The University Center Ballroom was humming on Wednesday, April 27, with the voices of hundreds of UMBC students presenting their research and creative work to proud long-time supporters and curious first-time visitors alike.

This year UMBC celebrated its 20th annual Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement Day, a particularly special celebration for a university so focused on student-led projects and engaged learning experiences. As Diane Lee, dean of undergraduate education, said, reflecting on the anniversary, “Indeed, we know of no other university where so many students, faculty members, and staff gather to come and learn from the voices of undergraduate students.”

URCAD programming included performances, film screenings, exhibits, posters, and talks from all disciplines, as well as a large number of interdisciplinary partnerships.

Aakash Bajpai ‘18, mechanical engineering, and three partners presented a collaboration with the Baltimore City Department of Public Works on research to anticipate when aging city pipes will fail before those incidents occur. Their research is also helping to determine why these pipes are failing and how the failures can be prevented in the future. Bajpai says that this project can save Baltimore millions of dollars by minimizing the disruptions caused by emergency repairs, moving toward a more proactive and cost-effective infrastructure maintenance approach.

Joel Tyson ‘18, biochemical engineering, is studying probes to determine whether they are compatible with the chemistry of the human body, under the mentorship of Gymama Slaughter, assistant professor of computer science and electrical engineering. The probes will be used to simultaneously sense neurotransmitters and monitor the electrical activity in the brain. Analyzing the safety of the probes and how they interact with the body’s chemical composition will be essential for when the probes are tested on mice and, later, in human models. The sensor is being designed as a more effective, less invasive way to continuously monitor neurotransmitter release and the brain’s electrical activity in people with neurological disorders.

Elise Donkor ‘16, computer engineering, is developing more personalized software to better diagnose and treat patients experiencing heart arrhythmia. Unusual patterns in heart activity can be signs of conditions like diabetes or heart attacks. Current software designed to track heart activity is mass produced, Donkor explains, and personalization could make it a more effective tool. The algorithms that she has developed to detect abnormalities have shown a 97.8% level of accuracy in identifying arrhythmia patterns.

Nerissa Vasconcells ’16, dance, presented her solo dance performance Limitless. Her primary research focuses on modern dance and methods developed by such masters as Graham, Horton, and Limon, but Vasconcells also has studied ballet. She was motivated to create a work that “emphasized beauty as a classical ballet choreographer, while using choreographic methods commonly found in modern dance.” Vasconcells says, “classical ballet has its origins in the 18th and 19th centuries, emphasizing elegance, beauty, and regimentation, and has a choreographic process directly related to a musical score. Modern dance, a product of the 20th century, is often abstract and uses a wide variety of choreographic processes not linked to the musical score. Combining these varied techniques has been a personal challenge and a pursuit of self-exploration.”

Rachel Wolven ’16, visual arts, presented her time-lapse photography film, Light Inhibits Light, the culmination of a comparative study of the visibility of deep space objects and the Milky Way as affected by light pollution. Her film presented over a dozen night sky locations from Baltimore to Nova Scotia, with light pollution measurements and GPS coordinates noted to orient viewers. Her time-lapse photography captured sublime celestial movements across dark skies as well as starless, hazy summer city nights, highlighting both particle and light pollution. Wolven aims to “bring attention…to show what is missing from the skies above our cities.” She says, “To protect this natural resource, awareness must first be raised in order for people to want to make changes and work to fight the overabundance of light pollution.”

James Loy ’16, mathematics and physics, works with Matthew Pelton, assistant professor of physics, on “quantum dots,” which are nanoscale semiconductor crystals. The dots may eventually be used as a lower-cost alternative to silicon-based solar cells. Using “acceptor molecules” to grab the excited electrons released by the dots increases overall electrical current output. Loy’s work showed that more acceptor molecules increased the output linearly, which is encouraging for future work to optimize quantum dots for eventual commercial use in solar energy harvesting. “Working in Dr. Pelton’s lab was the best part of my college career,” Loy says, noting “I experienced research from the posing of the problem through to publication.” Loy will pursue a Ph.D. in physics at Princeton this fall.

