All posts by: UMBC News Staff

Solid Gold Scholars

Two UMBC students were awarded Barry M. Goldwater scholarships for the 2010-2011 academic year. The Goldwater scholarship is awarded to sophomores and juniors who have excelled in science, mathematics or engineering.

Nathaniel Kim ’11, B.S. Chemistry and B.A. Political Science, and Geoffrey Clapp ’11, B.S. Mathematics and Computer Science, have both done substantial amounts of research during their time at UMBC. Both students will be presenting at the Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement Day on Wednesday, April 28.

Research is an essential part of the Goldwater application: each applicant must draft a research proposal in order to be considered for the award (they do not have to complete the research). Students must also be nominated for the award through their institution. A maximum of 300 awards are given out each year. This year, 278 awards were distributed among 1,111 applicants.

“Nate and Geoff had very solid applications, and they had great letters of recommendation. We had no reservations whatsoever about recommending them,” said Simon Stacey, associate director of the honors college, who helps to shepherd students through the process of applying for prestigious scholarships.

Though both students excel in their fields, they have very different interests and goals.

Kim hopes to earn his Ph.D. in chemistry and to one day become a university professor. “The support of my mentors has been integral to my success, and that really has put the impetus on me to give back to others,” he said.

He admits that he isn’t sure exactly where his political science degree fits into his future plans, but he can foresee a day when his two passions may intersect. “There aren’t enough scientists writing policy, and there aren’t enough politicians who know about the science of what they’re talking about,” he said.

Clapp plans to earn a Ph.D. in applied mathematics.

“I thought about applying for the Goldwater in my sophomore year. Then I looked at the research requirements and thought I had a lot of work to do, so I pretty much dedicated the last year to advancing my research,” said Clapp. The research outlined in his application is the same research that he will be presenting at URCAD: a mathematical study of how lamprey eels move.

“The hard work that they’ve done for the past two or three years is what gets them the scholarship,” said Stacey. “We know what a winning candidate looks like, and I think UMBC is a place that can have even more than two a year.” An institution can nominate up to four students each year.

The scholarship comes with up to $7,500 that the recipients can put towards tuition, housing and even books. But for both Kim and Clapp, the prestige of winning the award—which is one of the few awards that undergraduate students in these fields can earn in order to set themselves apart from their peers—is more valuable than the monetary prize.

And for Clapp, there was an even sweeter reward than money or recognition. “My parents were pretty amazed,” he said. “They got me an ice cream cake.”

(4/23/2010)

Sweat Free

Sweatshirts, hats and shorts. Jackets, T-shirts and pants. UMBC logo merchandise is now made under fair labor practices, thanks to the Fair Labor Standards Advisory Group (FLSAG). The group, appointed by President Freeman Hrabowski, is chaired by Assistant to the President and Vice President of Marketing and Public Relations Lisa Akchin and includes representatives of campus senates and members of the UMBC Solidarity Coalition, who brought this issue to campus administrators.

As a result of FLSAG deliberations, UMBC has adopted a code of conduct describing the fair labor standards required by vendors producing merchandise. The full code of conduct can be seen here. All merchandise for fall 2011 orders will be subject to the new code. UMBC has also joined 180 colleges and universities as a member of the Worker Rights Consortium (WRC), a non-profit governmental organization that assists campuses with enforcement of manufacturing codes of conduct through education, compliance monitoring and remediation negotiations. 

“Like much clothing manufactured today, university-logo merchandise is usually produced in overseas factories,” said Akchin. “In fact, the fair labor issue extends to nearly all clothing people buy – not just university logo. This makes it challenging for campuses and apparel suppliers to ensure that fair labor practices are followed by suppliers. With this new code, we can ensure that merchandise will be made under safe conditions.”

 “We’ve all heard about mistreated workers, and it all comes back to our economic system,” said Stefanie Mavronis ’12, political science. “Through our work, we hope that other people understand what’s happening outside our bubble and recognize that these are humans – just like us. There are real people on the other end, and we are benefitting by exploiting them.”

Mavronis is a member of the Solidarity Coalition and has been passionate about fair labor standards since she was in high school. Although the Coalition is small in size, the group often partners with other on- and off-campus organizations to pursue a similar goal: ending harmful mistreatment of workers.

