It’s Valentine’s Day, and love is in the air! For all of us here at UMBC, it’s a great day to tell you, our donors, how much we appreciate you and all that you do for UMBC.

When you give to the University, you make it possible for our students to get the highest quality education. You ensure that our faculty and staff have the resources to do amazing things. You invest in a place that strives for greatness. And though that investment means more to us than words can convey, we still want to say thank you. So we asked a few of our faculty and staff to say thank you to a donor who has made a difference to them:

“We’re so appreciative of the support that Ken Pittman ’80, economics, gives to our university. He is generous with his time through his service on our alumni board, and he and his family regularly contribute to several of our scholarship funds. His willingness to give back helps make UMBC a great place.”

~Stanyell Bruce, Director of Alumni Relations, UMBC

“We are so grateful for Next Century’s support of this software engineering course. Their gift helps students learn about the fundamentals of Software Engineering and the software development lifecycle. The students are getting a great opportunity to work with a ‘real-life’ application, developing a student alert system. Next Century personnel are acting as ‘customers’ for this project, which gives students valuable training in working with real customers. The students are also going to present their project in Next Century’s offices and will get an experience of actual office/industry setting.”

~Karuna Joshi, Research Assistant Professor, UMBC

“Through his work as a student caller with UMBC’s Phonathon, Jordan, class of 2014, has done exceptional work on behalf of UMBC and the Meyerhoff program. He has had hundreds of conversations with alumni and parents, helping to secure many gifts for the  LaMont Toliver Alumni Memorial Scholarship. This fall, Jordan himself made a contribution to the LaMont Toliver Alumni Memorial Scholarship. I was really impressed by his leadership as a student and donor. UMBC’s students often give back of their time and talent, but it’s more rare for students to part with their hard-earned paychecks. Jordan’s commitment to helping future generations of UMBC students excel was a really moving act that leaves a lasting legacy in Mr. Toliver’s name.”

~Dayna Carpenter, Director of Annual Giving

Check out UMBC’s Donor Roll, where we say thank you to everyone who has supported us each year.

The UMBC community honored faculty and staff who were instrumental in the lives of UMBC’s African-American and Latino students at a Legends of Excellence Brunch and Awards ceremony held on Saturday, March 31, 2012. Congratulations to the award recipients:

• Ramona Arthur, Former Director of Off-Campus Student Services
• Norma Green, Former Coordinator of Student Activities
• Bonny Tighe, Senior Lecturer of Mathematics and Statistics
• LaMont Toliver, Director of the Meyerhoff Scholars Program and Assistant Dean of Undergraduate Education (awarded posthumously)

“It was wonderful to see so many alumni, faculty, staff and friends come out to celebrate and honor members of the UMBC community who are considered to be trailblazers, mentors, role models and friends to thousands of our alumni,” said Stanyell Bruce, director of Alumni Relations. “The event is a great opportunity for alumni to pay homage to those people who’ve inspired true excellence in their lives.”

The Legends event is held once every five years. The first event, held in 2007, honored Betty Glascoe of Career Services; Dr. Daphne Harrison of Africana Studies; Cynthia Hill of Student Support Services; Dr. Acklyn Lynch of Africana Studies; and Dr. Ana Maria Schwartz of Modern Languages and Linguistics.

To read more about the 2012 award winners, click here.
To see more photos from the event, visit our Flickr page.