Rebekah Rashford ’18, biological sciences, is studying how ribosomes, the cellular structures that build proteins, are put together. Ribosomes are made of both protein and RNA. The unnecessary parts of the initial RNA molecule need to be cut out before it can function in the ribosome, a process called “maturation.” Ribosomal proteins bind to the RNA throughout the maturation process. By taking snapshots of the RNA at different points in time, she’s creating a map of what happens when. This foundational research could eventually contribute to treating diseases caused by ribosomal defects. Rashford’s mentor, Lasse Lindahl, professor of biological sciences, has had a major impact on her UMBC experience and aspirations as a scientist. “He’s so excited about the research, and he gets me excited about it, too.” Rashford says. “When you’re motivated, your work will be that much better.”

Taisha Gainor ‘16,political science, and Asfiya Mariam ’16, biological sciences, researched how pop culture can influence citizens’ participation in politics. After coming across studies suggesting people who have read or watched Harry Potter are statistically more likely to participate in politics, they focused on exploring the series’ political elements. Gainor noted that she hopes her work will spur more engagement with the political system. “I think it’s a great way to get people involved in politics…relating it to something that they want to talk about and then showing how that actually relates to things in their everyday life.”

Deirdre Lohrmann ‘16,ancient studies and history, studied Roman glass production in antiquity with a specific focus on glassware from the Marie Spiro collection. Viewing a display during UMBC’s Ancient Studies Week sparked her interest in the project, and she says that studying artifacts from Ancient Rome has helped her develop a greater appreciation and understanding of the world around her. “We learn from our past,” she says, to understand the similarities between people in antiquity and people today.

Throughout the event, students shared the impact of mentors who served as guides through research and creative processes and as sounding boards on graduate school and career path possibilities inspired by their work.

Featured URCAD speaker Mark Reynolds ‘78, ‘82 M.A., psychology, picked up on these themes. Reynolds, now dean of the University of Maryland School of Dentistry, shared how his undergraduate research experience paved the way for his career and how UMBC faculty mentors helped him develop a passion for teaching, learning, and supporting others.

“To students, please give back,” said Reynolds crediting his career success to the interest and mentorship of people who encouraged him during his student years. “It is so important,” he told the URCAD crowd, “…and you want to perpetuate that.”

Visit the URCAD website to access the full list of student presenters.

**Update: Dean Scott Casper and Provost Diane Lee invite the university community to a campus forum on Thursday, May 12, at noon in the Albin O. Kuhn Library and Gallery, where students Zoe Wang and Riley Auer will present their poster, “Illustrating the Unseen: Analogy and Metaphor in an Ancient Gynecological Text.” This event follows a decision made to move the poster before URCAD began and a thoughtful conversation that followed, regarding the important issues of the nature of artistic, humanistic, and scientific research and representation; the presentation of research to academic and public audiences; and the meaning and centrality of academic freedom. In addition to the presenting students, several members of UMBC’s faculty, including Carole McCann, Preminda Jacob, Molly Jones-Lewis, and Stephen Freeland, will reflect on the issues that the poster and its presentation raise for scholarship and our academic community, and audience members will be welcomed to join in the dialogue.

Images: URCAD 2016 posters, performances, and presentations by (from top to bottom) Taisha Gainor ’16, political science; Elise Donkor ’16, computer engineering; Nerissa Vasconcells ’16, dance; and Mark Reynolds ’78, ’82 M.A., psychology. All photos by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

James Loy
B.S., Physics; B.S.; Mathematics and Statistics
Summa Cum Laude
Hometown: Taneytown, Maryland
Plans: Ph.D. in Physics, Princeton

The focus UMBC places on allowing undergraduates to perform research has prepared me to attend graduate school. The URA program is excellent at preparing students for research demands beyond their undergraduate career.