To engage the campus further, the Solidarity Coalition will present “Sweatshop Workers Speak Out!” on Thursday, April 29, 6-8 p.m., in the Albin O. Kuhn Library Gallery. This event will feature a Bangladeshi garment worker and a representative of home-based workers in Pakistan. It is co-sponsored by the International Labor Rights Forum, IWW, Red Emma’s Bookstore, The United Workers, Women Involved in Learning and Leadership, Gender and Women’s Studies, Media and Communications Studies and UMBC’s President’s Office.

“This event will be the biggest we’ve ever had,” Mavronis said. “I think it will be interesting to see what people ask and also how these workers see themselves in the bigger picture. We look forward to the campus learning more about this important issue.”

Other groups involved in FLSAG include representatives of the Professional Staff Senate, Graduate Student Association, Student Government Association, the Administration and Finance Division and the General Counsel’s Office. All Senates were invited to participate, and the University Steering Committee was engaged throughout the process.
For more information on the Solidarity Coalition, click here.

(4/23/10)

Striking a Balance

The professional challenges of balancing care-giving responsibilities for an aging parent and a full-time job can be significant and daunting.

UMBC’s Wellness in the Workplace program has partnered with the Erickson School to create a workshop designed to help UMBC employees who face difficult caregiving situations related to aging.

On April 30, three leading experts from the Erickson School will provide guidance and advice on caregiving in a workshop titled “Striking a Balance: Eldercare in the Workplace.” The workshop will be held in The Commons 331 from 10-11:30 a.m.

The workshop will be led by Interim Dean Judah Ronch, professor Bill Thomas, author of “What are Old People For?” and M.A. in Aging Services alumnus Steve Gurney ’08, founder and publisher of the regional publication – Guide to Retirement Living.

Employees caring for aging parents often find that new family dynamics and the responsibilities of caregiving are difficult to balance with work, said Ronch.

“Whenever you’re dealing with the aging of a parent you’re going to face an entirely new family situation. You’re family is not alone in having this kind of difficult adjustment,” Ronch said.

The workshop will offer new perspectives on aging and will include time for participants to ask questions about eldercare, including balancing the burden of care-giving among family members, transitioning a parent from home care to nursing care and making end-of-life care decisions.

“We want to take advantage of something that’s unique to UMBC — the Erickson School has a specific approach to aging and the organizations that serve families of elders and we want to share that expertise with our fellow staff an faculty on campus,” said Thomas.

Click here to register. Space is limited – Registration deadline is April 22.

Watch the Feb. 24, 2010 Wellness in the Workplace workshop on Eldercare featuring Judah Ronch, Bill Thomas and Steve Guerney.

(4/21/10)

Starbux

Starbucks would love to hear your thoughts. That’s what the customer comment card says. And Christine Ferrera ’10, M.F.A. imaging and digital arts, took them up on their offer.

“I asked myself: ‘what would I naturally say to a friend?’ and began writing,” she said.

Fast forward five years, and you’ll find nearly 2,000 letters from Ferrera to Starbucks – one for every day of every year, ranging from fun and quirky to highly sensitive. In one, she asks, “Has anyone ever fallen in love at Starbucks?” In another, she discusses her pride in buying a new couch. In many she writes about the daily struggles of being an artist.

The project spurred when Ferrera was living in Richmond and taking classes at Virginia Commonwealth University. She was enrolled in an endurance art class and had to undertake a project for one year. The class was asked to do something out of their element, and since Ferrera was a painter, she chose writing.

 “I never placed rules for what I’d write. The only loose rule I had was that this wasn’t going to be some kind of political statement,” she said. “After the year was over, I just started doing it out of habit.”

Within a month, Ferrera started receiving generic replies from Starbucks. Some enclosed coupons. But after six, they stopped sending them. Time went on, Ferrera kept writing and would hear from Starbucks sporadically. They would respond to many of her questions related to the business (saying yes – that some people had fallen in love at the coffee shop). But mostly, the replies were short.

After two years of writing, Ferrera moved to Korea. It was the only time she had to pay for postage. She didn’t hear from them that year, assuming they had lost her address. But when she returned to the states, a surprise was waiting her: a personal letter from a customer service representative at Starbucks, addressing her by name.

“The letter was so direct, so confrontational,” she said. “But it was nice and obvious that she had something to say to me. She had been reading my letters for years and had been touched by them.”

Although Ferrera was appreciative of the reply, part of the cycle was broken.

“Before, the project served as a diary for me, and it was almost like no one was reading,” she said. “This letter assured me that someone had been reading, that my words were out there.”

