All posts by: UMBC News Staff

Service and Scholarship

OrLando Yarborough, who graduated in May with a B.S. in Biological Sciences, is on his way to Yale University’s biomedical research doctoral program, but it’s not the first time, nor likely the last, that he will be counted among the elite of scholarship and research. In addition to being a Meyerhoff Scholar at UMBC, Yarborough was part of the Undergraduate Scholarship Program (UGSP) at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), one of the world’s top biomedical research institutions.

For the past two summers, through the NIH UGSP’s Summer Biomedical Research Training Internship, Yarborough worked under the mentorship of Dr. Roland Owens, Senior Investigator of the Laboratory of Molecular and Cellular Biology in the National Institute of Diabetes and Digestive and Kidney Diseases.

Yarborough’s other achievements during his four years at UMBC are numerous and equally impressive. During his freshman and sophomore years, he interned at Baltimore’s Center for Marine Biotechnology. He received additional scholarship support from the William Randolph Hearst Endowed Scholarship Fund, the Ray A. Kroc Youth Achievement Scholarship program and a Brown-Pettyway Scholarship.

He was also a member of the UMBC Honors College and the Golden Key International Honors Society. A highly active member of UMBC’s chapter of Alpha Nu Omega, Inc., Yarborough was named the fraternity’s national Undergraduate Brother of the Year for 2003. Yarborough also mentored elementary school students and spoke or served at various UMBC community service and academic events.

“As I move from UMBC to enter my graduate studies, I carry with me the mindset that academic integrity is a virtue and diversity is a blessing,” says Yarborough. “On this campus, I developed leadership skills, built strong social bonds, and embraced scholarship as a lifestyle. God has used UMBC to equip me for my future, and I am grateful for the experience.”

A Future Light on Broadway

Doug Yetter, who has directed, written and/or conducted over 200 musicals, was one of seven finalists for UMBC’s 2003 valedictorian and graduated in May with a 4.0 GPA. This fall, he begins the world’s only graduate program in musical theatre writing at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, where he has received a full scholarship and housing allowance.

Yetter originally came to UMBC’s music department as an accompanist in 1998 and enrolled in the undergraduate program the following year. He began his career in musical theatre in Denver and has been involved in productions across the United States. He has been named “Baltimore’s Best Piano Bar Entertainer” numerous times, and is the former co-owner of the Chesapeake Music Hall, a dinner theatre in Annapolis, Maryland.

His work has been performed off-Broadway and around the country. Locally, his version of “A Christmas Carol” has become an annual tradition at the Chesapeake Arts Center in Brooklyn Park, where his adaptation of “Dracula” will also be performed this spring.

At Tisch, MFA students in the Graduate Musical Theatre Writing program have the opportunity to participate in assistantships at New York theatres, and in their final year they each compose an entire Broadway show, which will be read for Broadway producers. Yetter says, “Without the depth of education I received at UMBC, and the life-changing experience I had in the music department, I would never have been accepted by an institution such as NYU.”

Caring for Communities

Sipi Gupta’s summer plans begin at the Office of Homeless Services in Baltimore and then take her to a community health organization in West India.

At the Office of Homeless Services, Gupta will help evaluate the 2002-03 Code Blue Policy, which includes a first-time program to find shelter for the homeless when temperatures fall to a minimum number of degrees. Her internship is sponsored by the Abell Foundation. In India, Gupta will survey community needs, including access to water for the elderly, and vision care.

Gupta, who has been a volunteer coordinator at UMBC’s Shriver Center, received both her bachelor’s (2002) and master’s (2003) degrees in sociology from UMBC. She says the department’s strong emphasis on field research and faculty support has been extremely helpful to her academic career. “Faculty are really supportive — if you tell them what you want to do, they will help lead you in the right direction,” she says. Her master’s thesis, “Physician’s Attitudes Toward Managed Care,” won first prize in her discipline at UMBC’s Graduate Research Conference.

At a UMBC Social Science Forum last spring, she was inspired by Maryland Insurance Commissioner Steven Larson’s lecture on “The CareFirst Conversion.” “I think his job sounds awesome,” says Gupta, who is interested in issues of corporate accountability. She is now getting ready to take the LSATs and will be applying to law schools this summer.

