A reflection from student intern, Sheila, about the subtle moments of life, both good and bad. 

A little while ago I asked someone for their life story. This is a random thing I do whenever someone new starts working at my restaurant (#serverlife), to see if they can stay on their toes. The response I got back was that this person was only 18 years old, and that they were too young to have a life story. I proudly said, “I am not too young for anything…. Only to rent a car for a good price … and I can’t run for president.”

Someone asked why I couldn’t run for president, and if you didn’t already know, it’s because you have to be 35 years old to run for the president of the United States.

Overhearing the question, my boss turned around and started laughing. He thought I couldn’t run for president because I wasn’t born in this country. For those who don’t know, you have to be a natural born citizen of the United 

My “Bro!… seriously?!” face

States to run for president. I was born in Gaithersburg, Maryland…  (aka in this country).

He laughed and asked me if that was racist.…

I said, “Kinda…”

If you didn’t know what a microaggression is, that was one.  

According to the Merriam-Webster dictionary a microaggression is “a comment or action that subtly and often unconsciously or unintentionally expresses a prejudiced attitude toward a member of a marginalized group (such as a racial minority).”

Some people do not see microaggressions happening because it can be so subtle. These are statements/actions that we hear or see every day– but no matter how common, microaggressions still have underlying meanings attached to them.

Another Example!

“Shalia. Sheyla. Chalia. Shayla. Sheila.”

These are the ways my name has been spelled and/or pronounced over my 22 years of life.

If you know me, saying my name wrong is one of the most hurtful things you can do to me.

On my first day of class, I walked in five minutes late because I had to go to the bathroom. When I finally walked in my professor yelled out “Sanchez!” as I confusedly looked for a seat. I realized the professor was speaking to me, hoping that I was the person that missed attendance and that their class wasn’t going to be only the 12 people currently seated.

Now, back to my original point, people have called me a bunch of different things in my life but I had never gotten “Sanchez” before. I corrected my professor, as I always do with my first name, and took my seat.

It wasn’t until 2 hours into our 2 and half hour class, I realized there was no one named Sanchez in my class. There was no one else with an “S” sounding last name in the whole class, actually.

Why in the world did my professor call me Sanchez?

Why would people continue to pronounce my name wrong after me correcting them for months?

Why do people continue to tell me I am pronouncing my own name wrong?

My reaction when some tells me I am pronouncing my own name wrong. Like… what?

Recently I have noticed when these things happen more and more often.

When I face microaggressions, I challenge them! I fight for myself! I question why people believe these things to be true of me but the real question is… why I constantly have to fight these things? Some folks will tell me not to bother, that people don’t know better and I can’t let these tiny moments in my life impact me as much as they do.

I want you to know: I hear you. I don’t want these tiny moments to hurt. But it doesn’t change the fact that I shouldn’t have to deal with these things, I shouldn’t have to correct my professor or my boss, I shouldn’t have to waste my energy worrying about someone seeing me in a different light because of how I look. It gets tiring, sticking up for myself and challenging people.

While writing this blog, I spent my free time thinking about two moments. Knowing that these people did not intend anything negative by their words but it still filled this week with many headaches and moments of disheartening doubt. Why would anyone care what a queer latina women would have to say? Would they even believe what I wrote?

With all the personal demands I face during a week, I needed to take care of myself after thinking about why these moments in my life deeply impacted me repeatedly for the past week. This is where I talk about one of my favorite things in da world!

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Self-care!

I actually wrote another blog about it last year. If you like to read it, here is the link

Temitope Ibitoye is a Chemical Engineering major who will graduate in 2019.

My research is titled, "Photolysis of Macrolide Antibiotics at 253.7 NM". I work with Dr. Lee Blaney in the Chemical, Biochemical, and Environmental Engineering department. Research in the Blaney Laboratory focuses on the intersection of environmental, analytical, organic, and inorganic chemistry. Our primary research interests are the (1) fate, transport, and toxicity of contaminants of emerging concern (CECs) in natural and engineered systems and (2) recovery of vital resources to ensure sustainable development. My advisor from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute program set up a 6-week rotation in Dr. Blaney’s laboratory. After that, Dr. Blaney invited me to continue bworking in his laboratory. He also encouraged me to apply for the Undergraduate Research Award (URA).