But that didn’t stop Ferrera. Her daily routine persisted, and she found herself continuing to write – despite knowing that someone was actually reading. Although she doesn’t want to be only recognized for her letters to Starbucks, she notes how important the project is in terms of today’s art.

“Starbucks – and other corporations – are part of our every day landscape. Artists need to react to the times in which they live,” she said. “There may be some kind of shift eventually, and maybe I’ll know when to stop writing the letters. But for now, it is part of my routine, and I’ll keep doing it until there’s a reason to stop.”

Ferrera has considered publishing her letters on a Web site or in a book and is currently weighing her options. 

The Starbux diary project will be featured at the Imaging and Digital Arts M.F.A. Thesis Show, held April 8-24, at the Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture. Ferrera’s letters will be on display, and she will perform a reading of her letters on April 21, 10:30 a.m., and April 22, 3 p.m, both at CADVC. Work by six upcoming graduates will also be featured including videos, installations and live performances.

For more information about the show, click here.

Ferrera also did a reading of her letters at Baltimore’s Stoop Storytelling Series, an event that gathers seven storytellers who tell stories for seven minutes. Click here to listen.

Click on the thumbnails below to read a selection of Christine’s letters:

(4/2/10)

Heritage of Excellence

The UMBC community mourns the passing of Albin Owings Kuhn, a lifelong farmer who rose through Maryland’s university system to become the founding chancellor of UMBC. Kuhn died of pneumonia at his Woodbine farm March 24 at the age of 94.

“Good gracious, we have so much to thank him for. He was a very special man and a giant, and we’re standing on the shoulders of that giant,” UMBC President Freeman A. Hrabowski III, said in a March 26 Baltimore Sun story about Kuhn.

“Dr. Kuhn was our biggest cheerleader. He believed in us. He’d call me up and tell me how proud he was of our work, and I’d get tears in my eyes,” Hrabowski said.

Kuhn was heavily involved in the initial planning, development, and construction of UMBC. A University of Maryland graduate (B.S., M.S., Ph.D.), he had been professor of agronomy and head of the agronomy department at what is now the University of Maryland College Park, and executive vice president of the University of Maryland, which included campuses in College Park, downtown Baltimore and the Eastern Shore.

In 1965, Kuhn was given the responsibility for creating UMBC as the newest member of the University of Maryland System. He and his family moved into one of the original farmhouses of the campus grounds. This small gray house became the command center – residence, office, architects’ and builders’ outpost, student and faculty way station. Its porch was the catalog center for the library’s nascent 20,000 volume collection. That farmhouse was later replaced by UMBC’s library, named after Kuhn.

Kuhn was officially chancellor of both UMBC and the University of Maryland Baltimore (UMB), a position he held from 1967 until the University’s second commencement in 1971. At that point, as each campus was acquiring individual leadership, he left UMBC to serve as chancellor of UMB.

History professor Joseph Tatarewicz, an old friend and admirer of Kuhn’s, said to the Baltimore Sun that Kuhn was, “Gregarious, yet self-effacing. He took to educational administration almost effortlessly, and by the early 1960s he was the perfect person to lead the development of a new campus, sorely needed due to the baby boomers’ entering college.”

Every year in his Commencement address, Hrabowski quotes the words Kuhn said to the first graduating class in 1970:

“If you bring to the future the same personal qualities and personal commitment you have brought to this campus as students, good and important things will happen to each of you, as well as to those around you … and the university community will be proud to have played a part in your life.”

In lieu of flowers, the Kuhn family suggests contributions to the Friends of the Albin O. Kuhn Library & Gallery at UMBC. Checks may be made payable to the UMBC Foundation and sent to Albin O. Kuhn Library & Gallery, Administrative Offices, UMBC, 1000 Hilltop Circle,  Baltimore, MD  21250.

Excerpt from 1994 interview with Albin Kuhn:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSfE7yCxcEQ

UMBC Heritage of Excellence video featuring interview outtakes with Albin Kuhn:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HiL-_-Rlf8A

(4/6/10)

Chess Powerhouse

Continuing its dominating sweep of collegiate chess tournaments, UMBC’s powerhouse chess team won a record sixth “Final Four of College Chess” April 11 in Brownsville, Texas, at the 2010 President’s Cup.

The annual President’s Cup tournament, which falls just days after the NCAA Division I Basketball Tournament Final Four, determines the top U.S. collegiate chess team in an equally intense round-robin sporting competition.

