SAP Concur Launch Week: Day Three!

We're keeping the momentum going as we continue to roll out SAP Concur!

Join us today from 9:30–11:00 AM for virtual support on Webex — our team is here to answer your questions and help you get comfortable using the new system.
Join the session (this is not a training) 

Today's Highlight: Travel Discounts

We are thrilled to announce that Ed Kelly has been awarded the October DoIT Gritty Award! This well-deserved recognition celebrates his outstanding contributions to the Division of Information Technology (DoIT) over his remarkable 18-year tenure at UMBC.

The Gritty Award is given to DoIT employees and teams who exemplify outstanding work and go above and beyond, and Ed has certainly done both. His dedication, expertise, and collaborative spirit have made a lasting, invaluable impact on critical university systems and student services.

Recognizing Exceptional Contributions

Throughout his career, Ed has been instrumental in numerous strategic projects, earning the admiration of his colleagues as a trusted team member. What truly sets him apart is his unselfish willingness and ability to share knowledge, mentoring countless individuals across UMBC, UMGC, and Io Consulting. Early in his career as an EPIC PeopleSoft Technical Trainer, he even achieved a kind of "celebrity" status, known and respected for his passion for teaching and practical tips.

His foundational and ongoing work is what keeps many of UMBC's most important systems compliant and functional.

Key Highlights of Ed's Impact

Ed's technical prowess and steady leadership have been critical to the success of several high-profile initiatives:

• PeopleSoft Campus Solutions System Implementation: Ed was a pivotal figure during the challenging implementation of PeopleSoft. Serving as both a consultant and confidant, his expertise was essential in navigating difficult phases, ensuring that Student Administration (SA) continues to operate smoothly today.
• Creation of UMBC's Advising Center: Soon after the PeopleSoft launch, Ed developed the UMBC Advising Center. This resource was ahead of its time, pre-dating the widespread "Student Success" movement. For over 15 years, it has centralized key advising information, creating significant efficiencies for the advising community. It remains a dynamic tool, recently enhanced with automated advising notes.
• Personalized Student Experience via myUMBC: Ed designed the underlying data mechanics and logic that allows myUMBC to deliver a personalized student experience. His development of APIs also facilitated profile sharing, addressing long-standing access concerns. As Collier Jones from the myUMBC team puts it, "Ed is the bomb—without his expertise... we wouldn't be where we are today."
• Transcript Ordering System: Ed engineered the transcript ordering process, allowing alumni, students, and former students to efficiently request, pay for, and receive transcripts. This system generates between $70,000 and $100,000 annually for UMBC.
• Incomplete Grade Agreement: Ed created the functionality for the "Incomplete Grade Agreement," which helps students and faculty manage the process of converting an "I" (Incomplete) grade to a final grade. This resolved a long-standing issue caused by unclear communication or unavailable instructors.
• Ongoing SA Framework and Maintenance: An often unseen but crucial contribution is the foundational framework Ed developed. This framework allows the SA team to seamlessly apply routine image and regulatory updates, keeping all systems compliant and functional.

For his eighteen years of Grit, dedication, and invaluable service to UMBC and DoIT, we are proud to present Ed Kelly with the DoIT Gritty Award. Congratulations, Ed!

The Gritty Award is in recognition of outstanding work within the Division and beyond. Full-time DoIT employees, DoIT student employees, and teams are eligible to be nominated for going above and beyond! Anyone in DoIT can nominate someone for the Gritty by completing this short Gritty Nomination Form. 

The DoIT Community & The DoIT Gritty Committee

Erica D'Eramo

Ada Crutchfield

Andrew Shebest

Anthony Finneran

Carlos McKinney

Daniel Loftus

Dave Souder

David Toothe

Debbie Michaels

Dondre Hatef

Josh Abrams

Khalil Alston

SAP Concur Launch Week: Day Two!

We're here to help as you get started in the new travel system, SAP Concur.
Join us today from 9:00–11:00 AM and 12:00–2:00 PM — we'll be live in the UC Lobby in front of the Center for Global Engagement (Room 207) and also available virtually on Webex for one-on-one support.

