Jody Murray

A celebration of stories and a concert highlighting the history of San Joaquin Valley’s railroads are the opening acts of the 2024-25 UC Merced Arts season .

Merced LitFest and Train Station Trios reflect the season’s varied offerings. Gallery exhibitions, concerts, theater performances and a film festival are scheduled on and off campus through May 2025. The creators and their work provide a multilayered experience of the Valley’s people, culture and landscape.

UC Merced said “welcome” to its 2,400 new students Tuesday as only UC Merced can, with a joyous and colorful Scholars Bridge Crossing ceremony that symbolizes their transformation into Bobcats at the San Joaquin Valley’s only research university.

Hundreds of those first-year or transfer students gathered in yellow T-shirts on the lawn next to the Pavilion dining hall in preparation for the crossing.

First responders from across Merced County converged on UC Merced Thursday for what they said was a highly successful response to a simulated emergency.

Police officers, sheriff’s deputies, firefighters and medical personnel assembled at the university’s library to carry out incident duties and protocols. The UC Merced Police Department and Office of Emergency Management led the simulation — a yearly exercise at the university designed to enhance and evaluate the agencies’ collaboration and incident effectiveness.

This is part of a series of profiles of new UC Merced Bobcats enrolled for the fall 2024 semester.

San Joaquin Valley native Anmol Kaur is well on her way to making a splash in the worlds of science and medicine. The Bakersfield resident, coming to UC Merced as a first-year student, parlayed strong experiences in high school into a slot in the second SJV PRIME+ medical education cohort.

Kaur is poised to follow a path taken by her parents, who both have careers in medicine.

A study of fast-tracked government funds for relief during the COVID-19 pandemic uncovered bottlenecks at federal, university and community levels that undermined partnerships. Researchers, including UC Merced Professor Nancy Burke , made several recommendations to strengthen financial partnerships that underlie community-based participatory research.

It’s spring break 2009 and Jane Lawrence is rushing across campus, the words from the phone call still ringing in her ear. The unimaginable is happening and she must tell Charles Nies,

First Lady Michelle Obama is coming to UC Merced as commencement speaker.

Lawrence, the vice chancellor for student affairs, finds her associate vice chancellor in his office. With the campus quiet and students gone home, Nies had brought his two young daughters to work.

Exploring sources of historical narratives can take you to places where walls seem to move and truth feels fluid and interchangeable. Ma Vang’s research has focused on how people narrate their histories, tracking the lived experiences of people pigeonholed or marginalized by dominant narratives that privilege the record and written text.

It is impossible to avoid — the real-life event that frames the play “26 Pebbles” is disturbing. Heartbreaking.

Which makes all the more remarkable the play’s uplifting message of human resilience and the ability to come together after an unspeakable tragedy — the mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Conn.

Thirteen graduating students were honored by UC Merced’s School of Social Science, Humanities and Arts for outstanding academic careers.

UC Merced Arts invites everyone to a free performance that serves up whimsy, interactive fun and an inspiring message with a big helping of … operatic singing.