Annie Byrd ’04, emergency health services, M.P.S. ’23, community leadership, began her staff career at UMBC as an executive administrative assistant and she is now the Career Center’s assistant director for employer relations. She attributes her growth as a leader to UMBC’s supportive environment that encouraged members to make an impact in their communities. Annie says that the community leadership program helped her connect the dots between her undergraduate degree in emergency health services, her experience as a doula—a trained professional who provides emotional, physical, and informational support during pregnancy, birth, and the postpartum period—and her passion for maternal health equity and social justice. She then integrated these values into systems-level change, co-founding the Doula Alliance of Maryland.

Q: What’s one essential thing you’d want another Retriever to know about you?

A: I’ve been part of the UMBC community for over 20 years—as an undergraduate, graduate student, and a staff member. I love building connections, supporting students, and finding creative solutions that help people succeed.

Q: Tell us about someone in the UMBC community who has inspired you.

A: Yvette Mozie-Ross [’88, currently vice provost for enrollment management and planning] saw potential in me before I saw it in myself. As my first supervisor at UMBC, she encouraged me to continue my education and pursue new opportunities. Her mentorship helped shape my journey from executive administrative assistant to assistant director.

Q: Tell us about what you love about your academic program or an organization you’re involved in at UMBC.

A: What I loved most about the M.P.S. in Community Leadership was learning alongside people committed to creating change. The program challenged me to think strategically, and it directly inspired my work co-founding the Doula Alliance of Maryland to advance equitable maternal health. 

Q: What’s the one thing you’d want someone who hasn’t joined the UMBC community to know about the support you find here?

A: What makes UMBC special is that everyone belongs here. It’s an inclusive community that values curiosity, encourages ambitious ideas, and provides the support to help you grow personally, academically, and professionally.

Q: What part of your job do you enjoy the most and why?

A: Student interactions are what I enjoy most. I love helping students discover opportunities, build confidence, and recognize the skills they already have. It’s rewarding to know that even one conversation can have a lasting impact on their career journey.

Q: What brought you to UMBC?

A: I came to UMBC as an undergraduate and a student-athlete, and I’ve come back as a staff member because I experienced firsthand how transformative this community can be. UMBC has shaped my life. I met my husband, built lifelong friendships, and found a career where I can help students create their own UMBC stories.

Q: At UMBC, how have you found support for birth work advocacy? 

A: The community leadership program faculty and staff helped me turn my passion for birth work into systems-level change. Research shows that doula support is associated with better maternal health outcomes, yet many families—particularly those who have been historically marginalized—face significant barriers to accessing this care. Seeing both the impact of doulas and the inequities in access inspired me to co-found the Doula Alliance of Maryland to expand access and advance maternal health equity. Also, my Career Center colleagues have continued to support that mission, reminding me that UMBC values both professional growth and community impact.

Q: What would you tell someone who is considering a career at UMBC?

A: UMBC is a place where your ideas and potential are valued. It provides opportunities to grow your career while connecting your work to a larger purpose. My own journey from student to staff member shows how UMBC supports people who want to make a difference.

In early 2025, thousands of U.S. federal workers were unexpectedly laid off, many living in the Washington, D.C., Maryland, Virginia (DMV) area. Patrick Shirdon ’92, economics, a civil servant of 33 years, was among those left to grapple with the uncertainty and frustration of restarting a career. While searching for resources, he found UMBC’s Paws & Pivot free webinar series, where career development experts share concrete skills on resume writing, interview preparation, navigating a tech-centered job market, and more.

“After losing my job, I didn’t know what to do. I was just so happy to find something to do—and this series became so much more than that for me,” wrote Shirdon in an email to Rex Jarrett, the director of professional programs in UMBC’s Division of Professional Studies (DPS). 

“Growing up in Montgomery County, being part of the DMV, I knew a lot of people whose parents were federal workers,” says Jarrett. “Many of my friends followed in those footsteps and were impacted by the layoffs.” The 2024 annual Maryland employment statistics report totaled the Maryland workforce at 2,764,497 people. Of these, some 530,257 workers, or 19.2 percent, were employed by federal, State, and local governments in the public sector.” Those impacted were asking for help to access new professional networks via Facebook and LinkedIn after decades of serving their country,” Jarrett noticed.

With skills in webinar development, Jarrett knew this format could quickly serve a wide audience. He reached out to Jill Barr, then associate vice provost and assistant dean of the Graduate School, and Julie Gilless, assistant vice provost for marketing in DPS, with an idea for a job skills development webinar series. What began as an idea grew into a conversation, and with the full support of Barr and Gilless, became a call to action. 

Gathering the Paws & Pivot pack

Jarrett came to UMBC in fall 2024 after more than half a decade leading the Harvard Business Analytics Program. He was excited to return home to Maryland and put his expertise in career growth and community engagement to work for the greater good. Jarrett is passionate about his work because it helps him answer a question that is always on his mind—How can I make the world a better place? He did not anticipate that the answer would come so soon after joining UMBC, nor that it would involve hundreds of federal workers. 

Quickly, the team created the Impacted Federal Workers Think Tank Committee and agreed that the series would be free for everyone—regardless of a UMBC affiliation—and remain accessible on the division’s YouTube channel. Thanks to DPS’s Rashad Cheeks, associate director of marketing, and Theresa Mabe, marketing data manager, the series received a memorable name and logo. The first episode of Paws & Pivot, “Building Your Digital Brand,” aired on Wednesday, April 16, 2025, and featured Rowena Winkler, assistant director for graduate student career development. 