How did you know this was the project you wanted to do? One of my life goals is to help solve the global water crisis. I knew that one way that I could do this was to study Environmental Engineering during my undergraduate career. When I started at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County I learned that there was a lab on campus that conducts research concerning water quality, and I knew that I had to join this lab.

What academic background did you have before you applied for the URA? I had just completed the first semester of my sophomore year when I applied for the URA. I had completed about 6 months of research and had just passed my Chemical Engineering gateway requirements.

How much did your mentor help you with the application? I am still learning to write technical papers, but my mentor helped revise my application multiple times. He gave me valuable advice on writing and communicating my research.

What has been the hardest part about your research? There was a learning curve when I first joined the lab. I joined the lab in the spring semester of my freshman year. Many of the experiments I would run required knowledge that I had not acquired in class yet. I had to learn difficult concepts and apply them for my research.

What was the most unexpected thing? I did not expect to enjoy data analysis as much as I do. Deciphering the results I receive after weeks of research is very enjoyable.

How does your research relate to your work in other classes? All of my research requires skills that I am learning in my engineering and chemistry courses. As I learn more in my classes, I get a better grasp on the research that I am conducting.

What else are you involved in on campus? I am a member of the National Society of Black Engineers. Last semester, I was an athletic tutor, and about a year ago I volunteered weekly at the Baltimore Animal Rescue and Care Shelter.

What is your advice to other students about getting involved in research? I would tell all students to try it out! Many people are scared that they do not have enough knowledge to participate in research, but that is not true! Nobody expects you to know everything from the get-go. You learn so much as you conduct research. 

What are your career goals? I would like to obtain a Ph.D. in Environmental Engineering and continue working in water quality research. I would like to work to create water quality technology that can be used in lower resource regions.

Want to be a URA Scholar like Temitope? Apply for a URA award: https://ur.umbc.edu/ura/forms/

Questions? Contact Dr. April Householder at aprilh@umbc.edu

ur.umbc.edu

Attend the upcoming workshop on how to write a winning research proposal for a URA award: This Wednesday, Nov. 1 from 12-12:50pm in 113 Sherman Hall A-wing!

CHMPR Distinguished Lecture Series

Energy Exascale Earth System Model

Dr. Mark Taylor, E3SM Chief Computational Scientist, Sandia National Laboratories

2:30pm Tuesday, 31 October 2017, ITE 325, UMBC

Dr. Taylor will present an overview of the DOE Energy Exascale Earth System Model (E3SM), including Sandia’s role in numerical algorithms, parallel scalability, and computational performance. E3SM is designed to run on upcoming next-generation DOE supercomputers. Adapting simulation codes to these new architectures is expected to be more disruptive than the previous transition from vector to massively parallel supercomputers. E3SM development is driven by several grand challenge science questions focused Earth’s cryosphere, biogeochemical and water cycle systems. E3SM has a new land and atmosphere component models branched from the CESM v1.2, coupled to new MPAS ocean, sea ice, and land ice models.

The current performance and throughput challenges of the E3SM high-resolution coupled configuration on several DOE computers will be discussed. Our current focus is on the NERSC Cori system with Intel Xeon Phi architecture, in the longer term we hope to make effective use of the upcoming NVIDIA GPU based system at ORNL. An analysis is presented of the E3SM spectral element atmosphere dycore following the NGGPS dycore computational evaluation protocol, but with an emphasis on the throughput rates needed for climate simulations. For even higher resolution simulations, we will rely on E3SM’s ability to use unstructured grids in all component models. This will allow us to achieve cloud-resolving resolution in select regions of interest seamlessly within the global modeling system.