James Loy, a 2012 Burgee Regent Scholar, dove into research opportunities at UMBC. By joining Matthew Pelton’s physics lab when Pelton was still relatively new to UMBC, Loy “experienced research from the posing of the problem through to publication,” he says.

Loy is an author on a paper published in the peer-reviewed journal ACS Energy Letters. He received undergraduate research awards for his work in the 2014-2015 and 2015-2016 academic years and extended his research beyond UMBC by participating in a Research Experience for Undergraduates (URA) in Missouri focused on nanofabrication.

 
“The focus UMBC places on allowing undergraduates to perform research has prepared me to attend graduate school,” Loy says. In addition to his academic success, Loy served as secretary for the Honors College Council, 2013-2014.

Images: Loy at his poster presentation following an REU in Missouri; photo courtesy of James Loy. Header portrait by Marlayna Demond ‘11 for UMBC.

Matt Pelton, assistant professor of physics, has received the prominent CAREER Award from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to advance his research on vibrating nanoparticles. His award totals approximately $650,000 over five years, and his research will focus on how nanoparticles act in various liquids, to understand the unique ways in which mechanical energy flows at the nanometer scale.

“We congratulate Dr. Pelton on his NSF CAREER Award, a recognition of his work and dedication to impacting other scientific fields through his research,” said Karl V. Steiner, vice president for research. “This recognition of Dr. Pelton adds to our growing list of outstanding young faculty who are receiving this high level of peer-based recognition from NSF and other sources.”

Scientists understand how conventional liquids, like water, behave on ordinary time and length scales, and how individual molecules make up liquids, but there is less understanding about liquids on intermediate scales. Pelton has developed a method based on ultrafast laser spectroscopy of vibrating metal nanoparticles suspended in liquids to understand the complex properties and molecular interactions of ordinary liquids.

“It’s like ringing a bell, but on a much smaller scale,” Pelton says of his work. When a bell is rung, it vibrates many times, and if the bell was rung and then submerged in water, it would ring fewer times than when it was not in water, he explains. And if the same bell was rung and then submerged in honey, a viscous liquid, the bell would only ring once or twice.

The nanoparticles in liquids that Pelton studies vibrate a few billion times per second, and can be manipulated with laser pulses. These pulses cause the nanoparticles to expand and vibrate, but like a bell, they react differently depending on the liquid that they are in. Pelton is working to understand how long the nanoparticles vibrate when hit with laser pulses, and where the energy goes as the particle moves.

It is known that particles on fast time scales and short length scales do not act the way that the particles on ordinary scales behave. Pelton explains that sometimes liquids act like a solid, giving the example of cornstarch mixed with water. The mixture acts like a liquid if somebody pushes slowly on it with their finger, but someone presses quickly enough, the particles in the mixture cannot move out of the way and the mixture appears to behave like a solid. Pelton’s research shows that this happens even for an ordinary liquid, such as water, if you push on it quickly enough — such as with a vibrating nanoparticle.

By contributing new knowledge about the complex properties of liquids, Pelton’s work will expand understanding of the function of biological molecules, which live in a liquid environment, and of potential new molecular sensors based on vibrating nanoparticles.

Beyond the research methodologies and findings, Pelton shares that UMBC has allowed him to create his own, independent research group and train the “next generation of scientists in an environment that emphasizes inclusive excellence.”

“I’m particularly happy to receive the CAREER award because it recognizes both of these goals: effective teaching and innovative research,” Pelton says. “It allows me to pursue a research project that will form a cornerstone of my longer-term scientific program as a researcher and educator: to understand the unique ways in which energy flows at the nanometer scale.”

In the last two decades, UMBC faculty have received 30 NSF CAREER awards. Helena Mentis, assistant professor of information systems, is the most recent previous recipient of a CAREER award for over half a million dollars to advance her research on gesture-based tools that can be used by remote surgeons to share expert knowledge in the operating room.