Art Matters

Zachary Handler, who graduated magna cum laude from UMBC in May, begins a master’s degree in arts administration at Columbia University this fall. “My goal and dream in life is to start a visual and performing arts secondary school for deaf youth,” says Handler, a Linehan Artist Scholar who majored in visual arts.

Handler is a American Sign Language Program creator and drama teacher at the Green Acres Day Camp (Rockville, Maryland). He has been a teacher’s assistant in deaf and hard-of-hearing K-12 classrooms and an arts assistant at the Maryland School for the deaf.

He first became interested in working with the deaf after taking a sign language class at Quince Orchard High School. “My teacher, Susan Davidoff Gershowitz, taught me the importance, significance and pure beauty of the language, people and culture,” Handler says. “The deaf community is the community I am most passionate about and want to make sure that the art of the deaf is abundant and included within the greater art world. There aren’t enough deaf artists, and deaf youth should have an institution that can hone and focus their intrinsic talent, enlightening and providing their creative potential.”

Handler’s art often examines the struggle between popularity and ostracism, between those who have power and those who hunger for it. He received a Provost’s Undergraduate Research Award which helped fund the creation of his photography exhibition, “Sticks and Stones: Bullies, Brats and Bashers.” The show was recently on display at Chela Gallery in Baltimore’s Fells Point/Canton neighborhood.

Handler also presented his work at UMBC’s Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement Day. “I’ve been especially interested in Zack’s work this year,” says Beth Pennington, assistant to the provost and a member of the Provost’s Undergraduate Research Awards Committee. “It’s one of the most innovative projects we’ve ever sponsored.”

The Power of Social Work

In high school, Tera Foster decided she wanted to be a social worker after participating in a local social activism project dealing with sexual assault awareness. Now Foster is a member of the first class to graduate from the Universities at Shady Grove, where she received hands-on training and participated in community service.

UMBC is one of eight University System of Maryland institutions that offer upper-division courses leading to a bachelor’s degree at the Shady Grove Center in Rockville, Maryland. UMBC offers programs in social work and information systems at Shady Grove.

“Since the program is new, it brings some of the best, most influential professors from UMBC and what you end up with is a great education,” says Foster. “The classes are very hands-on and experimental; you learn a lot through group situations and class projects, which makes learning interesting.”

Classes at Shady Grove are small — usually between 15 and 20 students per class — and there is a close relationship between the teachers and students. “My professors are people who I’ll probably know for the rest of my life,” says Foster.

Last year, Foster was one of only two recipients of the Cliff and Camille Kendall Scholarship at Shady Grove, an award given based on personal need and academic strength, and she was the first student to receive the Shady Grove Student Achievement Award.

In addition to being a member of the Social Work Honor Society, Foster was the founding president of the Shady Grove Social Work Student Association, a 45-member group formed to help further the goals of students interested in social work. “We plan a lot of community service activities,” she says. “In April, we organized a Homeless Bag Lunch where our group made 200 peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and distributed bag lunches to several area homeless shelters.”

Currently, Foster teaches two days a week at The Pathways School, a high school for emotional and behaviorally disturbed students. She planned and facilitated group therapy sessions and also worked with students one-on-one. “I’ve learned that even the smallest life event can have a life-altering influence on the students I work with,” she says. “I teach them how to visit a recruiter, how to interview for a job or enter a social situation. These are all small skills, that most of us take for granted, that will help them to be successful once they graduate from high school.”

In the future, Foster plans to continue her education with a Master’s in Social Work from the University of Maryland, Baltimore, and pursue a position in the social work field.

