Summer Walking and Movement Series

The Division of Institutional Equity, in partnership with the RAC, Retriever Integrated Health/Counseling, and Health Promotion, invites you to join us for Summer Walking and Movement, a weekly wellness series designed to encourage movement, connection, and community care throughout the summer.

The series will begin on Wednesday, July 8 at 10 a.m. and continue weekly through Thursday, August 13.

• Seated Yoga at the RAC
  Join the RAC for a 30-minute outdoor seated yoga session on Wednesday, July 8, July 22, and August 5 from 10–10:30 a.m. Participants are encouraged to arrive 5–10 minutes early to get settled. Sessions will be held outdoors in the rectangular area between the outdoor pool and tennis courts, weather permitting.

        For questions about seated yoga, please contact Joella at joellak1@umbc.edu.

• Weekly Summer Walks
  Each week, 30-minute group walks will be offered on Wednesdays and Thursdays. Walks will begin from different campus locations to make participation accessible across campus. Walking routes are wheelchair accessible.
  • Wednesdays:
    • A 10 a.m. walk will begin from outside the Women's, Gender, and Equity Center (Commons 004).
    • At 12 p.m., participants will meet at the True Grit statue by the Admin building.
  • Thursdays:
    • At 9:30 a.m., participants will meet at the Women’s, Gender, & Equity Center for the walk.

In the event of rain, walks will take place on the indoor track. Please keep an eye on myUMBC for updates.

We hope you will join us this summer for movement, wellness, and community connection!

Accessible routes for summer walks.pdf 

Summer Walking and Movement Series

The Division of Institutional Equity, in partnership with the RAC, Retriever Integrated Health/Counseling, and Health Promotion, invites you to join us for Summer Walking and Movement, a weekly wellness series designed to encourage movement, connection, and community care throughout the summer.

The series will begin on Wednesday, July 8 at 10 a.m. and continue weekly through Thursday, August 13.

• Seated Yoga at the RAC
  Join the RAC for a 30-minute outdoor seated yoga session on Wednesday, July 8, July 22, and August 5 from 10–10:30 a.m. Participants are encouraged to arrive 5–10 minutes early to get settled. Sessions will be held outdoors in the rectangular area between the outdoor pool and tennis courts, weather permitting.

        For questions about seated yoga, please contact Joella at joellak1@umbc.edu.

• Weekly Summer Walks
  Each week, 30-minute group walks will be offered on Wednesdays and Thursdays. Walks will begin from different campus locations to make participation accessible across campus. Walking routes are wheelchair accessible.
  • Wednesdays:
    • A 10 a.m. walk will begin from outside the Women's, Gender, and Equity Center (Commons 004).
    • At 12 p.m., participants will meet at the True Grit statue by the Admin building.
  • Thursdays:
    • At 9:30 a.m., participants will meet at the Women’s, Gender, & Equity Center for the walk.

In the event of rain, walks will take place on the indoor track. Please keep an eye on myUMBC for updates.

We hope you will join us this summer for movement, wellness, and community connection!

The Meritus School of Osteopathic Medicine is hosting a free virtual MCAT Boot Camp from July 13-17, led by MSOM faculty. This workshop is designed to help students strengthen their MCAT preparation with guidance from experienced faculty.

Space is limited, so register soon if you are interested.

See attached flyer for more information and the link to register. 

If you have any questions about the boot camp, contact Dr. Shawn White at  shawn.white@msom.org.

The UMBC Human Research Protections and Integrity office is in the process of updating our IRB application in the coming year. For us to accomplish this, all protocols that were grandfathered into Kuali in 2020 will require conversion from the legacy format to a full protocol. This will make amendments for you more seamless moving forward.

The legacy conversion process is straightforward. It will not require IRB review, but protocols will be reviewed by the HRPI office to ensure your submission matches the legacy file as of 2020, and incorporates all approved amendments over the last 6 years. If you are making any changes in addition to the conversion, these may need to be reviewed by the IRB prior to approval.

If you have completed all data collection, are no longer in contact with participants with no planned follow up, and all data have been de-identified, you may choose to close your protocol.

All legacy protocol conversions need to be submitted to our office for review by 12/31/2026. If we have not received it by then or you have not communicated with our office by 12/31/2026, we will consider the protocol abandoned and will be closing it out in January 2027.

