The annual day of giving at UC Merced — Give Tue UC Merced (#GiveTueUCM) — presents many opportunities for donors to help students and programs.

Every opportunity is equally worthwhile because #GiveTueUCM is ultimately about supporting student success, but everyone has their favorite causes.

UC Merced alumnus Daniel Lobato (’13) always planned to give back to the campus that provided him an education.

As a student, Lobato started with modest donations during the university’s annual Giving Tuesday fundraiser, which returns Nov. 28 as Give Tue UC Merced.

Very few people will admit to an abiding love of statistics. But Emanuel Alcala, a second-year public health doctoral student, believes statistics are key to solving many of the San Joaquin Valley’s public health challenges.

“I grew fond of statistics when I started working at the Central Valley Health Policy Institute,” Alcala said. “I saw firsthand how statistics could impact people.”

UC Merced is welcoming back its first alumni keynote speaker, Shavone Charles, to address December 2017 graduates at its first Fall Commencement ceremony on Dec. 16.

Zach Petrek, a second-year doctoral student in chemistry and chemical biology, can usually be found running experiments in the laboratory of his advisor, Professor Tao Ye. But this summer, he did something different — he went to NASA.

Petrek was one of seven UC Merced students to intern at NASA over the summer, an opportunity provided through MACES, the Merced nAnomaterials Center for Energy and Sensing.

If you’ve ever wondered why people stand where they do on the political spectrum, science might have at least part of the answer: People can be biologically predisposed to certain feelings toward politics and society.

A new paper lead-authored by UC Merced graduate student Chelsea Coe indicates that physiological factors can predict how someone will react when presented with political scenarios — an idea that demonstrates an emerging area of study, the intersection of biology and politics.

UC Merced’s Vernal Pools and Grassland Reserve has become a hallmark of the campus — acres of preserved lands that contribute to the university’s mission of environmental conservation and while offering unique research opportunities to students and faculty.

One of the campus’s best-kept secrets, though, might be The Vernal Pool, a scholarly journal for undergraduate students’ creative writings, from poetry to plays.

More than 22,000 students applied to UC Merced for the Fall 2017 semester, and about 2,300 are now beginning their educational journeys on campus. Among those, 24 rose to the top of the class to be named Regents Scholars, recipients of the University of California’s most prestigious scholarship award.

First-year student Michael Grey is one of those select 24, having proven himself through determination and diligence. He said taking advanced placement and honors courses in high school in Antelope, just north of Sacramento, motivated him to succeed academically.

When Chigoziri Ibechem attended her first planning commission meeting in downtown Merced last November, she had no idea where it might lead.

After the meeting, the psychology major from Los Angeles was greeted by the city of Merced’s principal planner, who noticed her enthusiasm for the city’s Local Transportation project. He invited her to apply for an internship program UC Merced’s sustainability office launched earlier this year to give students education and applied learning opportunities in sustainability-related careers.

Karen Merritt came from a family without much money. Like nearly 90 percent of UC Merced’s students, financial aid made her college dreams a reality. However, she quickly learned the costs of higher education don’t end with tuition, room and board.

“There were occasions when I needed special help in buying books or taking an extra course I didn’t realize was necessary,” she recalls.