School of Engineering Has New Dean

The UC Merced School of Engineering will have a new dean on Oct. 1, when E. Daniel Hirleman will take over for interim dean Mark Matsumoto.

Hirleman has served as the head of Purdue University's School of Mechanical Engineering since 1999. During that time, he's helped expand the school's faculty and student body, double its Ph.D. graduation rate and vastly increase its scholarship and fellowship distribution and put the school on a strong financial footing. He was also able to increase the quality of the school's undergraduate students while also expanding enrollment.

Matsumoto has served as interim dean since April, when he replaced Thomas Harmon, who served as acting dean for three months following the December resignation of Jeff Wright, founding dean of the School of Engineering.

Hirleman is the founding director of GlobalHub.org, an international cyber-community of students, faculty and practitioners interested in global engineering and global citizenship, and is chair of the Engineers for a Sustainable World advisory board. He founded the Global Engineering Program at Purdue in 2005, and he's been active in student advising and community service at all stops during his career.

He said he was inspired by UC Merced's signature commitment to sustainability — both in its faculty's research and in its own construction and operations — and to interdisciplinary research. He was also drawn by the university's unique challenge of building a research university worthy of the University of California name while creating a transformative, large-scale engineering education model uniquely targeted to the 21st century students and their needs.

"I'm thrilled to be joining a university system with such a remarkable history of academic achievement while also taking part in the inspiring growth of a new campus," Hirleman said. "My predecessors and the faculty at UC Merced have built a strong foundation for the School of Engineering, and I look forward to the exciting challenge of continuing in their footsteps."

UC Merced Students Return from Harvard, Turn Attention to Valley

UC Merced students participating in the Latino Leadership Initiative at Harvard University have returned to the San Joaquin Valley energized and ready to make a difference.

During a packed week of classes in Cambridge, Mass., students heard lectures from some of the nation's top leaders, including Univisión President César Conde, businessman Farouk Shami and former U.S. Secretary of Commerce Carlos Gutierrez.

"The Latino Leadership Initiative did a great job of making its pioneering students well-rounded in all areas, from negotiations to public speaking and networking to emotional intelligence," psychology major Jacqueline Miramontes said. "It is now our responsibility to apply all the skills that we have learned and put them forth to a program that will enable us to promote leadership in our community."

Miramontes said the UC Merced students hope to hold leadership talks in local high schools, passing on the vital information they received during the lectures. Another goal is to have some of the speakers from the initiative give a talk in Merced.

Six students from UC Merced were selected to participate in the inaugural class after a highly selective application process. The students are:

• Dulcemaria Anaya, a junior from Merced majoring in world history.
• Jesse Anaya, a junior from Modesto majoring in environmental engineering.
• Ismael Lara, a junior from Stockton majoring in literatures and cultures.
• Rafael Maravilla, a junior from Planada double majoring in sociology and political science.
• Jacqueline Miramontes, a junior from Merced majoring in psychology.
• Maira Pulido, a junior from Le Grand majoring in history.

UC Merced Proves to be Right Choice for Twin Sisters

According to twin sisters Faiza and Sabah Jivani from Tulare, one of the biggest decisions they have made was where to attend college.

Four years after they began their journey at UC Merced, the Class of 2010 alumna are busy planning for the future and applying to graduate schools this fall. Faiza plans a career in architecture and Sabah in dentistry.

“UC Merced was closer to home and financially more affordable because there were two of us,” Sabah recalled. “Also, when we looked at the student teacher ratio, and the prospect of establishing the culture and traditions for the school, we leapt at the opportunity. It was one of the best decisions of my life.”

UC Merced Researchers Take Regional Issues to Heart

From research on the snowpack in the Sierra Nevada, the transition from hunting and gathering to pastoralism in highland Peru and the effect global warming has on coral reef health, UC Merced professors and students are conducting studies around the globe.

But some researchers at UC Merced are carrying out UC Merced's mission closer to home in hopes to confront some of the critical issues affecting the San Joaquin Valley.

Chancellor Steve Kang showed his dedication to community-engaged scholarship last year when he formed a task force of faculty and community members and committed resources to the group.

Symposium Highlights Health Research

The Health Sciences Research Institute recently held its inaugural symposium, which featured keynote speaker Dr. Frederick J. Meyers, executive associate dean of UC Davis' School of Medicine and executive director of medical education and academic planning at UC Merced.

Meyers' speech, "UC Merced is Ideally Positioned to be a Leader in Health Sciences Research," focused on how the trajectories of young scholars and discovery can intersect and create innovation networks that can put forth bold new ideas.

Those networks, Meyers explained, will be important for taking health research and applying it in the medical field. It's the new scholars who will be the most enduring form of transferring knowledge and technology, he explained.

Meyers was among more than a dozen speakers who talked about health research. Other presenters included Dr. Don Hilty, director of UC Davis' Rural-PRIME program and Paul Mills, professor of internal medicine and associate chief for research at UCSF Fresno Medical Education Program.

Hilty was recently appointed co-director of the UC Merced San Joaquin Valley Program in Medical Education.

