Two days after dozens of UC Santa Cruz students first set up an encampment in support of Palestine in Quarry Plaza, the number of campers has nearly tripled to more than 100, according to organizers. Student organizers say they won’t leave until their demands are met.
Education
California could require kids to learn how to manage money. Should voters decide curriculum?
An initiative that looks likely to appear on the November ballot and that would require a personal finance class in high school circumvents the usual process for curriculum changes.
Scotts Valley Unified School District weighs November bond for new stadium, other upgrades
Scotts Valley Unified School District is considering a bond measure after its board unanimously backed a plan detailing $76 million in facility upgrades. Officials hope better athletic facilities can stem the district’s declining enrollment.
UC’s president had a plan to deescalate protests. How did we get a night of violence at UCLA?
The University of California’s campus safety plan was designed to calm protests by limiting law enforcement. Yet as tensions grew to violence against a UCLA student encampment erected in protest over the war in Gaza, many are criticizing law enforcement’s lack of intervention.
‘Fentanyl High’: Student filmmaker explores root causes of teen drug crisis
After a schoolmate was expelled for overdosing in class, student filmmaker Kyle Santoro began exploring the roots of the opioid crisis among teens and what was causing his fellow classmates to self-medicate. His film “Fentanyl High” screens Thursday at the Rio Theatre in Santa Cruz and May 15 at CineLux Green Valley in Watsonville.
Amid crackdowns on student protests nationwide, UCSC sprouts a homegrown, peaceful pro-Palestine encampment
Police arrested pro-Palestinian demonstrators on college campuses across the U.S. on Wednesday. It was a jarring contrast to the civil scene at UC Santa Cruz, where hundreds of students and faculty marched in a dense yet orderly phalanx across campus and into Quarry Plaza, where about 50 to 60 protesters set up a tent encampment.
Remembering Zainab Mansoor
Tae Yun Kang, a first-year literature and linguistics student at UC Santa Cruz, remembers fellow student Zainab Mansoor, 21, as kind, compassionate and someone uniquely able to make strangers feel welcome. Mansoor died in February and police have arrested her boyfriend, a former UCSC student, on charges of homicide. Here, Tae Yun writes about meeting Zainab, why she misses her and looks for people like her in all her classes.
Hundreds march at UC Santa Cruz in Gaza protest, set up Quarry Plaza encampment
With a May Day march and rally Wednesday, UCSC joins dozens of campuses across the country that have been the site of marches and encampments by pro-Palestinian demonstrators. The clashes have turned violent at some schools, but Wednesday’s gathering at UCSC remained largely peaceful as school officials kept a watchful eye.
UCSC sees record applications and admission offers but expects enrollment to remain flat
UC Santa Cruz’s applications and offer letters for the upcoming academic year reached record highs — again — but officials don’t expect overall enrollment numbers to increase significantly from last year.
I spent a decade struggling with body image; now I’m 19 and still learning to love food and myself
Isabella Counts, a UC Santa Cruz sophomore, has spent her life worrying about her weight and look. She put herself on diets as early as sixth grade. She is not sure she will ever fully overcome her struggle with body image, but she is trying. Writing is helping.

