The Sun God Festival is one of UC San Diego’s most anticipated student events, and this year it will take place from noon to 6 p.m. on Saturday, April 30. As students gear up for the festival, organizers are working to ensure all attendees are informed with regard to having fun, acting responsibly and reducing risky behavior.
Tiffany Taylor took a deep breath, reminded herself to give it her best, and calmly walked onto the stage. She had just three minutes and three PowerPoint slides to explain her years of research on glioblastomas—the most common and deadliest form of malignant brain tumors in adults—to a crowd of non-experts. She was prepared for this. What she didn’t expect was to be called back onto the stage later in the evening as the first place winner of UC San Diego’s 3rd annual Grad Slam. Her prize: $2,500 and a chance to compete against students from all ten University of California campuses at the systemwide event on April 22.
Founded in 1780, the academy convenes leaders from the academic, business and government sectors to respond to challenges facing the nation and the world. Previous members have included George Washington, Benjamin Franklin, Daniel Webster, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Margaret Mead, and Martin Luther King Jr.
Just four hours south of the UC San Diego campus lives the most endangered marine mammal in the world: the vaquita porpoise. Despite the Mexican government’s ban on gillnet fishing in the northern Gulf of California, fishermen on the hunt for totoaba fish and shrimp continue to use the nets illegally, leading to the incidental capture of vaquita, which become tangled in the nets and drown. According to the World Wildlife Fund, the estimated 100 individuals remaining are at risk of becoming extinct by 2018 if incidental capture is not prevented immediately.
It was a drizzly Thursday afternoon when they began to arrive with pillows, sleeping bags and suitcases in hand. Yet the wet weather did little to temper the enthusiasm of the 244 high school students who traveled to UC San Diego from across the state to take part in an overnight program designed to introduce historically underrepresented students to college life.
Thousands of newly admitted students and their families visited campus on Saturday for Triton Day, an annual event that showcases all that UC San Diego has to offer. Students toured residence halls, attended academic presentations, watched performances by student organizations and much more. These visitors were also the first to try a new virtual reality experience based on UC San Diego technology: Shakeboarding. The activity allowed students to simulate surfing, experience an earthquake and wipe out—all on dry land.
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