Image: Matt Pelton works with a student in his lab. Photo by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC. 

UMBC and U.S. Naval Academy (USNA) faculty researchers presented updates on five collaborative cybersecurity projects funded by the Office of Naval Research (ONR) during the inaugural USNA-UMBC Partnership Symposium, hosted by UMBC’s Office the Vice President for Research on March 22, 2016.

The five projects presented are supported by three-year grants from the ONR, most of which are entering their second year of funding.

When the joint research initiative launched a year ago, Karl V. Steiner, vice president for research at UMBC, described it as “the start of a long-term partnership.” The recent symposium was the first formal opportunity for the research teams to formally present their progress on tackling major cybersecurity challenges outlined when the partnership began.

One team is developing a way to ensure that cloud-based storage services are secure, and that consumers can store their files with confidence. UMBC principal investigator (PI) Karuna Joshi, assistant research professor of computer science and electrical engineering (CSEE); Tim Finin, professor of CSEE; and USNA faculty are developing a cloud storage system that will make it impossible for deleted data to be restored or recovered.

Another group is developing a system that can continuously monitor itself and detect potential threats more quickly than human monitors. This technology has important safety as well as security implications. In cars, for example, hackers can gain control of a vehicle through Bluetooth or other existing systems, potentially having deadly effects. UMBC PI Ryan Robucci, assistant professor of CSEE; Chintan Patel, assistant professor of CSEE; Nilanjan Banerjee, associate professor of CSEE; Anupam Joshi, professor and chair of CSEE; and USNA faculty are now completing tests that involve working to detect anomalies in various systems.

Drawing on the finding that many online attacks follow predictable patterns, UMBC PI Tim Oates, professor of CSEE, and USNA PI Nate Chambers, assistant professor of computer science, presented their work on a tool to monitor social media networks, like Facebook and Twitter, in real-time to detect likely attacks. The team is analyzing language trends on social media platforms around the times that previous attacks took place. Regular social media users often notice attacks or threats of attacks first, and by analyzing and characterizing the content of their posts on “normal days” compared with “attack days” the team is developing a way to automatically generate an alert when real-time social media posts indicate a possible attack.

Understanding the strengths and limitations of the range of existing mobile authentication methods is important in protecting individuals’ devices from getting hacked. UMBC PI Ravi Kuber, associate professor of information systems, and USNA faculty are studying the strength of various authentication tools on Android devices to develop new methods that use tactile cues, like vibrations, to authenticate mobile devices. The team conducted research to understand authentication practices of people who are conscious of security issues, and the susceptibility of current authentication methods to over-the-shoulder breaches. Kuber and his team developed a secure authentication tool called H4Plock that prompts individuals to enter strokes in response to cues, where response patterns would be unique to an individual user.

The fifth group including UMBC PI Nirmalya Roy, assistant professor of information systems; Todd Pittman, associate professor of physics; James Franson, professor of physics; and several USNA faculty, is working to create quantum computers that can help identify abnormal behavior or patterns at much faster speeds than current computing technology. The team is extracting photons that will then be included in optical fibers to emit light. They are working to pull bundles of optical fibers thinner to create nanofiber cavities.

Don Engel, assistant vice president for research at UMBC, thanked the ONR for their close collaboration and shared his excitement that the research collaborations have already shown such “fruitful findings.”

Image: Karuna Joshi presents during the USNA-UMBC Partnership Symposium. Photo by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

Congressman Elijah Cummings visited UMBC this month to speak with faculty, staff, and students from across the university about UMBC’s national leadership as a research university and commitment to growing Baltimore through long-term partnerships in local communities.

The morning focused on several major UMBC research centers and labs. Joining Congressman Cummings were Belay Demoz, director of the Joint Center for Earth Systems Technology (JCET); Jan Merka, director of the Goddard Planetary Heliophysics Institute (GPHI); Jane Turner, associate director of the Center for Research and Exploration in Space Science and Technology (CRESST); Gymama Slaughter, assistant professor of computer science and electrical engineering and director of the Bioelectronics Laboratory; and Lee Boot, associate director of the Imaging Research Center (IRC).