A Passion for UMBC Athletics
UMBC Athletic Director Dr. Charles Brown came to UMBC from his native New York in 1988 looking forward to the challenge of leading a Division I program after several years as AD for Division III Hunter College. “As soon as I stepped on campus, I knew UMBC was a diamond in the rough,” says Brown. “I wanted to take a chance to put UMBC on the map.”
Fifteen years later, Brown has exceeded that goal and turned UMBC into a regional dynamo in college athletics. He has just been selected to receive UMBC’s Presidential Distinguished Professional Staff award, after signing a three-year contract extension through the 2008 academic year.
Under Brown’s tenure, UMBC Athletics has made big strides. Most recently, Brown engineered UMBC Athletics’ move to the America East Conference, after the Retrievers experienced unprecedented success in their five years in the Northeast Conference.
UMBC teams have won 32 NEC Championships and made 22 appearances in NCAA Championship competition. In all five years of league play, UMBC has been awarded the Commissioner’s Cup, symbolic of the conference’s top overall program. Just last year, UMBC produced its first national champion; shot putter Cleopatra Borel, in NCAA Indoor Track & Field.
UMBC’s student-athletes have also excelled in the classroom. In the last five years, 20 student-athletes have earned Academic All America status, and for the past two semesters, over 50% of Retriever student-athletes have earned 3.0 or higher grade-point averages.
Brown has increased the full-time faculty and staff of the athletic
department and initiated the UMBC Dance Team, the Down and Dirty Dawg Band and the Spirit Squad. He has presided over an increase of over 1000 percent in fund-raising. In the area of community service, UMBC student-athletes currently donate over 1,000 hours of time per year to mentor local middle school students and coaches make hundreds of appearances throughout the year.
Brown has also improved the visibility of UMBC and the greater Baltimore
region in the national sports scene. In 1995, he brought the first and
second rounds of the NCAA Men’s Basketball Championships to the Baltimore Arena. In 1998, UMBC hosted the Women’s Lacrosse national championships at the Stadium, drawing record crowds and kudos from the national media. Dr. Brown also led the successful bid to bring the highly success Men’s Lacrosse National Championships to Ravens’ Stadium in 2003, 2004, and perhaps for many years to come.
Brown has helped lead the university’s growth and improvement in
world-class athletic and recreational facilities during his tenure. Over the next three years, he will preside over another multi-million dollar facility
enhancement.
Despite all the individual and team glory obtained for UMBC during competition, some of Brown’s finest memories at UMBC occur off the field
of play. “The Hall of Fame Dinners are some of my most special memories,” he says. “When the alums that were here when I was AD talk about their experiences, those are the most rewarding moments I can remember, more than the individual or team championships. You feel great that you have been a part of making college life a great experience.”
Recently, the former LIU wrestling standout and Hunter wrestling coach has contemplated retirement and spending more time with his wife, Linda,
UMBC’s Associate Director of MIPAR, and family. But UMBC’s move to the America East Conference has put those plans on temporary hold.
“The America East has gotten my juices flowing as we challenge our program at a higher level. I’m excited to plan with my coaches and staff how we’re going to be successful at this new level. There will be challenges, but, as Linda says, I am the ultimate optimist and I never give up.”
 

Tomasz Macura loves a challenge.
At sixteen, Macura is putting the finishing touches on two Honors Theses for B.S. degrees in Mathematics and Computer Science. He will continue studies towards a Ph.D. in Computer Science at the University of Cambridge’s (UK) Trinity College — considered the most prestigious of the 37 Cambridge colleges. Cambridge has more Nobel Prize winning alumni, 70, than any other university in the world. He will be the school’s youngest and he will be its youngest Ph.D. student since World War I.
Age aside, Macura stands out as one of the nation’s most promising scholars in the areas of math and science. He was one of sixteen winners of the Department of Energy Computational Science Graduate Fellowship, which pays tuition, fees, and a $29,000 stipend per year for four years. Because of its selectivity, the Fellowship is considered the most prestigious Science and Engineering graduate award in the U.S. All together, Macura – who only ten years ago didn’t speak a word of English – has been offered more than $800,000 in academic awards from some of the most prestigious foundations and institutions in the U.S. and beyond.
He credits his parents, both M.D./Ph.D.s, for instilling in him love and respect for knowledge. “A major part of my academic success is due to UMBC faculty. I was lucky to do research with Professors Matthias Gobbert and Jacob Kogan. They are brilliant professors who are very busy with their own research but make the time to focus on mentoring.”
“Tomasz is young, bright, highly motivated, and already an independent researcher. I am confident that Tomasz will become a leading authority in his research field,” said Kogan.
Macura is establishing a legacy at UMBC. His 13-year-old brother, Wiktor, is a sophomore here with a 4.0 GPA and a full merit scholarship. “Wiktor is my brother and my best friend.” Wiktor is also his partner, as the brothers have formed a foundation to give back to the community.
The Macura Brothers Foundation was established by the Macuras to help gifted children from Poland (their homeland) and other Eastern-European countries. “We are very fortunate and grateful for the opportunities presented to us in America and are doing our best to give back.” The Foundation donated over $5,000 of educational materials to the Hungarian Student Research Society and the Polish Library in Washington D.C. Now the Brothers are working on establishing “The One” Scholarship for immigrant prodigies studying in the United States.
“Tomasz is exceptionally bright,” said UMBC President Freeman A. Hrabowski III. “But he’s a very hard worker, very inquisitive, and has a great sense of humor. I am impressed not only by Tomasz’s achievements in the classroom and lab, but also by his sincere interest in others. He is a wonderful role model for other academically talented young people.”
Macura is sure of one thing, “No matter what I will do after my Ph.D. degree, I will always cherish the time I spent at UMBC – my Alma Mater. This is the place I grew up intellectually and personally.”

