Student Life

Sow and Grow Workshops Connect Smart Farm, Community

November 13, 2025

Photo depicts Ph.D. student Lynn Breithaupt holding up a native plant cutting.

On a chilly autumn morning at the UC Merced Experimental Smart Farm, about a dozen people enthusiastically dug/plunged their hands into soil in an exercise on how to propagate plants. For the less horticulturally inclined, propagating is the process of creating new plants from a single parent...

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...

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...

UC Merced to Celebrate Hundreds of Graduates at Fall Commencement

UC Merced will celebrate hundreds of graduates alongside their friends and families in the Art Kamangar Center at the Merced Theatre this weekend. There are 402 Bobcats set to participate in the...

Alice Waters Institute Challenges Student Chefs to Get Creative

Student employees in UC Merced’s dining centers got an up-close look at the sustainable techniques at a family almond farm and were challenged to create locally sourced dishes as part of a...

Star Soccer Player Finds Success On and Off the Pitch

Four years ago, lifelong soccer player Yesenia Tijerina stopped playing when the pandemic shut everything down. Her classes at UC Davis were taken online at her home in Salinas. Tijerina started...

UC Merced Unveils Big Rufus, a Monument to Resilience, Diversity and Hope

UC Merced on Wednesday unveiled a striking monument to a university on the rise. A crowd of students, faculty and staff gathered in the early evening’s long shadows at University Plaza to...

UC Merced new Bobcat Bound Leslie Aquino

Bakersfield Student Ready to Go the Distance at UC Merced

This is part of a series of profiles of new UC Merced Bobcats enrolled for the fall 2024 semester. A high school distance runner from Bakersfield is striding into new territory, becoming the...

Photo shows people using carts to move items into dorms at UC Merced.

UC Merced Welcomes Students For Fall 2024 Semester

As classes begin Wednesday for UC Merced's 20th academic year, the campus and its offerings continue to grow to meet the needs of students and the community at large. Edwin Lopez was so...

New UC Merced student Antonio "Tony" Lopez-Blanco

Central Coast Student Brings Flair for Robotics to UC Merced

This is part of a series of profiles of new UC Merced Bobcats enrolled for the fall 2024 semester. After diving into robotics in high school, Antonio "Tony" Lopez-Blanco is...