Tyson King-Meadows, incoming associate dean of the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences and Karl V. Steiner, vice president for research, also offered their perspectives on UMBC’s well-rounded research portfolio, beyond the conversation’s focus on research strengths in physics, geosciences, space science, and bioengineering.

After a brief campus tour, Congressman Cummings met with several leaders among UMBC staff whose work focuses on students’ academic success, including Renetta Tull, associate vice provost for graduate student development; Keith Harmon, director of the Meyerhoff Scholars Program, and others.

The congressman also spoke at length with scholars from UMBC’s three colleges: Sheniqua Brown ’15, M.S. chemical engineering; Marina Congedo ’17, physics and ancient studies; Ciara Davis ’17, mechanical engineering; Joseph Hunter ’16, biological sciences; Da’Kuawn Johnson ’17, biochemistry; Naomi Mburu ’17, chemical engineering; Larry Morton ’16, biological sciences; Alexis O’Malley ’16, psychology and mathematical sciences; Andreas Seas ’16, mechanical engineering; and Manisha Vepa ’18, economics and global studies.

These students represented the Sherman STEM Teacher Scholars Program, Meyerhoff Scholars Program, and UMBC Honors College. They are pursuing a range of PhD and MD/PhD programs and the most prestigious national and internships and fellowships available. They also spoke of their experiences with and deep personal commitments to community engagement in Baltimore, supporting local groups from refugee communities to elementary school students.

Images: Congressman Elijah Cummings visits UMBC on March 10, 2016. Photo by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

UMBC celebrated the accomplishments of over 1,000 new Retriever alumni at 2015 Winter Commencement, with a graduate ceremony held on December 16 and undergraduate ceremony on December 17.

The ceremonies included representatives from UMBC faculty, staff, student, and alumni leadership, as well as the University System of Maryland Board of Regents. UMBC President Freeman Hrabowski shared more than a dozen inspiring stories of accomplishment, highlighting graduates who have achieved great things, often despite significant challenges in their lives and while balancing personal and professional commitments.

These graduates included students like Muntadar Al-Luwaim ’15, design, a deaf student from Saudi Arabia who welcomed the challenge of mastering two new languages, English and American Sign Language. He has helped build a welcoming community at UMBC for other deaf and hard of hearing students, and plans to develop his own design studio in Saudi Arabia.

Fellow graduate Wafa Raja ’15, information systems, came to the United States with her family eight years ago to pursue an education, but felt pressure to marry and return to Pakistan. Yearning to continue her education, she returned to the U.S. and enrolled in community college, while working and raising her young daughter. She soon transferred to UMBC, where she became both a Cyber Scholar and a Newcombe Scholar, and has shown a remarkable commitment to mentoring other students. She will work for Northrop Grumman as a cyber intelligence analyst.

During the UMBC Graduate School commencement, President Hrabowski recognized Erika Nesvold ’15 Ph.D, physics, who “spends her days thinking about asteroids smashing into each other.” She has accepted a post-doctoral fellowship at the Carnegie Institute of Washington and, in her free time, is a volunteer firefighter and EMT.

Nichole Zang Do ’15 M.A., history, has explored the history of the juvenile justice movement in Baltimore, focusing on understanding the use and misuse of juvenile reform institutions. She will support UMBC’s upcoming 50th anniversary celebrations through alumni outreach.

“The point of these stories is that every one of you indeed has a story,” President Hrabowski reflected, sharing that for each student the path to their degree “has not been easy.”

UMBC is proud to honor all of the students who received graduate and undergraduate degrees in Winter 2015.

Videos of the ceremonies will be available soon on the UMBC Commencement website. The ceremonies were also live-tweeted @UMBC, with posts available through #UMBCgrad. For additional photos, see our Undergraduate and Graduate Commencement galleries on Facebook.