Subsequent episodes were co-hosted by a cadre of UMBC supporters, including the Alex. Brown Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, the Career Center, and the Department of Education.  Community partners also joined the effort. Batul Sadiq, owner of BHS Image Consulting based in Gaithersburg, Maryland, hosted the 11th episode, “First Impressions Matter: Dress The Part, Brand With Intention.” The Paws & Pivot team is heartened by the wonderful response, says Jarrett, as well as the steady stream of new volunteers eager to get involved. And the impact is real. 

A few months after tuning into a Paws & Pivot webinar, Shirdon reached out to Jarrett: “Today, I attended my orientation day with the human resources team at my new organization. It has been 33 years since I was a ‘new’ employee!” wrote Shirdon. 

Award-winning programming

Since launching in April, Paws & Pivot has hosted 15 sessions, amassed 150 registered participants, and engaged with over 900 impacted federal workers and government contractors. Over 90 percent of attendees say they would recommend the series to other impacted federal workers. The University Professional and Continuing Education Association (UPCEA) has nominated Paws & Pivot for their “2026 UPCEA Regional Program Award‘ as a Mid-Atlantic educational program that focuses on addressing a regional need. Jarrett notes that the initiative has become a model of regional engagement, scalable virtual learning, and social impact, grounded in the values of continuing education, career resiliency, and access.

“Paws & Pivot was/is amazing. In addition to the wonderful, technical information taught at the Wednesday sessions, an unintended benefit for me was the ability to have an event on my calendar. It gave me something to look forward to, and truthfully, I learned a lot,” writes Shirdon. “I certainly had my share of ups and downs, more downs than ups. But UMBC’s effort was an absolute blessing for me. Now, I just have to go and do great stuff! Ball in my court.”

Paws & Pivot’s 16th episode will air at noon on Wednesday, November 12, 2025.

Meet Jok Abraham Thon, UMBC’s first Peaceworker Global Fellow and the first Retriever from South Sudan. Thon is pursuing his master’s in entrepreneurship, innovation, and leadership and plans to use these skills to continue to promote educational opportunities for other South Sudanese people.  

Q: Tell us about yourself. What are the essential things you’d want another Retriever to know about you? 

A: I am the father of four beautiful kids from the world’s youngest country, South Sudan. I left behind my young family in search of knowledge and skills so that when I return, I can play a part in transforming the lives of vulnerable children in my country.

When I was a refugee, it was not easy. We had our classes under trees; we didn’t have toys to play with, but I turned my bitter memories into positive energy to change the cycle of violence in my country by establishing Promised Land Primary and Secondary School with the motto of “Changing Minds from Bullets to Books.” 

Let’s be great libraries for our children where they can find great stories of peace, love, and humanity. This message is for the parents and students who are our future leaders and policy makers. This principle will help them change policies that discriminate and instead create policies that embrace inclusion and equality. 

Q: Tell us about your primary WHY, and how it led you to UMBC.

A: I need to use the leadership and entrepreneurial skills I will get from UMBC to help transform South Sudan into a peaceful and democratic country.

Q: What do you love about your academic program?

A: My first course was Introduction to Community Leadership and my biggest takeaway was what I called a ‘”spiderweb” from placemaking—how public parks are great places to build more inclusive and peaceful communities; they’re great places for communities to come together for entertainment and family outings; they’re great places for communities to build back trust and take away fear and misinformation. In South Sudan there are some cultures that negatively affect women and girls—I want to see how we can use this placemaking idea to create parks that will bring all people together. 

In my Developing the Entrepreneurial Mindset class, I am learning skills that will help me to establish a company to sustain my school and help in establishing more schools in the hard to reach villages in South Sudan. We want to provide education to the vulnerable 2.5 million children who are not in school in South Sudan and break the cycle that prohibits many girls from finishing their schooling—about 75 percent of girls don’t finish high school due to early forced marriage and poverty. 

From my classes so far, I came up with two projects—one is Jonglei Multipurpose Memorial Park. It will not only be a park but also provide a great solution to the flooded villages along the River Nile as a way we can beautifully live with water as we fight climate change.

Second, is the Central Nile Paper Company that will produce paper sustainably from local sources of bamboo and papyrus for school workbooks and use the revenue from sales to support the Promised Land School while opening more schools across the country.

Q: Tell us about someone in the community who has inspired you or supported you, and how they did it.

A: My journey to UMBC came as an inspiration from the love I received from Joby Taylor (Ph.D. ’05, language, literacy, and culture) in the Shriver Center, Kenneth Baron in Academic Advising, David Di Maria in the Center for Global Engagement, Gib Mason (’95, economics) in the entrepreneurship, innovation, and leadership program, and Kimberly R. Moffitt, dean of the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences. This team and many more great faculty as well as staff from International Student and Scholar Services have changed my life.

I want to particularly thank Dr. Joby Taylor and his wife and children for being such a great host family. I am glad to call UMBC my sweet home far away from home.

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UMBC’s greatest strength is its people. When people meet Retrievers and hear about the passion they bring, the relationships they create, the ways they support each other, and the commitment they have to inclusive excellence, they truly get a sense of our community. That’s what “Meet a Retriever” is all about.

Learn more about how UMBC can help you achieve your goals.