Greetings Residential Retrievers--
We can hardly believe that October is here! As we enter a new month, we want to provide you with some important residential updates.
Important Dates
- October 1, 2022 | Spring Student Success Scholarship Opens on Scholarship Retriever
- October 6, 2022 | True Grits Festi-Fall Celebration
- Week of October 2, 2022 | Health & Safety Inspections (see below)
- October 7-16, 2022 | Homecoming & Family Weekend
- October 12, 2022 | Sign Up for the Pesto Teaching Kitchen
- October 23, 2022 | Spring Student Success Scholarship Deadline
Health & Safety Inspections
Residential Life values the co-creation of a safe environment in every residential community. It is the responsibility of every resident to ensure that they are contributing to a safe and healthy environment in their residence by:
- committing to community standards set at the beginning of each year with their floor
- reviewing and adhering to the Residential Life Rights and Responsibilities Guide,
- submitting requests for facility maintenance
It is the responsibility of Residential Life staff to educate residents through positive, personal contact, maintain the residential facilities and conduct health and safety checks in residential rooms intermittently throughout the semester to identify health and safety issues in a timely way. These issues could include facility issues, fire safety, and the presence of prohibited items.
This semester, Residential Life staff will be conducting these health and safety inspections on the week of October 2, 2022. Residents are not expected to be present during the inspection, but if you would like to be please contact your RA to schedule a time.
If concerns or issues are found in your room, you will receive notification via email. Please review the email and follow the instructions for correcting the issues in advance of a reinspection. Failure to correct the issues by the reinspection date, outlined in the email, may result in Student Conduct Action.
If you have questions about these inspections, please contact your Resident Assistant or Community Director.
Mail & Package Reminders
Residential students are encouraged to have mail and standard packages delivered directly to their residential community during. All residents are assigned a mailbox and combination that they will share with their roommate(s). If you have misplaced your combination you can ask the Community Desk for assistance.
Students commonly report that they have received notice from the shipper that their package has been delivered, but it is not immediately available for in-community pick up. This is most often due to misdelivery of packages by third-party carriers. For this reason, we highly encourage students to include the name of their residential community desk in the shipping address (ex. Apartment Community Center or Harbor Community Desk) to ensure packages are directed to their communities rather than Central Receiving or another UMBC building. Mail should be addressed like the example below to avoid delays or loss:
Your Name
Community Desk Name
Room/Apartment # Number
UMBC, 1000 Hilltop Circle
Baltimore, Maryland 21250
Mail and packages that are not addressed for a current residential student and/or a residential facility may be refused by staff at Campus Card & Mail Services, Central Receiving, or Residential Life community desks.
When items are misdelivered by carriers, we ask for student's patience as Campus Card & Mail Services, Central Receiving, and Residential Life staff work to redirect, deliver, and log packages appropriately. This can take up to 3 business days.
For more information about mail and package procedures please visit https://reslife.umbc.edu/rlexperience/procedures/
Residential Hall Community Kitchen Updates
We are excited to share that we will begin reintroducing communal cookware into our residence hall ground floor community kitchens in Chesapeake, Susquehanna, Patapsco and Potomac Halls. During the pandemic items were removed from these kitchens to help minimize the spread of COVID-19 and had to be checked out at Community Desks.
With the reintroduction of items like pots, pans, and other cookware we wanted to remind students of expectations for using these items:
- Clean and sanitize items after use. Dish soap will be provided to ensure you are able to clean the items.
- Return dried items to the location in which you found them.
- Ensure that any spills or any other mess is cleaned.
- Lost, stolen, or damaged items will not be replaced during the academic year.
Again, please keep in mind that this addition to the communal kitchens is a privilege. Reports of misuse of the items and/or the space may result in the revocation of these items.
Student Success Scholarship
The purpose of the Student Success Scholarship is to assist current residential life students who demonstrate significant financial need to remain on-campus residents, who may otherwise be unable to afford housing during the academic year. The scholarship is supported by Residential Life. Award funds are for the following semester. If you are applying in fall, the funds would be applied for the spring semester housing balance. Several scholarships may be awarded each semester. Funds will vary based on eligibility and will range from full semester housing costs to partial semester housing costs, not to exceed the cost of a double room.
The application is open on Scholarship Retriever from October 1-23 for Spring Awards.
For questions or concerns please contact your Resident Assistant or Community Director. We hope you have a wonderful day!
Residential Life Staff