If you can't make it in person or online, you can always email us your questions at travel@umbc.edu.

In addition, SAP Concur provides User Support Desk assistance directly to all UMBC travelers. You can access it right within Concur for help with system navigation or troubleshooting.

And don't forget to visit our new website at travel.umbc.edu for the Interim Travel Policy, FAQs, discounts, training links, and more.

View original post here.

Over a thousand students gathered at the UMBC campus and virtually for the 11th annual hackUMBC. It was a fun, snack-fueled 24-hour competition where teams built innovative apps and tools to solve problems important to them.

The Division of Information Technology (DoIT) sponsored a special challenge track called the Data Science Track: Best Student Insight Hack. Most innovative solution using a knowledge graph of simulated academic student data. The track boasted a much-desired prize: a brand-new Nintendo Switch 2 bundled with Mario Kart World!

Out of 18 projects, the big winner of the DoIT Data Science track was Ruben Finkel for his project called "StudyCompass." Ruben is a senior at Pikesville High School and is currently applying to computer science BS programs. This was his first hackathon experience, and he was excited to see the whole room full of coders in Engineering Lecture Hall 1. He described the 24-hour hackathon as grueling, intense, and energized by many Red Bulls. Throughout the first hour, he kept coming back to the idea that he wanted to design something that would help students like himself. Then he began building his project off this idea, which developed into his creation of an AI Guidance Counselor. 

Left to right: Isabella Golster, Logan Montgomery, Ruben Finkel, Jason Paluck, and Todd Haddaway. 

StudyCompass: Like Having a Personally Trained Guidance Counselor on Your Laptop

What exactly is StudyCompass? Think of it as a digital guidance counselor. It's a web tool that helps you plan your classes and fix your study habits so you can do your absolute best in school.

Ruben was inspired because he felt like many students in large schools don't get enough one-on-one time with their guidance counselors. He wanted to build the perfect tool he wished he had.

What StudyCompass does:

• Checks Your Studying: It looks at how you study and gives you advice on how to study smarter, not just harder.
• Tracks Your Grades: It helps you keep an eye on how you're doing in your courses.
• Plans Your Future: It can make a personalized road map of the classes you should take, even telling you which classes are harder or more important for your major.

Study Compass Short Demo Video

Ruben used simulated university data provided by DoIT to make StudyCompass smart enough to help students with their real-world problems.

Shoutout to the DoIT Team

The hackUMBC event wouldn't have been possible without the people in DoIT who set up the challenge!

A group of people, including Jason Paluck, Todd Haddaway, Logan Montgomery, and Erica D'Eramo, worked hard to create the Data Science track. Jason came up with the highly detailed challenge, giving everyone data and great ideas. Todd was the superhero who stayed up until 2 a.m. on a Sunday morning to answer questions and help the students as they worked! Logan, who had been to hackUMBC before, gave the team tips on what the student hackers would need. Stacy Cahill, the Chief Information Security Officer, stopped by to cheer on the students!

Great job, hackUMBC organizers!

The DoIT team is thankful for the impressive coordination and leadership of all of the hackUMBC leaders and volunteers. A special shout-out to Isabella Goltser, the president of hackUMBC and a computer science major, and Jay Gepilano, the Design Team Lead and a computer science major and double minor in bioinformatics and Gender & Women's Studies. Their assistance in making our track happen during the hackathon is greatly appreciated!

Check out more about how HackUMBC goes virtual in a big way, attracting over 1,000 students!

In a world where AI is becoming commonplace, students are learning how and when to navigate these tools. Each student should follow their professor's guidance in regarding to the use of AI in their courses. UMBC's enterprise license for Google Workspace means the basic features of Google Gemini AI are available to all UMBC users free of charge. Importantly, the information you type into the free version of Gemini AI is protected for Level 1 data, which is data not considered public. This could include internal communications and non-sensitive administrative data. 