 

One of the 1.8 million photographs in UMBC’s Special Collections: Newsboys and Supply Men at Newspaper Office for Baseball Edition,  5 p.m., Cincinnati, Ohio, August 1908 by Lewis Hine

“Curating UMBC’s Special Collections”
UMBC’s Special Collections Department is one of the country’s leading resources for photography, science fiction, Marylandia, biological science archives, and other notable collections of rare books, artifacts and manuscripts. And it’s all at the fingertips—wearing protective gloves, of course—of the campus community and visiting scholars. As Chief Curator, Tom Beck manages and continues to develop the collection, housed at the Albin O. Kuhn Library & Gallery.
UMBC’s Photography Collections alone include 1.8 million photographs by some of the world’s leading photographers, including a portfolio by Ansel Adams; archives by Mildred Grossman, Lotte Jacobi and Lewis Hine; and work by Berenice Abbott, Judy Dater, Roland Freeman, David Plowden, Minor White, and others.  
In order to build Special Collections, Beck is dedicated to developing relationships with photographers and their families, as well as writers, scholars and major organizations. He often collaborates with members of the campus community. For example, UMBC’s science faculty helped the Collections become the foremost center for history of biology archives. Over the past twenty years, the University has acquired archives from the American Society for Microbiology, the American Society for Cell Biology, the American Society for Chemistry and Molecular Biology, the Society for Developmental Biology, the Society of Protozoology and the International Union of Immunological Societies, among others.
Recently, Stephen Braude, professor and chair of the philosophy department and a nationally known expert on parapsychology, assisted Beck in acquiring work by thoughtographer Ted Serios, reputed to be able to print images from his mind onto photographic material.
Beck also collaborates with the Friends of the Albin O. Kuhn Library & Gallery, and with the Library Gallery’s Curator of Exhibitions, Cynthia Wayne, who mounts solo and group exhibitions culled from the extensive Photography Collections. Future exhibitions include newly acquired work by David Seymour, founder of the prestigious Magnum Photos, Inc.
Of the importance of Special Collections, Beck says, “The great Bauhaus educator Laszlo Moholy-Nagy said that ‘the illiterate of the future will be ignorant of both camera as well as pencil.’ The future that he conjectured about has arrived and we live in a world awash in images. People are knowledgeable about them, but not enough. So a collection like ours being available for study is critical for a society that is based so much in visual imagery. Our students have the incredible opportunity to access material right on campus that is rarely found in one place and previously was only available to a privileged few. Here at UMBC, anyone can see these images.”
In addition to his work at UMBC, Beck teaches at the Corcoran College of Art and Design in Washington, D.C. He is working on two books about David Seymour: one to be published by the British art publisher, Phaidon, and another for UMBC to showcase Special Collections’ new Seymour photographic holdings.
                                                                                            
 
 
 

