UC Irvine’s Sierra Program helped forge a 50-year friendship through shared experiences and life lessons
At UC Irvine’s 1976 summer orientation, five incoming freshmen found themselves grouped together. Aside from having alphabetically adjacent last names, they had little in common. Yet the shared experience of starting college – and, for four of them, participating in UC Irvine’s Sierra Program – forged an unexpected bond.
Fifty years later, that bond still holds.
The friends reunite at least once a year. For 1980 graduates Les McCabe, Dave Mayo, Jill (Martin) Halvaks and Lori Miller-Bath, Sierra became one of the defining experiences of their college years. The fifth member of their freshman circle, Teresa Martinez ’81, passed away in 2025.
The Sierra Program is a living-learning opportunity for first-year UC Irvine students, aptly named for taking place in Sierra Hall. The program’s activities challenge residents to think critically and consider new perspectives among their peers.
For McCabe, Mayo and Halvaks, Sierra’s initial appeal was largely its status as an all-freshman dorm.
“My freshman year began in an all-male residence hall with a junior roommate who, let’s just say, made it less than ideal,” recalls McCabe, now president and CEO of Junior Achievement of Southern California.
Meanwhile, the friends he had met during orientation were living in Sierra, and Miller-Bath was spending much of her time there, as well, despite living in Mesa Court.
“When an opening became available in Sierra during the second quarter, I moved in,” he says. “What initially drew me there were my friends, but what kept me there was the program itself.”
The Sierra Program celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2025. As part of its curriculum, Sierra residents take a four-unit class and participate in the program’s off-campus Simulated Society Retreat (SIMSOC), an activity that challenges students to develop an “ideal” society – an exercise designed to spark conversations about community, governance and responsibility.
“The SIMSOC weekend was an eye-opener,” says Mayo, a retired business professional. “To this day, I found it to be a frustrating and enlightening experience.”
For McCabe, the class itself was especially meaningful.
“It opened doors to new perspectives, particularly around cross-cultural awareness,” he says. “Many of us came from different communities across Southern California, and Sierra gave us a structured, safe space to learn about one another’s backgrounds, identities and belief systems.”
“What initially drew me there were my friends, but what kept me there was the program itself.”
Halvaks says the Sierra experience prepared her well for life beyond college.
“It helped with everything,” says Halvaks, who retired following a 33-year career at UC Irvine. “Listening skills, negotiation tactics, understanding assertion versus aggression, appreciating and celebrating other cultures, teamwork and humor – the list could go on and on. But the best thing it gave me was friends.”
For McCabe, Sierra expanded his worldview and created opportunities for deeper conversations with staff and faculty.
“We examined our belief systems,” he says. “We talked honestly about culture, identity, privilege, fairness and responsibility. We challenged one another. We listened. We reflected.”
That experience, he adds, shaped his perspective long after graduation.
“The lasting impact for me was a deep appreciation for the richness of human difference – and a genuine love for cross-cultural engagement. Sierra pushed me beyond the cultural insulation I had grown up in and helped me understand both myself and others more fully.”
Since graduation, the group, including their honorary member, Miller-Bath, has kept in touch through letters in the early days and now email, social media and text.
Halvaks, the group’s devoted “planner,” who is also the president of the UC Irvine Retirees Association Board of Directors, arranges regular in-person gatherings.
“Relationships don’t maintain themselves,” McCabe says. “Someone has to care enough to tend to them – and we’ve been fortunate to have that.”
Despite the different directions their lives and careers have gone, they connect over Sierra and their mutual respect and love for one another. A happy alphabetical coincidence may have brought them together 50 years ago, but what has kept them together is something far more meaningful.
When they reflect on the Sierra Program today, they share the same conclusion: It has meant everything.