Images: All photos are by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

Anthony Johnson, professor of physics and computer science and electrical engineering, has been named chair of the American Physical Society (APS) Bridge Program’s National Advisory Board (NAB). Johnson was involved with the Bell Labs Cooperative Research Fellowship Program for Minorities, a precursor to the APS Bridge Program, in the 1970s. “The Bridge Program had its genesis with the Bell Labs Diversity Program, which I participated in, and thus it was quite an honor to be nominated Chair or the APS Bridge Program’s NAB,” he shares.

The Bridge Program was created in 2013, funded by the National Science Foundation and the APS, to increase the number of physics PhDs awarded to underrepresented minority students, defined as African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Native Americans. The APS Bridge Program aims bring the percentage of underrepresented minority students who receive PhDs closer to the percentage of underrepresented minority students who receive bachelor’s degrees, he explains. Through the Bridge Program, the APS has created a national network of doctoral-granting institutions that provide mentoring for students completing PhD programs.

Johnson is a fellow of the APS and served on the APS Executive Board from 2013 to 2014. In 1996, he received the APS Edward Bouchet Award, which promotes the participation of underrepresented minorities in physics by recognizing a distinguished minority physicist who has made significant contributions to physics research.

Of his new role on the NAB, Johnson says, “As chair, I will be involved in the programmatic aspects of achieving the program’s goals, as well as preparing for a second round of funding from the NSF and other entities to continue these good works.”

For more information the APS Bridge Program, see the APS website.

The Joint Center for Earth Systems Technology (JCET) partnership, which just celebrated twenty years at UMBC, has renewed its cooperative agreement with the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, bringing up to $46 million to JCET and UMBC over the next five years.

JCET was formed in 1995 as an innovative collaboration between the Earth Sciences Division of the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and UMBC. Belay Demoz, physics, joined JCET as director in 2014. Danita Eichenlaub serves as administrative director.

“The work that goes on in JCET is an exceptional example of UMBC’s commitment to strengthening education and research through national partnerships,” says Karl Steiner, vice president for research.

For twenty years JCET has brought leading scientists to UMBC in research areas that align with NASA’s Earth science interests, such as climate and radiation, atmospheric chemistry and dynamics, and solar system sciences, including geophysics. UMBC is now ranked among the world’s top universities for geosciences (2015 Performance Ranking of Scientific Papers for World Universities).

Among JCET researchers making waves internationally is Jay Herman, a senior research scientist whose work recently made news with the launch of the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR). Herman serves as an instrument scientist for this NASA-NOAA-Air Force mission, which will look at the Earth and solar wind from 932,000 miles away.

On the NASA Goddard campus, JCET is recognized as an often emulated model of a well-run university center that works seamlessly with a government laboratory. “Still,” says Demoz, “JCET remains distinctive among these leading research centers in its fundamental commitment to graduate and undergraduate education.” JCET researchers frequently teach and mentor UMBC students, and JCET scientists who have benefited from this dual focus on teaching and research have gone on to become leaders in their fields.

The center has contributed substantially to both undergraduate and graduate teaching through courses and seminars across disciplines, including the departments of physics, geography and environmental systems, chemistry and biochemistry, and mathematics and statistics. JCET faculty led the formation of UMBC’s internationally recognized atmospheric physics program, and graduate students in JCET work both at UMBC an on-site at NASA Goddard.

The Plains Elevated Convection at Night (PECAN) project, which wrapped up a marathon field campaign this July, is just one example of a compelling initiative with both important research and educational impacts.

Night time storms producing tornadoes, thunder, lightning, strong winds, and hail are notoriously difficult to predict. Through PECAN, scientists from 14 universities and eight research labs studied evening precipitation and convection in the plains to improve predictions of whether storms will stay elevated or make their way down to the surface. Demoz and JCET scientists Ruben Delgado, Kevin Vermeesch, and Brian Carroll, a graduate student in physics, participated in the field research, as well as two UMBC undergraduate interns. Since the team’s return, several UMBC undergraduates have focused on analyzing the resulting data. Their findings could lead to improved storm predictions, providing invaluable information for communities at risk of severe weather.