UMBC defeated University of Texas-Brownsville (UTB) by just half a point to clinch its sixth title in the tournament’s 10-year history. The tournament was hosted by UTB, a newcomer chess powerhouse whom UMBC defeated Dec. 30 to win the 2009 Pan-American Intercollegiate Team Chess Championship (the Pan Am). UMBC has won or tied the Pan Am competition a record nine times in the past 14 years, more than any other college in the tournament’s history.

“UMBC had to bring their best game ever to win against the strongest field of chess teams ever assembled at any Final Four,” said UMBC Chess Director Alan Sherman. “(UMBC chess) team captain Sergey Erenburg and Leonid Kritz played amazingly to lead their team against such tough competition.”

Competition was so fierce, Sherman said, that UTB hired a top grandmaster consultant who in the months before the tournament helped the team prepare an opening trick designed specifically to trip-up Kritz, who is the highest rated college player in the Pan Am. The trap contributed to Kritz’s third round defeat, but a victory by Erenburg and a draw by UMBC player Sasha Kaplan clinched the team’s victory.

Collectively, the four teams fielded seven international grandmasters, one woman international grandmaster and 10 international masters. In third and fourth place respectively were Texas Tech University and the University of Texas, Dallas.

UMBC’s chess team players are full-time students first and chess players second, Sherman said. Three team players have earned perfect 4.0 grade point averages and team captain Sergey Erenburg is a candidate for valedictorian this May.
UMBC’s championship chess team: Leonid Kritz, a Grandmaster from Russia; Sergey Erenburg, a Grandmaster from Israel; Giorgi Margvelashvili, an International grandmaster-elect from the Republic of Georgia; Sasha Kaplan, an International Master from Israel; Sabina Foisor (alternate), a Woman International Grandmaster from Romania; UMBC Chess Coach Igor Epshteyn; and Associate Chess Director Sam Palatnik.

Listen to Alan Sherman discuss UMBC’s record victory on NPR’s nationally syndicated Tell Me More.

For more information on the tournament: www.collegechess.org.

(4/12/10)

What’s in Your Dinner?

Where do UMBC graduate research and local high school students meet? Over slices of caribou.

Mix together graduate students from UMBC’s civil and environmental engineering department (CEE), samples of pike and caribou from the Arctic, and a handful of inquisitive high school students, and you get one big prize: The Best Poster Award at the annual meeting of the International Society for Risk Analysis (SRA). The SRA is more than your average high school science fair. This unique group of students was competing with other Ph.D. students at an internationally recognized competition. 

In 2009, Upal Ghosh, CEE associate professor and graduate program director, was already deep into a study with the Maryland Department of the Environment when he was approached by Julie Rogers, a Park High School teacher, about a partnership. Rogers was taking a trip to the Arctic Research Center and wanted to bring back a few wildlife samples for her students to analyze, but needed some help from the UMBC labs.

Piggy backing on the study already in progress with the UMBC CEE program, both sets of students combined forces. The high school students were responsible for designing the study (goals, questionnaire, plans for sample shipping) and getting approvals. In addition, they used the data generated from the samples to conduct a human health risk assessment. The UMBC graduate students were responsible for the lab work, analysis, data, and project oversight. All of this combined would help to determine if there were hazardous legacy chemicals present in Arctic samples. Legacy chemicals are ones that may take more than 30-40 years to enter into the food supply depending on how they move through the environment.  The Inuit tribes may be ingesting chemicals from wildlife that may have taken 40 years to get there, but might be immediately dangerous to their health.

Although the analysis found that there were no chemicals present in the samples of fish and caribou collected, both sets of students found the study especially rewarding. Ghosh is excited about an opportunity to continue to pursue research collaborations with his graduate school students and high school students. Piuly Paul, one of the CEE graduate students, was especially excited about the collaboration. Paul explains, “You could show the high schoolers what we do in a graduate lab. It was exciting to see the curiosity that you generate in them. ”

Through a combined learning experience, the UMBC graduate students were able to expand their study of the Chesapeake Bay fish to the arctic. The Park high-schoolers got to partake in research that won them a major award and observe real research students in a real lab. Josh Naiman, one of the Park High School seniors, says, “It was a rewarding experience working with grad school students.” He hasn’t officially decided if environmental science is where he is heading, but this experience has him strongly considering it.   

 While these collaborations provide great opportunities, it’s the efforts of these students to keep our waters, and dinner, safe that really matters.

(4/2/10)