It was the marriage of whiplash and deja vu. Hours before Gov. Schwarzenegger debuted the latest version of a hellish state budget proposal, the University of California's governing Board of Regents gave a unanimous thumbs-up for continued planning for a multi-million-dollar Valley medical school headquartered at UC Merced. Among the regents ...

The menu of adjectives for Mark G. Yudof is pure Michelin: brilliant, visionary, outstanding, amazing, unique. A University of California Board of Regents panel has tapped him to succeed Bob Dynes as president of what is routinely called the most prestigious university system in the world. He's a Philadelphia-educated lawyer. He ran ...

Arrived a bit early for a ''UC Day'' dinner at Sacramento's Sheraton Grand Hotel. Who plopped down in an adjacent seat in the lobby? Mr. UC himself, president Robert C. Dynes. I was there to show solidarity for UC Merced grads -- yes there are UC Merced alums out there, and they sell the school well. Moreso, I was there to keep hope alive for a ...

They're working on a special Highway 99 offramp to the UC Merced campus, but in the meantime you trek across some seedy and some spanking new parts of the city to get to the land where the mascot is a Golden Bobcat. Bam. There it is. Like a space station on Mars. Dozens of buildings -- labs researching things like stem cells, ''student quarters'' ...

All the important feel-good words were there at the Fresno Board of Supes, which unanimously endorsed a resolution to bring a UC med school to the San Joaquin Valley. Partnership.... Pipelines.... Collaboration.... Unity.... All the sound reasoning was also present at the Jan. 29 vote. The Valley is short of doctors ... Short of allied medical ...

UC Merced Chancellor Steve Kang offered an engaging smile and a sense of exuberance as he and others provided a status report Nov. 16 on the push for a UC medical school in central California. The goal is to open the campus in 2013 with 32 students, and have 284 enrolled by 2023. In the words of Maria Pallavicini, dean of UC Merced's ...