June 8, 2011

Contact
Chelsea Haddaway
Communications Manager
410-455-6380
chaddaway@umbc.edu

Three faculty members from the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) psychology department have been awarded a $3,000 grant by the American Psychological Association to increase the diversity “pipeline” into the field of psychology. The project, called ASPIRE (Applied Social Psychology Intensive Research Experience), is funded through an implementation grant overseen by the APA’s Office of Ethnic Minority Affairs.

Shawn Bediako, associate professor of psychology, will serve as the lead investigator. Danielle Beatty, assistant professor of psychology, and Adia Garrett Butler, psychology lecturer, will serve as co-investigators.

The aim of the project is to provide high school juniors from Baltimore City schools with an intensive, mentored research experience during the 2011-2012 school year. Bediako expects that the program will benefit the students in several ways. “While the initial focus is on increasing each student’s aptitude in the social sciences, we expect that the majority of ASPIRE participants will eventually begin their college careers as psychology majors,” he said.

“Youth in urban school settings have limited exposure to the social sciences, which makes them less likely to consider majoring in psychology,” agreed Beatty. “If we can get them interested and prepared in the discipline during their high school years, then we can hopefully get them involved in conducting research much earlier in their undergraduate experience—and we know that students who are heavily involved in research are more likely to be accepted into graduate programs.”

Bediako said that one goal of the program is to increase the number of minority students who pursue graduate degrees and careers in psychology, noting that many minority students who study psychology at the undergraduate level do not pursue graduate work. “Clearly, as you go farther up the career ladder in psychology, there are fewer and fewer people of color. With this project, we want to approach this problem by doing things that will increase the talent pool so that the other programs and initiatives that occur later in the academic trajectory will have a critical mass of individuals with whom to work,” he said.

Bediako, who received funding from the National Science Foundation to bring the 16th annual Black Graduate Conference in Psychology to UMBC last summer, will work with Beatty and Butler to initiate the ASPIRE program with a cohort of high school juniors from Baltimore City Public Schools. The students will meet after school twice a month and complete didactic training in the responsible conduct of research, research methods and statistics and scientific writing and dissemination. Students chosen to participate in the program will receive a stipend and will present their independent research at one of the local science fairs endorsed by the BCPS and at an inaugural ASPIRE Symposium, which is planned for the spring.

About UMBC
UMBC balances a deep commitment to undergraduate education with its rapid development as a distinguished public research university. For the second year in a row, U.S. News & World Report recognized UMBC as the top university in the nation on a list of “Up-and-Coming” schools to watch. The Princeton Review and Kiplingers recently ranked UMBC among the “best values” among public universities in the nation, recognizing educational excellence with affordability. UMBC offers undergraduates an honors university experience with special learning opportunities traditionally found at small liberal arts colleges and is building one of the most inclusive graduate education communities in the nation. For more information, visit www.umbc.edu or contact Chelsea Haddaway, 410-455-6380 or chaddaway@umbc.edu.

About the American Psychological Association
Based in Washington, D.C., the American Psychological Association (APA) is a scientific and professional organization that represents psychology in the United States. With more than 154,000 members, APA is the largest association of psychologists worldwide. The mission of the APA is to advance the creation, communication and application of psychological knowledge to benefit society and improve people’s lives.

The APA Office of Ethnic Minority Affairs convenes a Committee on Ethnic Minority Recruitment, Retention and Training to award the Implementation Grants to various institutions through a competitive application and review process. The ASPIRE proposal was among four applications approved for funding in the Applied Experiences and Service Learning priority area.

Exhibition Organized by UMBC's Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture and Curated by Maurice Berger

Contact: Thomas Moore
Director of Arts Management
410-455-3370
tmoore@umbc.edu

This release is available as a pdf file.

For All the World to See: Visual Culture on the Struggle for Civil Rights has been selected as the tenth exhibition of the "NEH on the Road" initiative, a new project of the National Endowment for the Humanities. The exhibition was organized by UMBC's Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture (CADVC) in partnership with the Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture.

