[Tune in every 2 weeks for Library Staff Highlights!]

Name: Sarah New

Hometown: Bel Air, MD, USA

Alma Mater: University of Virginia

Well there is no need to splurge on an expensive bike on a college student's budget. The perfect solution is the RetrieverFleet! The program is free (unless renting overnight) and consists of 6 Diamondback bikes!

How does it work?

You hand your UMBC I.D. to the RAC staff and check out a bike—they come with locks and helmets. Bikes are due back to the RAC 15 minutes before closing time to avoid the overnight charge.

Need the bike for more than one day?

The program allows for overnight rentals at the rate of $17 per day and the first day is free. 

Author: Uyen Nguyen, OCSS Sustainability Outreach Intern

Through our PROMISE AGEP collaborations with the World Engineering Education Forum (WEEF), and the Student Platform for Engineering Education Development (World SPEED), you are being invited to apply for  MIT’s “Education DesignShop”  the sponsored by MIT’s Office of Digital Learning. The program is slated to employ “design thinking” and “user-centered design” to address three distinct topics:

1) Curriculum Re-Design for STE(A)M – Science, Technology, Engineering, (Arts), and Mathematics

2) Motivational Structures In & Out of the Classroom

3) Resources and Support Structures for Retention & Diversity

Slots are limited. This program is free. The leader of the program has asked that we encourage you to apply. They learned about PROMISE at the 2013 WEEF Conference in Cartagena, Colombia, and through meetings of the International Federation of Engineering Education Societies.

This is a unique opportunity to “think outside of the box” and have some, new, and different experiences. Please apply:

http://edudesignshop.mit.edu/apply.html.

_________________________________

Related: 

About WEEF 2014: http://weef2014.org/

Through our PROMISE AGEP collaborations with the World Engineering Education Forum (WEEF), and the Student Platform for Engineering Education Development (World SPEED), you are being invited to apply for  MIT’s “Education DesignShop”  the sponsored by MIT’s Office of Digital Learning. The program is slated to employ “design thinking” and “user-centered design” to address three distinct topics:

1) Curriculum Re-Design for STE(A)M – Science, Technology, Engineering, (Arts), and Mathematics

2) Motivational Structures In & Out of the Classroom

3) Resources and Support Structures for Retention & Diversity

Slots are limited. This program is free. The leader of the program has asked that we encourage you to apply. They learned about PROMISE at the 2013 WEEF Conference in Cartagena, Colombia, and through meetings of the International Federation of Engineering Education Societies.

This is a unique opportunity to “think outside of the box” and have some, new, and different experiences. Please apply:

http://edudesignshop.mit.edu/apply.html.

_________________________________

Related: 

About WEEF 2014: http://weef2014.org/

This year, SGA's Prove It! grant competition features many student groups looking to create real change on campus.  On the week of March 24-28, UMBC students will vote for the grant proposals they like the most.  The two winning ideas will receive $10,000 to implement their programs on campus.

One of the campaigns that students can vote for is Veteran Peer Mentor Program.

The student veteran population is one of the fastest growing populations at UMBC.

A solid support system at UMBC has not yet been developed to meet all their needs.

We need to implement a Veteran Peer Mentor Program to help meet those needs and provide the camaraderie many vets miss after leaving the military.

 Transitioning veterans to be successful students adds a valuable resource and benefit to the whole UMBC community.

Having veterans adds depth and diversity to the student body. Veterans are an incredibly team oriented, resilient, and motivated group of individuals.  They bring unique perspectives to the classroom from their experiences.  They understand the importance of cooperation, having been used to working in close-knit teams in the military; their peers were sometimes the difference between life and death.

Their military training prepared them to handle life and death situations but not how to transition to being a college student.  When a veteran doesn't feel connected to their university they may be more inclined to leave school.  Student veterans do not respond to traditional methods of outreach.  A Veteran Peer Mentor Program will enable veterans to achieve a higher level of academic success and smoothly transition to student life which not only benefits veterans but the entire UMBC community

Veterans have invested in our nation.  Now it’s our turn to invest in them.  Vote for the Veteran Peer Mentor Program on the Prove It! poll at http://my.umbc.edu/discussions/11313

1. The WT2014 Bb server will be taken completely offline on Friday, 3/21.
2. WT2013 courses will be restored on the UMBC Bb production server. We encourage you to download a copy of your grade center, and any other content that you might need to your local machine. If instructors have students finishing incomplete grades, and students must have continuing access to their WT2014 course over spring break, the instructors should put in an RT ticket request prior to Thursday, March 20.

Thank you for your patience during this transition.

As part of our ongoing commitment to security, the Unix Infrastructure will be conducting its quarterly patching of systems.  While many of the systems will be patched without any service disruption, there are several systems which require the downtime of key services.  The schedule below outlines which key services will be offline and for how long.

