized and underserved populations in the San Joaquin Valley...

UC Merced Spendlove Prize Tsitsi Dangarembga

Spendlove Prize Winner Brings Spirit of Ubuntu to UC Merced

Tsitsi Dangarembga spread the spirit of ubuntu over UC Merced on Wednesday night, imparting its message of “how we can be good people who live well together.” Dangarembga, a Zimbabwean...

3 New Majors Meet at Crossroads of Communication and Science

Information – how it is shaped, delivered and received – is a thread that runs through three dynamic new majors at UC Merced. Communication and media; neuroscience; and science,...

UC Merced Professor Christiana Spitzmueller

UC Merced Leads $6.5 Million Initiative to Reduce Promotion and Tenure Bias Against Black and Hispanic Faculty

Black and Hispanic faculty members seeking promotion at research universities face career-damaging biases, with their scholarly production judged more harshly than that of their peers, according to a...

Sharim Film 'Flora' Wins Festival's Social Justice Award

“Flora,” a film by UC Professor Yehuda Sharim, earned an award from the Latino and Native American Film Festival. The film, which Sharim describes as a memoir of post-teen daughters...

AI generated illustration for UC Merced Tobacco Summit

UC Merced Hosts Tobacco Control Summit

The community is invited to an all-day summit where researchers will present cutting-edge information on the latest efforts to stem tobacco use in the San Joaquin Valley and surrounding foothills...

AI illustration of rural dangers of tobacco use

Nicotine and Cannabis Policy Center Gets $3.9 Million Extension

UC Merced’s Nicotine and Cannabis Policy Center has earned multiyear funding to continue its mission to embolden community partners and share policy-influencing data in the long battle...

Research