Mountain lions in Santa Cruz County recently gained new protections under the California Endangered Species Act after years as candidates for listing. Protecting six distinct puma populations around the state is a win for many dedicated researchers, but the move heightens the concerns about potential land-use and livestock impacts for developers, ranchers and farmers.
UC Santa Cruz
UCSC alumni to celebrate life and legacy of Tom Lehrer with performance in April
UC Santa Cruz alumni will reunite on April 11 to honor the life and legacy of Tom Lehrer, a beloved math educator as well as American musician, singer-songwriter and satirist who taught at the university for decades and died last summer at 97.
UC lecturers are bargaining for a new contract. Who are they and what are they asking for?
Lecturers across the University of California system will begin bargaining March 5 for a new contract as they push for permanent job status, higher pay and stronger academic freedom protections, arguing that despite teaching more than 30% of undergraduate courses, they remain treated as second-class faculty.
From campus to community: UCSC brings science to the neighborhood to spark local dialogue
UC Santa Cruz has launched a lecture series that takes researchers out of the lab and into neighborhoods to provide the public with a clearer understanding of cutting-edge science.
UCSC explores making changes to its unique college system model
UC Santa Cruz administrators are exploring potential changes to the campus’ distinctive residential college system — modeled after Oxford and Cambridge universities — as part of a yearlong review aimed at evaluating how to ensure the colleges best serve students.
Mapping 218,000 Santa Cruz parking citations: UCSC student tracked city’s parking tickets in real time
Third-year UC Santa Cruz student Ivan Kuria built a website that maps and tracks every parking ticket issued in the city of Santa Cruz, and also shows daily tickets going back years. Although the site no longer updates, viewers can still see daily maps of tickets issued between 2020 and Feb. 11.
UC graduate workers, staff union authorize strike, citing unfair labor practices
More than 40,000 graduate student workers and staff across the University of California system voted to authorize a strike, accusing the university of committing multiple unfair labor practices and bargaining in bad faith as contract negotiations near a Feb. 28 expiration date.
I grew up in an education desert but made it to UCSC – rural California needs funding so students can thrive
Ava Thornock grew up in Amador County, an education desert three hours from Santa Cruz that has no local college and limited internet access. She saw firsthand how rural students are cut off from opportunity. She is now a second-year student studying biochemistry at UC Santa Cruz, where academic access reshaped her future and career goals. Here, Thornock details how distance, poverty, staffing shortages and transportation barriers keep many rural students from higher education. With looming state and federal cuts, she argues that California must invest more in rural schools and community colleges so more students can succeed.
UCSC students develop website to support Seabright small businesses amid Murray Street Bridge overhaul
UC Santa Cruz’s Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurial Development collaborated with the City of Santa Cruz on a student-built website to serve as a hub for local businesses, events and updates on Murray Street Bridge construction.
UCSC students rally against ICE raids, Trump’s military attack on Venezuela
A couple hundred UC Santa Cruz students marched on campus Tuesday against violent actions by ICE and other federal agencies in Minneapolis and around the U.S. as well as against President Donald Trump’s military attack on Venezuela last month.