NEH on the Road is designed to create wider national access to the ideas, themes, and stories explored in major grant-funded NEH exhibitions. Under the direction of project director Dr. Maurice Berger, research professor and chief curator of the CADVC, the initiative will adapt the exhibition in a smaller, lower security version and travel it to up to thirty-five more venues, mostly smaller and mid-size institutions across the country over a five-year period from 2012 to 2017. Participation in NEH on the Road will greatly broaden the audience for For All the World to See and will widely disseminate its messages about the power of visual culture to change the world.

John Jeffries, dean of the College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences at UMBC, commented, "We congratulate the Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture for this extraordinary achievement. For All the World to See, which has already toured to New York, Chicago, and opens this week at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C., and which has been named the Outstanding Exhibition in a University Art Museum for 2010 by the Association of Art Museum Curators, exemplifies UMBC's commitment to the the arts, to public education and to scholarship. We thank the National Endowment for the Humanities for the opportunity to bring For All the World to See to new audiences throughout the country."

Through a rich juxtaposition of visual images--including photographs, television and film clips, magazines, newspapers, books, pamphlets and posters--For All the World to See is the first comprehensive attempt to demonstrate how visual culture helped to transform prevailing attitudes toward race in America in the period of the modern civil rights movement. The project, which includes an exhibition, companion book, and comprehensive website, demonstrates the extent to which the rise of the modern civil rights movement paralleled the birth of television and the popularity of picture magazines and other forms of visual mass media, and traces the gradual introduction of African American faces into those contexts. It demonstrates that efforts to combat racism and segregation were waged not only with fiery speeches and nonviolent protests but also, significantly, with pictures, forever changing the way political movements fought for visibility and recognition.

About NEH on the Road
NEH on the Road is a special initiative of the National Endowment for the Humanities designed to create wider national access to the ideas, themes, and stories explored in major grant-funded NEH exhibitions. The program is funded by the NEH and run by the Mid-America Arts Alliance, a non-profit regional arts organization located in Kansas City, MO. (M-AAA is also known nationally for its other traveling arts exhibition program, ExhibitsUSA.) NEH on the Road exhibitions are adaptations of larger projects vetted and approved by the NEH. Each exhibition is designed to fit within 2,000 square feet and features approximately forty actual objects as well as panels, banners, and other supporting materials. NEH on the Road is envisioned as an opportunity for community organizations to create new connections to the humanities for their audiences.

About the Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture
The Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture is dedicated to the study of contemporary art and visual culture, critical theory, art and cultural history, and the relationship between society and the arts. The CADVC serves as a forum for students, faculty, and the general public for the discussion of important aesthetic and social issues of the day. Disciplines represented include painting, sculpture, drawing, printmaking, photography, digital art, video, film, television, design, architecture, advertising, and installation and performance art.

Since 1989, the CADVC has incorporated a number of public programs into its exhibition programming schedule to further impact the communities it serves. Symposia, lecture series, conferences, film series, visiting artist series, and residencies have all been fundamental in an effort to create an ongoing dialogue about contemporary art and culture. The Center has also initiated a number of projects with Baltimore and surrounding schools to integrate the contemporary artist and their concerns into the classroom. These projects take place on-site at both middle schools and high schools and are team taught by the instructors at these schools, professional artists, and students from the CADVC's Internship Program.

The Center produces one to two exhibition catalogues each year. Each document is fully illustrated and contains critical essays on the given subject by a variety of distinguished professionals in the field. Recent publications include Postmodernism: A Virtual Discussion and Paul Rand: Modernist Design. These books and catalogues are published and are distributed internationally through Distributed Art Publishers.