Mark Taylor is a mathematician who specializes in numerical methods for parallel computing and geophysical flows. He currently serves as Chief Computational Scientist for the DOE’s Accelerated Climate Modeling for Energy (ACME) project. Mark developed the mimetic/conservative formulation of the spectral element method, one of the atmospheric dynamical cores used in the Community Earth System Model (CESM) and the ACME project. Mark received his Ph.D. from New York University’s Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences in 1992 and has worked at Sandia National Laboratories since 2004. In 2014 he was awarded The Secretary of Energy Achievement Award for his work unifying the DOE climate modeling research community and enabling the development of high-resolution fully-coupled climate-system simulations.

The post talk: DOE Energy Exascale Earth System Model, 2:30 Tue 10/31, ITE325 appeared first on Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering.

The NSA has EXTENDED their deadline to apply to several of their SUMMER INTERN PROGRAMS.  The NSA offers UNDERGRADUATE and GRADUATE students a wide variety of excellent programs to get a jumpstart on a career in intelligence.

SEE SEARCHABLE DATABASE OF OPPORTUNITIES HERE AND APPLY

The programs below all have a deadline of Tuesday, October 31st.  Most simply require a resume and transcript.  Details on how to obtain your unofficial or official UMBC transcript can be found here.  APPLY before Tuesday if interested. 

CAE in Cyber Operations Summer Intern Program
Selectees will be invited to participate in a 12-week summer program to gain knowledge of specific cyber-related topics and apply educational knowledge to address various real world mission-related technical challenges.

Computer Science Intern Program (CSIP)
In the Computer Science Intern Program (CSIP), you will gain first-hand experience in critical work at NSA, while making a valuable contribution to national security. And you'll be earning a salary too! As a CSIP intern, you will have the opportunity to apply your computer science skills to NSA hardware and software systems.

Signals Intelligence Collection Program (SICP)
Does the prospect of applying your computer, technical, analytic, social science, communication, problem solving, and/or critical thinking skills to the National Security Agency’s Signals Intelligence (SIGINT) mission pique your interest? As a SICP intern, you will work to directly support the United States Intelligence Community, national-level customers and our armed forces operating around the globe.

Cyber Summer Program (CSP)
The Cyber Summer Program (CSP) is the National Security Agency's (NSA) premier outreach effort to the very best undergraduate and graduate computer science, engineering, mathematics, network security and information assurance students in the country

Data Center Management Intern Program
Data Center Management (DCM) is a dynamic, emerging field created to govern the facilities and complex engineering frameworks that support massive parallel computing systems. DCM involves an unprecedented integrated approach that combines power and HVAC engineering disciplines with telecommunications and business management. All of these branches of knowledge join together to help create a safe and secure environment where parallel computing systems and their infrastructure can operate at peak efficiency with optimal potential for future expansion. 

Human Resources (HR) Intern Program 
Summers at NSA will be educational and exciting for undergraduates majoring in Human Resources (HR) (an alternative major with a minor or concentration in Human Resources is also acceptable). HR Interns at NSA will gain practical HR experience while putting their intelligence and creativity to work at the world's technology leader and top cryptologic organization in the U.S. Intelligence Community.

Installation & Logistics (I&L) Intern Program 
The Installation & Logistics (I&L) Intern Program is intended for individuals interested in project management and electrical, power, mechanical or civil engineering fields, and supply chain and business management operations. In addition to gaining valuable work experience, interns will gain substantial exposure to NSA's mission operations through I&L's supporting functions.

Health Promotion & Wellness (HPW) Intern Program
The Health Promotion and Wellness Summer Intern Program is an intense and exciting 12-week internship open to select college undergraduate or master's level students majoring in the field of health promotion and wellness, health education or related fields.

Security & Counterintelligence Summer Intern Program (SCSIP) 
Spend 12 weeks of your summer at NSA, living in the Security and Counterintelligence world by working alongside experienced security professionals.

Summer Intern Program for Science and Technology (SIP/ST)
The Summer Intern Program for Science and Technology (SIP/ST) is a full-time, 12-week summer internship program open to college juniors who are concentrating their studies in the disciplines of computer science, computer engineering, electrical engineering, network engineering, software engineering or telecommunications.

