University of California Shines the Spotlight on Graduating Senior Rui Ming Yu
The University of California Office of the President is sending the graduating class of 2025 off in style, highlighting individual seniors and honoring the journeys that have brought them to the commencement stage.
The UCOP spotlight shines on Rui Ming Yu, a mechanical engineering major and electrical engineering minor, whose experience with MESA in middle and high school revealed a path toward STEM. He stayed with MESA as a mentor during his undergraduate years, hoping to inspire other young people to pursue STEM fields.
Read on to meet this inspiring senior.
As a kid, when his mom would ask him what he wanted to be when he grew up, Rui Ming Yu would always choose a police officer or a firefighter. He didn't know there were heroic jobs in science and engineering, too.
That was until he found MESA. Short for Mathematics, Engineering, Science, Achievement, MESA's middle and high school programs around the state expose kids to STEM who might otherwise not have those opportunities. The goal is not only to spark curiosity but to lay the groundwork for students to excel in STEM fields in college and the workforce.
For Yu, the MESA after-school program at his Stockton middle school was one of few options at the end of classes. The program was free and allowed his mom a few extra hours at work, so, as a sixth grader, he signed up.
"MESA showed me, hey, you can apply your physics and your math that you're learning in the classroom to real-life projects," says Yu.
The students worked together to build Popsicle-stick bridges and raided the recycling bin to make Rube Goldberg machines (dubbed "MESA machines").
"I had so much fun with my friends, experimenting and getting my hands dirty. All the materials we needed were provided. That was really wonderful because if my parents had needed to pay for supplies, I might not have been able to continue with the program."
Yu did keep going with MESA into high school, until Covid-19 shuttered on-site programs in his junior year. By then, he was locked in on a STEM path and ready to make the leap to UC.
Immigrants who worked in food service, Yu's parents had always envisioned him becoming a doctor. While he dutifully tried to pursue that path, deep down, he knew his passions lay in engineering. He wanted to bridge the two fields but wasn't sure how. The answer came in a summer internship with a medical device company.
"From there, I was able to see how I could pivot and also get the knowledge and skills I needed to move into the field right out of college."
Switching from a biology to an engineering major, all the pieces fell into place. Yu discovered the MESA program at UC Davis and was hired as a student assistant, a paid job that has him helping local middle- and high-school MESA participants to have as much fun as he did by applying math, science and hot glue to real-world challenges.
After graduation, Yu will join Alameda–based biomedical device company Penumbra as a manufacturing engineer. The company fabricates clot-busting catheters and other medical devices to treat pulmonary embolism and deep vein thrombosis.