Since 1992, the Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture has actively pursued the organization of exhibitions that contain the aesthetic, theoretical, and educational potential to reach both a national and international audience. Over the years, the CADVC has traveled these exhibition projects to a broad spectrum of museums, professional non-profit galleries, and universities national and internationally. Recent traveling exhibitions include:

- For All the World to See: Visual Culture and the Struggle for Civil Rights (2010)
- White: Whiteness and Race in Contemporary Art (2003)
- Fred Wilson: Objects and Installations (2001)
- Adrian Piper: A Retrospective (1999)
- Bruno Monguzzi: A Designer's Perspective (1998)
- Minimal Politics (1997)
- Kate Millett, Sculpture: The First 38 Years (1997)

Beyond the scope of these traveling exhibitions, the Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture also undertakes projects such as the Joseph Beuys Tree Partnership. As part of the educational mission of the CADVC, one graduate thesis exhibition and one undergraduate senior exhibition are presented each year. This multi-faceted focus for presenting exhibitions, projects and scholarly research publications focused on contemporary art and cultural issues positions the Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture in a unique position within the mid-Atlantic region.

Public Information
For All the World to See online exhibition: http://www.umbc.edu/cadvc/foralltheworld/
NEH on the Road: http://nehontheroad.org/

Images for Media
High resolution digital images are available for media use:
http://www.umbc.edu/newsevents/arts/hi-res/
Image in this release: Ernest C. Withers, Sanitation Workers Assemble in Front of Clayborn Temple for a Solidarity March, Memphis, TN, March 28, 1968, Gelatin silver print, Image: 8 1⁄2 x 14 3⁄4 in., Paper: 16 x 20 in., Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and Culture, Museum Purchase, © Ernest C. Withers, Courtesy Panopticon Gallery, Boston MA
Pamphlet, Frank Cieciorka (Artist), All Power To The People: The Story Of The Black Panther Party, 1970,, 10 x 7 7/16 in., Peoples Press, San Francisco, Collection of Civil Rights Archive/CADVC-UMBC, Baltimore, MD

1 Peter 2:4-10 (NIV)

⁴ As you come to him, the living Stone—rejected by humans but chosen by God and precious to him— ⁵ you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual houseto be a holy priesthood, offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. ⁶ For in Scripture it says:

“See, I lay a stone in Zion,
a chosen and precious cornerstone,
and the one who trusts in him
will never be put to shame.”

⁷ Now to you who believe, this stone is precious. But to those who do not believe,

“The stone the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone,”

⁸ and,

“A stone that causes people to stumble
and a rock that makes them fall.”

They stumble because they disobey the message—which is also what they were destined for.

⁹ But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s special possession, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. ¹⁰ Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.

Reflection:

For many of us, special care and thought was taken into the decision of our name; what we would be called.  Some of our parents/caregivers picked those names because they may have liked the meaning, or it was a name that has been in the family, or a name they hoped we would live up to, etc.  In this passage, God directly declares who we are called to be and in that name how we are to live.  God declares over us that we are his chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, his special possession.  This is what we have been called by the sovereign Lord over all the earth, therefore it’s a calling that comes with great assurance.  We are to declare the praises of him who has shown us mercy.  As we live our lives doing so and trusting him who has called us, his promise is that we will never be put to shame.

Response:

Let’s pray for our missional groups and campus fellowships that we would recognize again how precious we are in God’s eyes.  Let’s pray that as we receive this assurance of his wonderful love over our lives that we would confidently overflow in declaring the praises of him who has called us out of darkness into his wonderful light.

Out from behind the desk: Katie Couric thinks Donald Trump can be a real #&*@!$%.

Incoming! Yemen’s unwavering President Ali Abdullah Saleh is seriously wounded after rocket attack.

What’s the word for “economy” in German? German Chancellor talks economy with President Obama.

Everybody say “Wii!” Nintendo adds a U to their latest gaming console.

And, how are we supposed to drink our coffee in California?

Remember the celebrations surrounding the vanquishing of Osama Bin Laden?

President Obama does… he enjoyed a sudden bump in popularity in the US.

But how fast things can change. Any political advantage President Obama received after the killing of Osama bin Laden has vanished in the most recent polls. As focus returns to the economy, the president’s approval ratings have taken a serious hit.

Today, just 47 percent of Americans approve of Obama, while 49 percent disapprove. A majority of independents, 53 percent, disapproves of his job performance.”

Image from The Washington Post

The poll brings good news to Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney, whose campaign got off to a bit of a rough start last week. He ranks number one among the preferred GOP options, tying President Obama in a hypothetical election.

