UMBC political science professor Thomas Schaller has tough news for Americans frustrated with government gridlock. In his latest Baltimore Sun column, Schaller writes:

Americans sent divided governments to Washington in both 2006 and 2010, and will likely do so again this November. Since the conventions, President Obama’s lead over Republican nominee Mitt Romney has widened, and almost no sane analyst thinks the GOP will lose the U.S. House this November. So buckle up for two more years of stalemated, sometimes ugly governance in the nation’s capital.

The one remaining toss-up for Schaller is the Senate race, which might offer election night’s greatest excitement. However, he concludes, “Whichever party emerges this November with a Senate majority…the inability of the two national parties to solve major national problems is almost certain to continue for another biennium.”

David H. Murray ’14, economics, is hard at work campaigning for a seat on the Prince George’s County Board of Education, reports The Baltimore Sun‘s Explore Howard, and his chances look good.

Murray is speaking with as many voters as he can before the election, commenting, “Any time I’m not in school, I’m rushing back here to talk to people.” Next week he will participate in a forum sponsored by the Prince George’s County branches of the League of Women Voters and NAACP, alongside candidate Zabrina Epps. Murray was the front-runner in the April 2012 primary, garnering 56% of the total votes and receiving 1,500 more votes than Epps.

Responding to queries about his age, Murray notes that voters he meets seem pleasantly surprised that “they have a young person growing up in the county, deciding they’re not going to leave, or wait till they get older to solve problems, that they’re willing to jump in now and do that.”

Alumna Jeehye Yun ’97, computer science, was profiled along with her cybersecurity company Secured Sciences Group (SSG) by The Baltimore Business Journal’s Jack Lambert in an article published on September 7th.
Read the full story here.
Yun told Lambert that SSG–a member of UMBC’s Research and Technology Park, and which is in the process of working with the research park on a plan to attract investors–is particularly adept at cutting through red tape and redundancies which can occur in government applications, saying, “We can take a lot of disparate policies and figure out where the overlaps are.”
The alumna, who is CEO/President of SSG as well as a former teacher at her alma mater from the late-90′s, also told Lambert that the company’s upcoming technology will new technology will hopefully cut through the quantity of material companies have to sift through from government grant applications and contracts by finding the overlaps between for organizations like the Department of Defense, the Navy and the Marines.
Yun also noted that her company’s products also have value for colleges, management consultants and small businesses, saying, “The biggest rule of thumb for us is, actually, are we solving a problem where we would want to use the product?”
This story originally appeared in UMBC Insights.

Alumna Jeehye Yun ’97, computer science, was profiled along with her cybersecurity company Secured Sciences Group (SSG) by The Baltimore Business Journal’s Jack Lambert in an article published on September 7th.

Read the full story here.

Yun told Lambert that SSG–a member of UMBC’s Research and Technology Park, and which is in the process of working with the research park on a plan to attract investors–is particularly adept at cutting through red tape and redundancies which can occur in government applications, saying, “We can take a lot of disparate policies and figure out where the overlaps are.”

The alumna, who is CEO/President of SSG as well as a former teacher at her alma mater from the late-90′s, also told Lambert that the company’s upcoming technology will new technology will hopefully cut through the quantity of material companies have to sift through from government grant applications and contracts by finding the overlaps between for organizations like the Department of Defense, the Navy and the Marines.

Yun also noted that her company’s products also have value for colleges, management consultants and small businesses, saying, “The biggest rule of thumb for us is, actually, are we solving a problem where we would want to use the product?”

This story originally appeared in UMBC Insights.

The department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering (CSEE) announces its new NSF Scholarship for Service (SFS) CyberCorps program scholars.

According to CSEE,

“Four students in UMBC’s Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering have been selected for major scholarships to study cybersecurity in the National Science Foundation’s (NSF) Scholarship for Service (SFS) CyberCorps program.   Each student will receive full tuition, fees, and a nine-month stipend ($20,000 for undergraduates, $25,000 for MS/MPS students, and $30,000 for PhD students) for up to  two years (three years for PhD).  For this first year of the program at UMBC, recipients are Oliver Kubik (BS student in computer science), Brendan Masiar and Brandyn Schult (MPS students in cybersecurity), and Mary Mathews (PhD student in computer science).

While in the program at UMBC, each student will participate in paid summer internships and have opportunities to engage in mentored research opportunities at the UMBC Center for Information Security and Assurance (CISA) and its partners from industry and government.  Following graduation, each student must work for the government (for pay) for one year for each year of scholarship received.  Drs. Alan T. Sherman and Richard Forno direct the program using support they received from their recently awarded $2.5 million NSF grant.  The CyberCorps program will produce highly-qualified professionals to meet the increasing need to protect American’s cyber infrastructure.

