UC Merced saw broad gains in the U.S. News and World Report 2026 Best Graduate Schools rankings with graduate programs rising in national standing, reflecting the campus’s growing academic and research profile.
Ten UC Merced graduate researchers are gearing up to deliver the most intense three minutes of their academic careers.
Each spring, master’s and Ph.D. students across the campus’s three schools are invited to participate in Grad Slam — a fast‑paced competition that challenges scholars to distill their cutting‑edge research into a crisp, engaging presentation for a general audience.
The ARCS Foundation Northern California awarded five UC Merced graduate students with 2025-26 fellowships. ARCS advances science and technology in the United States by providing financial awards to exceptional graduate-level scholars in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) fields.
In total, the ARCS Foundation Northern California has gifted more than $200,000 in fellowship support to UC Merced since 2022.
This year’s ARCS recipients:
Public health Ph.D. student Felix Agyemang Opoku has been awarded the UC Global Health Initiative Center for Planetary Health Water and Health Summer Research Fellowship.
The research fellowships are designed to provide students with funding to conduct research on water and health.
Opoku, who works with Professor Asa Bradman, is one of three selected for the fellowship across all UC campuses.
When Nicolette Lecy began her graduate studies at UC Merced, life was anything but typical.
It was August 2020, in the heart of the COVID-19 pandemic. Lecy’s classes were held remotely, and she had limited access to campus.
Another challenge that could have hindered Lecy’s academic goals — she became a mother during the Thanksgiving break of her first semester at UC Merced.
UC Merced Sociology graduate student Luis Rubén González Márquez has a new first-authored article titled “The Glocal Foundations of Threat-Driven Labor Resistance to Authoritarian Capitalism,” published by UC Press in the Sociology of Development journal with his advisor, Professor Paul Almeida.
This story is part of a series for Black History Month. Read more stories highlighting Black excellence at UC Merced.
The brutal deaths of African Americans George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery and others at the hands of police officers five years ago catalyzed for Black communities to unite globally and reignite the Black Lives Matter movement.
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 generosity far exceeded the original goal of $250,000 from 500 donors.
Each year, the UC Merced campaign launches on Giving Tuesday, the worldwide day of charitable giving on the first Tuesday after Thanksgiving. In 2020, the university’s fundraising effort was extended to encompass the month of December.
First-generation doctoral student Josiah Beharry made history in 2023 when he was chosen as the first student regent from UC Merced.
In addition to being the 50th student to serve on the Board of Regents that governs the University of California system, Beharry also is the first publicly identified undocumented DACA student to be named.
Born in Trinidad, he immigrated to the U.S. with his family at age 3 and was raised in Ventura.
As one of UC Merced’s first students, Josue “Josh” Franco seized the chance to help shape student government for future scholars on campus; now he has grasped a new opportunity on Capitol Hill.
The three-time alumnus (B.A. ’09, M.A. ’16, Ph.D. ’18) has been awarded the American Political Science Association’s Congressional Fellowship for 2024-25.