Meanwhile, Romney emerges in the new survey as the strongest current or prospective Republican candidate in the 2012 presidential field. Although he is by no means in a secure spot, on virtually every measure, the former governor appears better positioned than any of his rivals.”

If the economy stays in such distress, terrorist leaders may want to start reconsidering their living arrangements.

Thanks to Techland!

Earlier this week, Apple announced its newest services and products at their annual Worldwide Developers Conference. Among the announced was a long awaited service dubbed iCloud.

‘We’re going to demote the PC and Mac to just be a device. We’re going to move the hub, the center of your digital life, to the cloud,’ said Steve Jobs.”

iCloud will allow users of Apple products to store their their music, photos, apps, and more on Apple’s servers and easily sync them to all of their devices. For now, the service is free to iTunes users, but plans to make profit are in the works.

Apple’s newest technology is sure to change the way many of us utilize computers. How will the new cloud work for you?

Ph.D. Dissertation Proposal

Improving traffic flow forecasts for road networks
with data assimilation

Shiming Yang

3:00pm Wednesday, 8 June 2011, ITE 325b

Macroscopic models for traffic flow in networks of roads are widely used in analyzing traffic phenomena and for the management and planning of transportation road systems. These models have various simplifying assumptions in order to be tractable. Moreover, we often have only partial and inaccurate knowledge of the model parameters. Consequently, there are modeling errors to be dealt with.

An approach to mitigate our partial knowledge and modeling uncertainties, is to collect measurements of the real traffic system and use computational methods to assimilate them with the model in order to derive more accurate forecasts of the state of the system.

In this proposal, we propose to design, develop, and analyze methods for assimilating measurements from road networks to improve the accuracy of short-term forecasting of traffic flow in road networks. The proposed methods will overcome challenges due to the non-linearity of traffic flow behavior, high dimensionality of the modeled state space, and anisotropic non-Gaussian modeling and measurement error processes.

Committee:

• Dr. Kostas Kalpakis (chair)
• Dr. Milton Halem
• Dr. Yaacov Yesha
• Dr. James Smith

WELCOME SUMMER VACATION!

The best way to reel in the summer is to have a fun BBQ with your closest family and friends. 

I decided to have a BBQ this past Memorial Day weekend. My most popular food item was KEBOBS! I made three types of kebobs: Pineapple Rum, Honey BBQ, and Garlic & Herb. These are the recipes I came up with to marinate the kebobs.

Pineapple Rum Marinade

• Pineapple juice
• Bacardi Rum
• Kikkoman’s Triple Ginger Teriyaki Sauce
• Minced garlic
• Olive oil
• Meat tenderizer
• Vinegar
• Soy sauce
• Spicy Montreal Steak Seasoning
• Adobo

Honey BBQ Marinade

• KC Masterpiece BBQ sauce
• Honey
• Meat tenderizer
• Garlic
• Canola Oil
• Onion powder
• Adobo

Garlic and Herb Marinade

• McCormick GrillMates Garlic and Herb seasoning
• Meat tenderizer
• Olive oil
• Vinegar
• Curry powder
• Adobo

Marinade for meats!

So once you get those marinades prepared in separate dishes, add your preferred meat (chicken, beef, steak, or pork) into each marinade. Your meat must be cut into cubes that are no more than one inch thick.  Mix the meat into the marinade well. Place the meat in the marinade into the fridge over night.

The next day, soak your skewers in water for 30 minutes or more. You must do this because, if not done, then the skewers will burn and start a fire on the grill.

Don't forget to soak your skewers!

While the skewers are soaking, dice up some colorful bell peppers and red onions. They should be thick enough so that they will not burn quickly on the grill.

When the skewers are done and the peppers are diced, take the meat out of the fridge. You can arrange the meat, peppers, and onion mix in any order you prefer. I did it in this order: meat, onion, pepper, meat, onion, pepper, etc.  I did only three sets of the combination on each skewer. It’s important to take your time so you won’t get splinters or broken skewers.

Delicious Kebobs!

Any major, any year, even students new to UMBC can find research and independent creative opportunities. Free how-to session, Wednesday September 7 at noon in Admin 911.