Class of 2003 Valedictorian Erika Danna
2003 Valedictorian Erika Danna  
Class of 2003 Valedictorian Erika Danna balanced academic excellence, research experience and community service while at UMBC. She accumulated a 4.0 GPA while working in Dr. Suzanne Rosenberg’s lab since June 2001 as one of the first students in the Department of Defense-funded Breast Cancer Undergraduate Research Experience (BCURE) program.
A biological sciences major, Danna presented her research findings at two major national scientific meetings, as well as four UMBC-sponsored research symposia. She also was part of the BCURE program’s Race for the Cure team to raise money and awareness for breast cancer research. Danna has also been active in other service and extracurricular activities including Garden Harvest, the Golden Key Honor Society and Community Service Corps.
When she first came to UMBC, Danna was focused on becoming a physician, but she was gradually drawn to a biomedical research career. Danna credits her UMBC teachers and mentors with influencing her.
“At UMBC I enjoyed learning about how scientific discoveries are made, and I became very interested in participating in research myself,” she says. Danna, a native of Ellicott City, Maryland, will begin her doctoral studies in immunology at Stanford University in the fall.
“Erika is a real go-getter student,” says Rosenberg. “She has taken great advantage of her time in the laboratory and she has a terrific future ahead of her in research.”
 
 
 

Policy Sciences PhD graduate Keith Elder’s studies how race impacts America’s health care system.

Inquiries and Inequities in managed Care
  

In a time when health care is one of the most urgent issues in the U.S. political spectrum, Keith Elder, Ph.D. graduate from the UMBC Policy Sciences (POSI) Graduate Program, is examining the tough questions surrounding our nation’s health care system.

Elder’s dissertation examines the racial disparities in managed care between majority and minority physicians. Specifically, it looks at health care contracts between physicians and organizations (such as HMOs) and attempts to determine if there is any connection between termination or denial of contracts and ethnicity.

“Patient demographics impact the rate of contract denials and terminations,” says Elder. “The greater the percentage of Latino and African American patients a physician serves, the higher the probability that physician will have a contract denied. The larger the percentage of Asian patients a physician sees, the higher the probability the physician will have a contract terminated.”

“After examining certain economic market level variables, the differences still exist. Some may look to other explanations for these differences in rate of contract denial and termination – namely, discrimination,” Elder says. Nancy Miller, assistant professor of policy sciences, corroborates Elder’s results, stating that they “offer evidence that requires serious reflection and action on the part of policy makers.”

Elder’s research draws data from the Maryland Physician Survey developed and conducted by the Center for Health Program Development and Management at UMBC. He drew from a sample size of about 1200 people. Elder will present his research at a symposium the center is holding March 26, The Effect of Managed Care on Minority Physicians and Socially Vulnerable Populations in Maryland: Data Findings and Policy Alternatives.

Unfortunately, the inequity that Elder identified in his research is not a new pattern in health care. “Minority physicians have reported inequities for years,” says Elder. In a 1994 survey of minority physicians, Elder says that “over 90 percent believed that they had experienced some form of discrimination. The same physicians believed that any health care reform would place them at a disadvantage in the managed care selection process.”

In addition to the Policy Sciences faculty, UMBC President Freeman Hrabowski has also been of great help to Elder: “He’s always given me support,” says Elder. “He gave me direction in how to plan for my dissertation defense, personal insights, told me what research opportunities I should be involved in. He wanted to make sure when I left here that I was ready for every opportunity that crossed my radar.”

Elder graduated from UMBC last fall and is currently doing research analysis for the POSI program. Next semester, he will begin a position as assistant professor in the School of Public Health at the University of South Carolina. While he will teach a university course, he also plans to spend a lot of time pursuing his research interests: “I definitely hope to further examine aspects of managed care and racial disparity,” states Elder.

Ronald Holzloehner (right) celebrates his successful Ph.D. defense with his mentor, Prof. Curtis Menyuk.

A Global Education in Telecommunications  

Berlin, Germany native Ronald Holzloehner will receive his Ph.D. in Computer Science and Electrical Engineering at UMBC this month, after traveling the world while winning international acclaim for his research on how to make fiber optics communications faster and more reliable.

Holzloehner came to UMBC after receiving his master’s degree from the Technical University of Berlin and spending a year at UC Santa Barbara on a Fulbright scholarship. In late 1998 he came to UMBC and joined Dr. Curtis Menyuk’s research team in the  Optical Fiber Communications Laboratory, which works closely with the telecommunications industry to push the frontiers of communications technology.

