STEM Culture Festival

The STEM Culture Festival is returning to UC Santa Cruz on Friday, May 15 from 1-4pm in the Baskin Engineering Courtyard. Join us!

This year, we’re expanding with even more performances, activities, and creative ways to celebrate UCSC’s vibrant, diverse, and excellent STEM culture! 

What to expect:

• Cuban Dance Master Susana Arenas and her troupe of Orisha dancers led by Cuban Drum Master Toribio Garcia return for a rousing, communal dance

• Student performers: Los Mejicas and their traditional baile folklórico followed by an open dance lesson/performance by Slug N’ Boots

• STEM-themed drag performances and spoken word poetry by student creatives

• Associate Vice Chancellor for Student Success and Equity Dr. Ebonee Williams (Chemical Engineering, University of Washington ‘04) will share an inspirational talk on “Bringing our whole selves to STEM!”

• El Buen Taco and Falafel Santa Cruz will be serving delicious food, completely FREE for all attendees who engage with the student orgs and their activities

• More than just your standard student organization tabling: Games, interactive demos, culturally themed activities, and opportunities to learn more about clubs from all over campus

• Raffle for gift cards to be awarded every hour from 1-4pm – must be present to win! 

This event will take place in the Baskin Engineering Courtyard and will be open to all UCSC students, staff, and faculty.

The STEM Culture Festival celebrates and elevates the many backgrounds, cultures, and identities that intersect with our work as scientists, engineers, educators, and members of the UCSC community. It is a rare opportunity when all of UCSC is invited to meet at the engineering school for a time of joy and togetherness. We enthusiastically invite you to attend and be in community with us – especially now in these tumultuous times of division and disunity. 

This event represents a collaboration between Baskin Engineering, the Women’s Center, the Lionel Cantú Queer Resource Center, El Centro Latinx and Chicanx Resource Center, the Asian American and Pacific Islander Resource Center, the Physical and Biological Sciences Division, and the Genomics Institute.