Summer Strategic Communications Intern Program (SSCIP)
The Summer Strategic Communications Intern Program is for students enrolled in one or more of the following areas of study: writing, editing, journalism, public relations, marketing or advertising; visual arts, television production, motion picture production, or 3-D animation; graphics or photography.

Summer Intern Program for Information Assurance (SIPIA)
The Summer Intern Program for Information Assurance (SIPIA) is a 12-week summer program meant to help accelerate your career in the field of Information Assurance (IA) by working for NSA. SIPIA hosts high potential students pursuing Bachelor's (between junior and senior year), Master's or Ph.D. technical degrees that can contribute to the IA mission.

Industrial and Organizational Psychology Intern Program
Spend your summer at NSA further developing your technical skills. As an intern working in the HR Strategy and Program Design unit at NSA, you'll learn how to apply scientific and quantitative methods to address a wide range of human capital issues.

Summer Program for Operations Research Technology (SPORT)
Spend your summer at NSA further developing your technical skills. As an Intern Analyst in the Enterprise Operations Research Division at NSA, you will work side-by-side with analysts in mission organizations to apply state-of-the-art scientific and quantitative methods, which employ applied mathematics and data science techniques, to develop innovative solutions to current agency, operational "hard" problems and to unconventional problems exclusive to the Intelligence Community.

Business Management & Acquisition Intern Program for Undergraduate and Graduate Students
Are you looking for an opportunity that will provide innovative professional work experiences that are significant and meaningful to your career and academic goals, enable you to explore the fascinating and unique world of intelligence, and give you the opportunity to serve your country? Look no further than the National Security Agency (NSA). NSA’s Business Management & Acquisition (BM&A) Summer Intern Program offers the opportunity for training and experience within a multi-faceted business discipline.

Field Site Internship Programs
How would you like to spend your summer developing technological solutions that contribute to the security of our nation? Where you can work and see that your efforts are supporting the broader Intelligence Community and our Armed Forces?

The Office of the Inspector General Summer Intern Program 
The OIG Summer Internship offers full-time paid internships for undergraduate and master’s degree students each year. It is a 12-week program that gives rising college seniors or graduate level students a wide variety of opportunities to be agents for change, analyze operations for efficiency and effectiveness and deliver results to our customers to reduce program costs and provide value to NSA and the US taxpayer. 

¡Hola! Me llamo Gerardo Herrera-Cortés y soy un pasante por los poblaciones hispanos y latinos en el Mosaico: centro para la diversidad y cultura en UMBC. Estudio diseño gráfico, pero tengo una pasión para la vida y experiencia de los universitarios.

In translation to the American English language, I just said my name, that I’m the Hispanic and Latino/x intern for the Mosaic, as well as my major and my main interest. Those two sentences took about half an hour to write. If you’re fluent in written Spanish, you can perhaps see the mistakes I made. I search endlessly through search engines and Spanish websites to ensure that my grammar is at least decent. In English, that’s lesser of an issue.

I was born in Puebla, México and immigrated to the United States with my mother at trés meses. I already knew that I was an undocumented immigrant, along with other members of my “nuclear” family (Side note: I found out what nuclear family meant this past weekend and it’s quite a weird concept). It was no biggie – my family had their life and other folks had theirs. We kept a sharper eye at the skin tones of police officers and the immigration Q&As on Univisión Noticias than others. It was normal. Normal.

My hermanos, 19 and 14, are American-born and, as my dad likes to put it, malagredecidos. They’re enjoying the American experience and the benefits of health insurance, an American passport, and citizenship. Aren’t they lucky, huh?

I applied to colleges, the first in my family, and got stuff done. I didn’t know how money worked nor how much it was but I went for it. During my sophomore year in high school, my sister and I applied for and were granted I-765 work permits and deportation deferral through DACA. I worked full-time for slightly above minimum wage – $7.80 at the time – because I had the ability to speak (decent) Spanish. I worked full-time, every week, from October 2013 to August 2015. Then, my mother revived her Permanent Residency application that was filed in 1993, back before the time of any children, with a costly lawyer during my junior year.