During his four and a half years at UMBC, Holzloehner and the rest of the team presented their work at national and international conferences, were published in respected journals, and won prestigious awards. Holzloehner received the Best Speaker Award at the UMBC Student Conference last year, and also won an IEEE LEOS student award fellowship last fall, an award of which only 10–20 are given annually world-wide. His dissertation describes a new method for computing bit error rates in optical fiber communications systems.

“Working with Curtis Menyuk was a good experience, and I certainly learned a lot,” he says. “I worked hard, many nights and weekends, but I wrote a bunch of papers, won some awards, got to travel the world by visiting conferences, and learned much about how science is conducted and managed in the US. What’s amazing about UMBC is the energy and tenacity with which it pursues its goals — President Freeman Hrabowski does a whole lot to promote the school, much like a sports team.”

Like other high-tech researchers, Holzloehner also experienced the ups and downs of the so-called “New Economy.” At the 2003 UMBC Engineer of the Year ceremony, Holzloehner spoke about the lessons high-tech industry has learned from recent scandals. “Corporate greed existed not only at Enron, but also in the telecom industry, and I think we engineers should do whatever we can to fight for solid and sound business models,” he said.

After an arduous search, Holzloehner accepted a postdoctoral position back in Germany at the University of Nuremberg’s newly founded Max-Planck Institute, and will start working there in July. The institute focuses on quantum optics, quantum computing, and some communications, while working closely with top companies like Lucent.

As he prepares to return home for a new chapter in his career, Holzloehner carries with him memories of his American education. “The U.S. is really an amazing country, and it is still able to attract many foreigners that help it grow,” he says. “The advantage that the U.S. has over many other countries is impressive, at times frightening. People should remember that many of these achievements are due to immigrants who work extremely hard.”

 
UMBC’s Ram Hosmane is the 2002 Maryland Chemist of the Year

Maryland Chemist of the Year

UMBC chemistry professor Ramachandra “Ram” Hosmane was named the Maryland Chemist of the Year by the Maryland division of the American Chemical Society in a ceremony on December 11 in Towson.

Hosmane, a faculty member at UMBC for 20 years, was honored for his career contributions to biomedical research, including the development of anti-cancer and anti-viral drugs as well as for creation of a powdered, artificial blood mix for use in emergency transfusions.

Hosmane is the third UMBC chemist to be named Chemist of the Year since the Society began giving the award in 1962. “This award is well-deserved recognition for the outstanding contributions that Ram Hosmane has made to synthetic and medicinal chemistry.” says Ralph Pollack, UMBC chemistry department chair and professor.

“I was surprised and shocked to win this honor,” says Hosmane. “I thought had little chance of winning it considering the fact that the nominations come from all over Maryland, including academia, industry and government.”

Hosmane’s recent breakthroughs include development of bulkier and leaner
forms of the natural building blocks of genetic material, nucleosides and nucleotides. The compounds have shown potential to fight against cancers including prostate, breast, lung, leukemia, colon, skin, kidney, brain and ovarian. The compounds also show promise against a dozen different viral infections, the major ones being hepatitis B and C, West Nile and herpes.

Hosmane’s artificial blood invention holds promise as a universal substitute for whole blood during emergency transfusions. The artificial blood requires no typing or cross-matching, is free of bacteria or viruses and is storable as a dry powder for indefinite periods of time. It can be carried to the scene of accident and administered as a buffered salt solution in water without having to transport the patient to the
nearest hospital.

Since joining the UMBC faculty in 1982, Hosmane has contributed well over a hundred original research articles in peer-reviewed, international scholarly journals and he is also the author of a half-dozen patents and disclosures on a variety of themes. He has been continuously funded since 1984 by both federal agencies and industrial partnerships. In addition to his research endeavors, Hosmane has trained
more than 75 scientists from all over the world, including undergraduate and graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, visiting scientists and visiting professors.

Two years ago, Hosmane won the “Outstanding Educator of the Year” award from the Maryland Association for Higher Education (MAHE). He was the UMBC Presidential Research Professor during 1998-2001, and has been the Provost’s Exceptional Sponsored Research Fellow ever since that program was initiated at UMBC.