Monday March 17th, 9am to 1pm

• myUMBC lite page will be up resulting in  reduced myUMBC functionality

• The sites (wordpress) web hosting environment will be down

• The new web hosting environment will be down (pages will be available but any database calls will not work)

• All HFS (user) servers will be down

• Student mySQL databases will be offline

Tuesday March 18th, 9am to 1pm

• RT will be down

• Userpages will be down

• Wiki will be down

• R25 will be down

• License5 will be down (autodesk, cadence, idl, schrodinger, xilinx)

• Student mySQL databases will be offline

• Perseus will be down

There will be no data loss during the outage and no user action is required prior to the downtime. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact the Technology Support Center at x53838.

Do you like competing? Do you love being green? Do you love recycling? If you answered yes to any of these questions, you’ll love RecycleMania!

What is RecycleMania?

It is an annual 8-week competition between universities to see who can recycle the most! Sounds fun right? So go around and grab all your recyclables (and your friends) and help our school win!

RecycleMania is not just a competition; it’s also a great way to educate people about recycling. There are plenty of events to attend like the RecycleMania Parade and “Regames” which feature giveaways and musical performances!

For more information on events and scheduling, visit http://my.umbc.edu/groups/sustainability/news/39998 . If you still are not interested, maybe checking out their website will help? Just give it a try and recycle when you can!

Our PROMISE AGEP: Maryland Transformation (PROMISE: AGEP-T) project invites you to save the dates for two big events coming this spring and summer:

Saturday, May 3, 2014: PROMISE AGEP Family and Friends Celebration of Graduates Cookout

PROMISE Cookout and Celebration of Graduates 2013

Register for the PROMISE Friends and Family Cookout and Celebration of Graduates:

Centennial Park – Pavilion D

Main/South Entrance

10000 Route 108

Columbia, MD 21042

Directions:
Main/South
PDF | Google Maps

Boat rentals will be available for an additional charge (See rates for paddle boats, kayaks, canoes, etc. so that you can plan accordingly. http://countyofhowardmd.us/Departments.aspx?id=6442456361.)

_____________________________________

Saturday, August 16, 2014: PROMISE AGEP Summer Success Institute (SSI)

SSI 2013, Top to bottom: 1) Session on planning for the professoriate with Dr. Christine Grant, 2) Webinar with Coursera’s Co-founder Dr. Andrew Ng, 3) Postdoctoral opportunities with NIH’s Dr. Jaron Lockett.

See information about these annual activities from past events:

• Cookout 2013: http://promiseagep.wordpress.com/2013/04/01/save-these-springsummer-dates-may-4-cookout-july-9-12-dissertation-house-august-16-17-ssi/
• Cookout 2012: http://promiseagep.wordpress.com/2012/04/12/promise-friends-family-celebration-of-graduates-cookout-sat-may-5-2012/
• SSI 2013 (Agenda & Information): http://promiseagep.wordpress.com/2013/06/21/promise-summer-success-institute-ssi-10th-anniversary-celebration-august-16-17-2013-in-baltimore/
• SSI: 2012 (Agenda & Information): http://promiseagep.wordpress.com/2012/06/29/2012-summer-success-institute-august-17-18-2012-umbc-the-hotel-at-arundel-preserve/

Our PROMISE AGEP: Maryland Transformation (PROMISE: AGEP-T) project invites you to save the dates for two big events coming this spring and summer:

Saturday, May 3, 2014: PROMISE AGEP Family and Friends Celebration of Graduates Cookout

PROMISE Cookout and Celebration of Graduates 2013

Register for the PROMISE Friends and Family Cookout and Celebration of Graduates:

Centennial Park – Pavilion D

Main/South Entrance

10000 Route 108

Columbia, MD 21042

Directions:
Main/South
PDF | Google Maps

Boat rentals will be available for an additional charge (See rates for paddle boats, kayaks, canoes, etc. so that you can plan accordingly. http://countyofhowardmd.us/Departments.aspx?id=6442456361.)

_____________________________________

Saturday, August 16, 2014: PROMISE AGEP Summer Success Institute (SSI)

SSI 2013, Top to bottom: 1) Session on planning for the professoriate with Dr. Christine Grant, 2) Webinar with Coursera’s Co-founder Dr. Andrew Ng, 3) Postdoctoral opportunities with NIH’s Dr. Jaron Lockett.

See information about these annual activities from past events:

• Cookout 2013: https://promiseagep.wordpress.com/2013/04/01/save-these-springsummer-dates-may-4-cookout-july-9-12-dissertation-house-august-16-17-ssi/
• Cookout 2012: https://promiseagep.wordpress.com/2012/04/12/promise-friends-family-celebration-of-graduates-cookout-sat-may-5-2012/
• SSI 2013 (Agenda & Information): https://promiseagep.wordpress.com/2013/06/21/promise-summer-success-institute-ssi-10th-anniversary-celebration-august-16-17-2013-in-baltimore/
• SSI: 2012 (Agenda & Information): https://promiseagep.wordpress.com/2012/06/29/2012-summer-success-institute-august-17-18-2012-umbc-the-hotel-at-arundel-preserve/