Madera High School grad enters elite program

For The Madera Tribune

Madera High School graduate Alyssa Maldonado has aspirations to become a physician and will attend UC Merced in the fall in the prestigious Health Scholars Program. She will graduate No. 5 in the Class of 2023 when commencement ceremonies begin Thursday evening.

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For Madera High School’s Alyssa Maldonado, the opportunity to stay close to home while getting a great education was too much to pass up.

Maldonado had plenty of choices like UC Santa Barbara, UC Davis and Fresno State. However, she chose UC Merced to stay close to home. She was also accepted into the UC Merced Health Scholars Program.

“They were only accepting 60 students, and that’s about how many on a dorm room floor,” she said. “It’s the whole Central Valley and whoever else they were accepting. I felt like they were accepting the Central Valley people to keep medical people in the Valley.”