Resources:

• Access Point: Visit gemini.google.com to use the free version, which is protected for Level 1 data.
• Enablement Toolkit: Gemini for Education and NotebookLM
• UMBC Gen AI FAQ
• UMBC Google Gemini FAQ  

We all use the Google Suite in the form of our emails, docs, spreadsheets, and presentations on the daily. While these tools are awesome on their own, there are a ton of advanced features and hidden gems in the suite that you might not be taking full advantage of (or maybe haven't even heard about). Here's a quick look at some of these under-the-radar tools, features, and applications that could seriously boost your productivity, whether you're working or studying.

Applications

Google Tasks 

'Find a Time'  in Google Calendar

Struggling with busy schedules not lining up? Calendar can automatically find a time where all participants are available for an event with guests. 

Under 'more options', the Find a Time menu shows all guest schedules side-by-side. 

For additional help with Calendar, please consult the Calendar Help Center 

Gmail Tasks Integration

Gmail has a useful integration with the previously mentioned Tasks application, allowing you to turn an email into a task. 

After opening an important email, simply click on the checkmark in the top bar. The email will automatically be marked on your tasks To-Do lists. 

For more help with Gmail, please consult the Gmail Help Center

Google Drive's PDF to Doc Conversion

With only a few clicks, you can instantly open a PDF file in Google Docs for editing. 

Within Google Drive, left click on a PDF file, select 'open with', and choose Google Docs. The 'open with' feature is also available at the top of your screen when directly viewing a PDF through drive. 

Google Calendar Daily Email Brief

Google Calendar offers the useful feature of delivering your tasks for the day as a daily email brief, and enabling it is quite simple. 

Through the settings menu on Google Calendar, under 'settings for my calendars', the option can be found in the 'other notifications' category.

For additional help with Calendar, please consult the Calendar Help Center 

Behind every student is an educator wielding technology tools that can help make success happen! The Academic Success Center (ASC) and the Division of Information Technology (DoIT) have collaborated on a comprehensive initiative to streamline academic support services, making it easier for undergraduate students, faculty, and staff to connect, refer, and track student success. This effort, which involves new software integrations and custom-built systems, aims to enhance academic advocacy, academic support appointment scheduling, and early academic alert notifications.

How do we streamline student academic support at UMBC? We listen to the students and understand what they need to thrive in an academic environment like UMBC. From tutoring to tailored advice from a trusted Academic Advocate, the Academic Success Center has become the center of academic support for undergraduate students, staff, and faculty. With the ASC's centralized and highly visible hub on the 1st floor of the AOK Library, students know where to look for support, and staff and faculty staff are easily able to refer a student for assistance. Since its opening in 2019, the Academic Success Center staff and peer educators have played a role in over 16,000 individual students' experiences at UMBC. 

The Division of Information Technology worked with the ASC team behind the scenes to establish three support systems:  

1. TracCloud Integration for Easy Scheduling of Academic Support
2. Early Academic Alerts
3. Custom System Powers Academic Advocacy

1. TracCloud Integration for Easy Scheduling of Academic Support

Together, the ASC and DoIT have integrated an outside vendor's web application, TracCloud, to simplify appointment scheduling for academic support. All of the ASC's academic peer support options are scheduled through TracCloud, including course tutoring, SI PASS, Writing Center, and Academic Skills Meetings. Students can easily search for support and manage their appointments online. 

The new system is integrated directly with the university's PeopleSoft SA (Student Administration), a Student Information System, ensuring that students are easily connected to relevant academic support resources for the specific courses they are currently enrolled in. Furthermore, the use of single sign-on (SSO) through myUMBC provides a convenient and secure user experience. 

2. Early Academic Alerts

Early Academic Alerts are proactive notifications that instructors send directly to students through myUMBC. Academic Alerts are intended as an early intervention to notify students who are at risk of earning a D or F grade in a currently enrolled course, to provide them with the necessary support and resources to succeed.

By alerting students early in the semester, students have the ability to utilize the various supports available, make the necessary changes to improve their grade before the end of the term, and achieve their highest potential.

