A New Gateway to Campus and A Home for Medical Education 

Planting the flag for UC Merced’s emerging medical school, the building gives shape to a new campus destination while establishing a defining gateway at the southwestern edge of campus. Located on Cottonwood Meadow, it is carefully oriented to strengthen campus connections—aligned with the upper campus and linked directly to the main Academic Walk via a landscaped pathway. The Medical Education Building embraces the wetland characteristics of the site, incorporating permeable and active edges that provide multiple points of entry and celebrate movement through the site, creating a vibrant new node of activity on campus.

To establish a strong sense of community, place, and belonging, a central courtyard serves as the building’s primary organizing element. This spatial solution creates a home-away-from-home for medical students by structuring daily experiences around a shared, open-air environment. Facilitating memorable moments beyond the classroom, the courtyard serves as both a daily gathering space and a venue for celebrating milestones reinforcing a sense of community and achievement. Exterior circulation on the second level frames the courtyard, with a prominent stair that descends to the ground level to accommodate white coat ceremonies and graduations. The building mass is oriented to regulate the courtyard’s microclimate for optimized user comfort, offering shade during hotter months while allowing natural light to filter in year-round.

The massing opens to create a breezeway at the building’s base, enhancing its connection to campus, while strengthening its presence as a gateway to the south. A two-story lobby enclosed in double-height windows provides a welcoming entry that offers clear lines of sight through the interior lobby to the courtyard. This level of transparency creates an inviting atmosphere with a strong connection to nature during the day, while illuminating the medical education campus at night.

Architecturally, the building extends UC Merced’s design language that’s rooted in the region’s agricultural heritage, while expanding its expression. The architecture is inspired by the San Joaquin valley’s cultivated agricultural fields, where orderly rows of crops stretch toward the Sierra Nevada foothills. This is reflected in the rhythmic repetition of the vertical bars and colonnades that define the façade, materialized in wheat-colored precast concrete to establish continuity with the main campus. At the ground level, a rust-colored steel plinth contrasts with the façade, creating a greater sense of energy and warmth at the ground level and establishing a subtle nod to the metal structures of the agrarian landscape of the valley.

A Home Away from Home for Medical Students 

Given the rigorous demands of medical school, coupled with UC Merced’s predominantly first-generation student population and the building’s mission to increase the number of doctors in the valley, the interior environment is intentionally designed to support student success. Throughout its four stories, interprofessional collaboration, research, and hands-on learning are supported in an environment that imparts a sense of belonging, promotes wellness, and evokes a sense of mutual support through shared experiences.

Upon entering the lobby from the breezeway, visitors encounter a dynamic sequence of gathering spaces that invite interaction, from casual lounge seating anchored by a grand stair to genius bar and café settings. A pre-function area on the ground floor connects two large meeting spaces, while breakout collaboration zones strategically positioned throughout the building strengthen connections between labs. These areas are complemented by immersive design elements inspired by UC Merced’s signature blue and gold. Coupled with materiality that’s carefully curated to reflect the textures of the surrounding agrarian landscape, the interior design evokes a sense of pride and place.

Beyond these shared spaces, the building unfolds around the courtyard, forming two interconnected wings. The southern wing is traditional of a medical education building, with classrooms, offices, and public-facing spaces, while the northern wing integrates cutting-edge medical education technologies, including simulation suites and flexible research laboratories. This zoning strategy optimizes space efficiency while maintaining connectivity, intuitive navigation, and security.

The Medical Education Building’s high-performance design optimizes user well-being, supporting the UC System’s long-term goal for carbon neutrality. Targeting LEED Platinum certification, the all-electric facility will operate at net-zero carbon by connecting to the university’s photovoltaic system. Through a combination of passive and active strategies, the design will achieve an 80% energy reduction from the baseline, enhancing comfort while minimizing environmental impact. Features such as daylight harvesting and solar heat gain mitigation ensure an energy-efficient interior that also supports cognitive performance and overall well-being.

The Medical Education Building presents a symbol of hope for a healthier, more equitable San Joaquin Valley—a place that will transform the educational landscape, elevate healthcare access, and contribute to a new generation of physicians to serve the local community.