With the eight-county San Joaquin Valley approaching four million residents, Meyers said it's vital that more homegrown doctors be trained.

"We have a bright future with a sense of urgency," Meyers said.

Citi Gift to UC Merced will Empower Parents

UC Merced's Center for Educational Partnerships hosted the last of its three closing ceremonies of the year for parents who have actively participated in the university's Parent Empowerment Program in Merced, Visalia and Fresno. During the ceremony at Merced High School, Citi presented the program with a $30,000 contribution.

The goal of the program is to empower parents to clearly understand how to navigate through issues related to higher education. The workshops include topics like educating parents about higher education admission requirements, financial literacy and financial aid concepts, and the difference between educational systems here and in their native countries.

Since its inception in 2004, nearly 6,500 parents have benefited from the program, which includes day and overnight campus visits for parents of freshman and transfer students from educationally disadvantaged backgrounds.

Financial Aid Director Supports UC Merced's Mission

Like any startup, a new university requires a versatile, dedicated staff.

Diana Ralls, UC Merced’s director of financial aid and scholarships, is one shining example of the caliber of individuals who have chosen to support the university's mission all year long.

“I noticed the ‘UC Center, Fresno’ sign while driving one day,” she said. “I stopped in and asked if there was really a UC there.” When a position opened up in 1998, she said, “I jumped at the chance to be part of history and shape the future of UC Merced.”

Ralls started with UC Merced as coordinator for K-12 education programs. When the campus was ready to start its financial aid office, she was asked to serve.

Her and her dedicated team walk students through the financial aid application process and help them find the most money possible.

Ralls credits her hand-picked staff with tackling challenging situations, knowing the ins and outs of a complicated system, and maintaining a positive attitude, calling them “amazing.”

UC Merced’s Berlow One of 23 Chosen as TEDGlobal fellows

TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) is a nonprofit that has gained global notoriety for its annual conferences in the United States and Europe focusing on what it calls “ideas worth spreading.”

Eric Berlow, director of UC Merced’s Yosemite Field Station, will get to take part in one of those conferences as one of an eclectic, international group of 23 TED Fellows for TEDGlobal 2010 at Oxford, England, July 12-16.

“I feel extremely privileged to attend TED as a fellow,” Berlow said. “TED is great because it rewards thinking big and thinking weird, so I’m going with a wide open mind ready to engage in new ideas. I’m very much hoping to be inspired by people who have successfully taken alternative paths in life and am hoping to make collaborative connections with creative people outside of academia.”

In addition to participating as full members of the TEDGlobal conference audience, each fellow will participate in a two-day pre-conference, where they will receive world-class communication training, deliver a short “TEDTalk” and collaborate with their peers. The fellows will also tell their stories on the TED Fellows blog and contribute to TEDx events in the year following the conference.

The TEDGlobal 2010 fellows hail from a variety of geographic locations, from Venezuela to Ghana to Brazil to Costa Rica to Sri Lanka to Yemen, and are pioneers breaking new ground in disciplines as diverse as technology, engineering, programming, biology, genetics, environmental science, filmmaking, photojournalism, architecture, music, poetry, entrepreneurship and activism.

Berlow was chosen after an extensive application and interview process in which he impressed organizers with his ideas on the interconnectedness of nature. As an ecological networks scientist, Berlow tries to take a big-picture view that embraces the complexity of nature to find new, simple patterns and solutions that would not otherwise have been discovered had the parts been studied in isolation.

For example, Berlow is currently working with other scientists to help protect the Yosemite toad from extinction by analyzing the park’s breeding meadows as a distribution network, identifying key meadows that may serve as population hubs.

“Every species is connected to every other species in an ecosystem due to things like feeding and other interactions,” Berlow said. “Those interactions can be studied like a network, like one might study the structure of the Internet or of social interactions.”

In addition to his work for UC Merced, Berlow is co-owner of a green business in Oakland. His other projects include creating a small creative incubator retreat in the eastern Sierra and working on a sustainable, “positive-impact” ecotourism project in the Arctic.

Leading Researchers Shed Light on Federal Spending Decisions

Top political scientists and economists from around the country attended UC Merced's two-day conference on "The Politics of Federal Spending" last week.

The political science group in the School of Social Sciences, Humanities and Arts organized the conference, which included leading scholars from top universities such as Stanford, Duke and Columbia. About 30 professors and graduate students attended the conference.

"Not only were the presentations and discussions enlightening, but the conference introduced UC Merced to a number of faculty who previously didn't know what to make of our campus," said political science Professor Nathan Monroe. "I believe many left with an extremely positive impression."

The conference brought attention to the government's spending decisions, even more relevant given the deep recession that led Congress to approve a $787 billion stimulus package in addition to the government's normal multibillion budget.

Despite spreading billions of dollars across the country, there hasn't been much research into whether the government should spend money, how much to spend or how to distribute it.

Some panel discussions focused on "Congressional Appropriations," "The Role of Bureaucrats," and "The President and Federal Spending."