This alert system is integrated with PeopleSoft SA, the software suite managing student records and course information. This integration provides a platform for instructors to efficiently access class rosters and provide timely notifications to students and their advisors when concerns arise regarding student academic progress. Formerly the First-Year Intervention Program, UMBC rebranded the alerts system in 2020, from focusing solely on students in their first year to include all undergraduate students, with approximately 65% of faculty sections reporting over 4,000 alerts each semester.

3. Custom System Powers Academic Advocacy 

A third key component is the launch of a unique and custom-built system dedicated to Academic Advocacy. This platform provides Academic Advocates with critical information about student success metrics. Academic Advocates are dedicated to serving undergraduate degree-seeking students to assist them in resolving academic and institutional challenges that may adversely affect persistence, progression, and timely completion of degree.

Undergraduate students identified, or those referred, who may be experiencing barriers to graduation will receive direct outreach from an Academic Advocate to address issues in a timely manner. No matter how complex the concerns (i.e., personal, academic, or financial), Academic Advocates will work together with students to review their progress, present options toward graduation, map out a plan for success, and facilitate communication and connections with the appropriate resources.

Crucially, the system allows any member of the campus community—faculty, staff, or students—to easily refer a student to an Academic Advocate. Once a referral is made, the Academic Advocate will connect with the student to provide timely and necessary support, seamlessly coordinating resources across various campus departments to address the student's needs. Students can easily identify who their assigned Academic Advocate is starting on the first day of class, as the information is front and center on each student's myUMBC profile, another DoIT provided platform. 

"By streamlining these three student support systems, students, faculty, and staff can easily access resources. Additionally, UMBC can track and assess the usage and impact of these initiatives, allowing for data-informed decision-making." 
~ Delana Gregg, Assistant Vice Provost, UG Academic Affairs

Successes by the Numbers

In 2024-2025, the ASC recorded significant engagement from students. The total number of visits to the center was 26,303, with 12,002 of those being tutoring visits. There were also 12,441 Supplemental Instruction/Peer-Assisted Study Sessions (SI PASS) visits. In total, the center supported 4,150 individual students. The ASC also noted a positive trend, with 915 more visits to its services in Fall 2024 compared to Fall 2023. The center connected with 1,689 students through Academic Advocates and worked on 872 student petitions.

For more detailed information, please check out the Academic Success Center's Annual Report.

The success of these initiatives is due in part to the collaborations between the Academic Success Center and the Division of Information Technology, but most importantly, the work of these two groups has facilitated all UMBC community members' contributions to student success! The Academic Success Center and DoIT's clear alignment with UMBC's strategic plan and campus collaborations helps each student achieve their academic goals!

Hello UMBC Community!

The Cybersecurity Assurance and Digital Trust Department in the Division of Information Technology has some tips for you to stay safe from financial scams that have recently taken place.

Attackers send phishing emails to trick unsuspecting victims into providing their user ID, password, and multifactor codes. Often, these phishing lures contain a link that redirects the user to a login page.

DoIT has observed cases where the attackers are mirroring legitimate login screens to capture credentials and multifactor authentication (MFA) codes in real time. The only indicator that something is amiss is the URL in the address bar.

Follow these general tips to safeguard your financial data and funds:

1. Use Strong & Unique Passwords: Never reuse your UMBC password on other platforms — including financial services such as BankMobile. Create unique passwords for each separate account.
2. Periodically Verify Your Personal Information: Log into your accounts and make sure all your information, such as linked financial accounts, billing address, phone number, and email addresses are correct.
3. Check the Link: Look over URLs and ensure you are accessing a trusted service. If you see a login page but the URL does not look legitimate, do not provide your password or MFA codes. It is best practice to bookmark trusted services to navigate to them directly.
4. Don't Give Away Your Secrets: UMBC and your financial institutions will never call, email, or text you to ask for your password or MFA codes.

If you give someone your password and MFA codes, you are handing them the keys to your account. This could result in financial loss or unauthorized activity for which you may be held responsible.

If you see something, say something! Report all phishing emails to security@umbc.edu.

Stay smart, stay safe!