“With a proven track record of successful partnerships like PECAN,” says Demoz, “JCET is paving the way for groundbreaking UMBC collaborations with NASA and other agencies, shaping the future of Earth sciences.”

Image: Dust storm over the Canary Islands. Photo by NASA

Eileen Meyer and Markos Georganopoulos, physics, published an article in Nature last week detailing their research on black holes. Meyer, the lead author of the paper, is completing a postdoctoral position at the Space Telescope Science Institute in Baltimore before beginning her professorship at UMBC.

Using photographs taken with the Hubble Space Telescope over the past 25 years, Meyer and Georganopoulos observed a “shock collision” of plasma jets, indicating that plasma jets run into each other and gain energy in that manner. “Something like this has never been seen before in an extragalactic jet,” Meyer said. “This will allow us a very rare opportunity to see how the kinetic energy of the collision is dissipated into radiation.”

“The collision of outward moving components in jets has long been known, but this is the first time we actually see it happening,” co-author Markos Georganopoulos told Discovery News.

View a time-lapse of shock collision below:

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nf7W-WfKxLM]

Their research has received national and international media attention. Read coverage of their study below:
Hubble spots a high-speed collision in an extragalactic jet (L.A. Times)
Watch a Superfast Jet of Gas Burst from a Massive Black Hole (TIME)
Black hole glimpsed playing cosmic billiards (BBC)
Hubble Witness to Relativistic Crash in a Black Hole Jet (Discovery)
UMBC physicists witness black hole history: ‘Something like this has never been seen before’ (Technical.ly)

UMBC is always full of hard-working people who aspire to do great things, and the class of 2014 is no exception. Today, we wanted to share with you what some of our recent graduates are planning to do with their Retriever education.

Sondheim Public Affairs Scholar Meghan Carpenter, political science, used her interest in politics to to focus on education policy. She was the director of the Office of Community and Government Relations in the Student Government Association and a Governor’s Summer Intern at the Maryland State Department of Education. As a student, Carpenter proposed a budget to the Maryland General Assembly that would aim to reduce textbook prices. She now works as the Director of Policy and Research for the
Eric Ebersole campaign for State Delegate.

Editor of the Technology Section in The Retriever Weekly for several years, Emily Scheerer, computer science, was also a Center for Women in Technology Scholar, and interned with the Department of Defense and Booz Allen Hamilton. During her spare time, she worked as a UMBC Welcome Week Leader (Woolie) and was president of the UMBC Ballroom Dance Team. Now, Scheerer plans to continue her education at UMBC and earn an M.S. in computer science.

Kelsey Krach, cultural anthropology and Spanish, was both a Sondheim Scholar and a valedictorian finalist for the Class of 2014. She interned with the Citizens Planning and Housing Association and Amnesty International USA. Krach also lead an Alternative Spring Break so other students could learn about refugees in Baltimore, won the Outstanding Student in Anthropology Award, and became a member of many honor societies. She now plans to do non-profit community development work.

A native of Germany, Kim Berghaus, physics, dedicated her time at UMBC to her school work and the Women’s Tennis team. She earned the Outstanding Graduating Senior Physics Award, the Joseph F. Mulligan Memorial Lectureship, and was name the Matt Skalsky Outstanding UMBC Scholar. Berghaus was also excellent on the court. She was named the Most Valuable Player for the 2014 season, was a member of the America East Tennis All-Academic Squad, and was the first Retriever to be nationally ranked in women’s tennis. Her freshman year, she was named America East Conference Rookie of the Year and Most Valuable Player. Berghaus now works in Dr. Giuliano Scarcelli’s Lab at the Harvard Medical School.

Read more about the Class of 2014!