Each year students may apply for SFS CyberCorps scholarships at UMBC, with application deadline in mid January.  For details, see www.cisa.umbc.edu.  In each of the next three years, UMBC expects to make six new awards.   Applicants must be accepted to a full-time degree program in a cybersecurity-related field (CS, CE, cyber, EE, IS, math, physics, education, public policy).”

Meet the scholars

From Philip Rous, Provost and Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs

The President has approved a new UMBC policy on development and approval of written academic agreements. The new policy covers all written academic agreements to which UMBC or any of its departments will be a party, except agreements for sponsored or unsponsored research and those between two or more departments within UMBC.[1] The new policy, the related procedures for developing written academic agreements, and the required forms can be found at http://www.umbc.edu/provost/Policies/Development_and_Approval_of_Written_Academic_Agreements.html.

The new policy and procedures are intended to support the following objectives:

1. To give UMBC faculty and staff the tools to draft agreements with potential partners according to guidelines that have been pre-approved by the UMBC University Counsel, thereby reducing the time needed for legal review of written agreements

2. To support UMBC faculty and staff in the efficient preparation of draft agreements by clarifying and streamlining the process by which they are developed, reviewed, approved, and signed at UMBC

3. To identify the Office of the Provost as the administrative unit responsible for the implementation of the policy and procedures, to which faculty and staff may address all questions about development, review, approval, and signing of written academic agreements covered by the policy

Beth Wells is the point of contact in the Provost’s Office for questions or information about the new policy on written academic agreements or about development of particular agreements. You can reach her at bwells@umbc.edu. Thank you very much.

Josiah Dykstra (computer science PhD student of Dr. Alan T. Sherman) presented the paper “Acquiring forensic evidence from infrastructure-as-a-service cloud computing: Exploring and evaluating tools, trust, and techniques” at the Digital Forensics Research Workshop (DFRWS), held August 6-8 in Washington, DC. Their pioneering work explains for the first time how to conduct a digital forensics exam of computations conducted in the cloud.

It’s the open road for the next few months for recent alumna Rachel Younghans ’12, geography, as she and her boyfriend, photographer Rob Brulinski, cross the country in search of “Only-in-America Americans” for their art-project/website Freak Flag America.

The couple were profiled by The Washington Post‘s Michael Rosenwald on September 17th, one day after they had set out on their cross-country trip. The two will travel to the Pacific and back in a Toyota Yaris packed with supplies ranging from a tent to rolls of film, from an American flag from Goodwill to a stuffed rat from IKEA which Brulinski plans to bug Younghans with.

Younghans spoke to Rosenwald of the importance of the project, saying, “We really feel a lot of responsibility, and we like our role as storytellers, as historians preserving folk stories.”

Adding that she is a fan of Aesop’s Fables and Grimms’ Fairy Tales, the alumna also detailed the vision behind the trip, which the couple hope to turn into a book on top of the blog posting which they plan to post to their site over the next four months

“Stories just retell themselves over and over throughout history,” Younghans said. “We are a creating a book that stands as part of that — stories based on true events that still hold the value of moral stories.”

Robert Deluty, associate dean of the graduate school, has published a new book of poetry, “A Crowded Life.” In his review, Joseph DeVitis writes: “In our crowded lives, where countless pressures often damage and paralyze us, Robert Deluty’s poems open windows allowing fresh, crisp air to renew us. Each of his lines bespeaks an exquisite sensibility to life, exposing the common humanity of our losses and victories. Wherever we live, however alone or free we might feel, Deluty extends our subtle understanding of the human condition within ourselves.”

Copies of “A Crowded Life,” as well as of Deluty’s other books, are on sale at the UMBC Bookstore.

From Larry Wilt, Director of the Library

I am very pleased to announce the appointment of Robin Moskal and Joyce Tenney as Associate Directors, in recognition of their increasing roles in the management and leadership of the Library.

Robin Moskal first came to UMBC in 1989 as an Assistant Reference Librarian. Since that time she has held several positions at UMBC, most notably as head of Collection Management and Interlibrary Loan. Since 2008, she has served on an acting basis as the supervisor of Library Accounting & Receiving and of the Reference Department. These responsibilities are now permanent with her appointment as Associate Director.

Joyce Tenney began as a student assistant in the Library and was appointed Serials Librarian in 1983. She has supervised several other units in the Library on a temporary basis since that time. Since 2008 she has supervised the Circulation and Library Media Departments on an acting basis. These responsibilities are now permanent with her appointment as Associate Director.

Please join me in congratulating Robin and Joyce on their success.