El trío was granted residency status in March 2015. We spent more than dos mil dólares por persona. I helped my older sister in funding the federal “forgiveness” fee, biometric fees, application fees, and lawyer costs. I came to UMBC, paid for my first semester with the dos mil that was left in my bank account and whatever leftover money the federal and state government had (and none from UMBC at the time).

Fast forward, I’m working several jobs here at UMBC, living financially unstable, enduring discriminatory and injusto practices and cultures, and still worried about several loved ones. Mi familia transverses the six of us. I acknowledge that the 1993 case was a life (and deportation) savior for most of my family.  I acknowledge the ability to live in lesser fear. I want you to acknowledge that getting benefits and “security” is not always truest to their words. I want you to acknowledge that la experiencia de un inmigrante no ha cambiado y la guerra para igualdad sigue más fuerte que nunca. Yo quiero lo más mejor por mis padres, mis parientes, y esos de la misma o peor experiencia. Tú eres querido, importante, y vital en este mundo. Y en el fin, yo asciendo por la guerra, por la gente, por mi gente, y por vos.

¿Necesita ayuda con la traducción? Need assistance with translation? Visit http://www.spanishdict.com/

I rise for our undocumented people whose voices are silenced. Our voices are silenced as soon as we internalize the belief that living in the shadows is our best chance at assimilating. We know this is oppression, but it keeps us relatively safe from deportation, discrimination, prejudice and their ripple effects that wound our families and spirits of life. Essentially, our shelter in the shadows is living fear in silence.

Like many of the 11 million undocumented immigrants in this country, I was born on the “wrong” side of the border. My home country is Mexico, Mexico City where I recollect 7 years worth of wonderful countryside memories with my mom’s family. I also vividly remember my crises of identity when I realized I was the abandoned child in the family. As a single mother and head of the household, my mom worked vehemently with a desperate heart for our reunion. In 2005, “coyotes” brought me over the border, across grasslands and from underground housing networks to my mother-daughter reunion. While we did bond effortlessly, I was well aware of my suppressed resentment toward my mom’s decision; a decision I felt placed me in a deeper crisis of identity than ever before. After many reflections and questions, I have come to understand and respect her valiant decision.

Shortly after making peace with the decision that flipped my world on its head, the 2016 election happened. I could not stop crying. Feelings of betrayal, anxiety, and confusion pained my mind and body. Then, everything changed when my dear friend asked me to speak out. You see, I am an immigrant with privilege in this country. DACA temporarily protects me from deportation, and it grants me permission to work here. Most importantly, it gives way for the peace of mind many undocumented immigrants are very likely to never experience. I am an immigrant with privilege.

When my dear friend asked me to advocate and organize for change, it dawned on me that I could no longer remain silent. Had I rejected her hand for help, I would have done a great injustice to her, my loved ones, our fighters in the shadows, and myself.

 “I rise for social justice” seems such a simple idea. The fact that one person deserves basic human rights is a very controversial topic, but should it be? In my opinion, everyone should have access to these rights, including life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. These ideals are very vague, yet we see these ideals throughout the left/ progressive movement. Life, or free healthcare for all, liberty, the choice to do with your body as you wish, and the pursuit of happiness, going to college if that’s what you wish for a reduced cost. Unfortunately, there are a few of us are very interested in controlling whatever possible. It’s ironic how they want less government control in their lives, yet seem to enforce their laws wherever they go. 

This is an example of a social injustice, which is something that “SJW’s” (Social Justice Warriors) and feminists fight against. I have been a feminist all my life, even fighting with parents whenever they said something inappropriate. Social Justice is something that everyone deserves, not just the societal elite and white people. These marginalised groups are exactly why I put #BLM or Black Lives Matter in my photo. 

Overall, everyone needs to realise that just because someone is different than you, doesn’t mean you should treat them differently or discriminate/segregate them from yourself. That’s one of the things I love about UMBC, it’s a very diverse and inclusive campus. With the exception of a few of us, that see the world through a different lens, this campus is a bubble of love.