We have attached an instructional guide for protocol conversion. If you have any questions or need assistance with this process, please reach out to our office, irb@umbc.edu.

Thank you,

UMBC HRPI Team

Congratulations to our new officers in Omicron Delta Kappa for the 2026-2027 academic year! 

President: Hareem Malik

Vice President: Faridah Folorunsho

Secretary: Makayla Washington

Treasurer: Juliana Blakely

Hello,

We are aware that you are receiving messages that the Percipio system is not available and to contact the administrator. We hope to have the system accessible early next week. We will post a message once the system is ready for you to access. 

Thank you,

Talent Learning & OD

This month's Ultra update provides a new report that gives instructors class-wide rubric data at a glance, and a dedicated field that separates discussion context from prompt. Paired with clearer time guidelines for students working in AI Conversations, this update gives instructors sharper data and more control over how students engage with course activities.

Rubric Evaluation Report gives instructors a bird's-eye view of rubric performance across an entire class. Instructors can now run this report directly from the gradebook for any graded activity that has a rubric attached, aggregating data from every student submission into a single view. Instructors can see at a glance how students are performing against each criterion, making it easier to spot patterns, identify skills that need reteaching, and adjust instruction before the next assignment is due.

Image 1: Example of Rubric Statistics Report featuring bar chart comparing points possible against actual points

Discussions and Journals now include a dedicated Description field, giving instructors a clearer way to set the stage before students engage with an activity. Previously, the prompt appeared on the Course Content page and had to do double duty as both context and task. Now, instructors can use the new Description field to lay out expectations, background, or logistics, and reserve the prompt itself for the actual engagement question or task. 

Image 2: Instructors can enter a description in the Description field for a Discussion.

With AI Conversations, instructors can now set a time limit on how long students spend in the activity. Two options are available, depending on how instructors want to structure the experience: instructors can time the assessment as a whole, or limit just the conversation portion itself. This keeps AI-supported activities consistent with the timing of other assessment types, and helps scaffold how long students should spend thinking before they respond.

Image 3: Instructors can now set a time limit for either a student's AI conversation, or their written reflection after the chat.

Additional Updates

• Users can now view their favorite courses directly within the Course Switcher. A new Favorites tab surfaces courses marked as favorites on the Courses page, cutting down on trips back to the main Courses page.
• When a user starts a message and adds recipients, any existing conversation with those participants loads right away, making it easy to check recipients and context before sending. Longer conversations remain accessible by scrolling or by selecting "See previous messages" to load the full history.

When can you expect the update?

Faculty should see the latest updates in their Ultra courses around July 2-3, 2026. The next update to our Ultra test environment will take place on July 7, 2026; release notes will be posted to the What's New in Ultra page. Faculty who are interested in test driving new features before they are released to production should open an RT ticket to request early access. Please watch the FAQs, including the What's New with Ultra page, and myUMBC for additional information about Ultra.

Connect with Instructional Technology

As always, if you have any questions about teaching, learning, and technology at UMBC, please consider the following options:

• Check our extensive FAQ collection

  • What's new in Ultra? |Known Issues

• Open a ticket via RT

• Follow the Instructional Technology & DoIT myUMBC groups

• Request a consult with instructional technology staff

Hello, I am selling a 2005 Nissan Altima- As Is Condition. Please email- mwhidby@umbc.edu if interested.  $1,500. 

Call for UMBC SCIPE (UM-CIP Fellows) Graduate Fellows - Fall 2026
Submission Deadline: July 10, 2026

Funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF) SCIPE program (Enhancing the Transdisciplinary Research Ecosystem for Earth and Environmental Science with Dedicated Cyber Infrastructure Professionals), CGC-SCIPE is a collaborative effort between the University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) - iHARP and the University of Maryland Center for Environmental Sciences (UMCES). The project aims to strengthen the research capacity in Earth and Environmental Sciences by leveraging High Performance Computing (HPC), Artificial Intelligence, and data-driven modeling, while developing the next generation of Cyber Infrastructure Professionals (CIPs). This project, as part of the iHARP center and Mdata lab, invites applications for UMBC CIP Graduate Fellows (UM-CIP Fellows).

About the Fellowship
The UM-CIP Graduate Fellowship supports a senior PhD student whose dissertation research aligns with Earth or Environmental Science and who seeks to incorporate HPC or advanced AI into their work. The Fellows will receive guidance from an HPC mentor to expand their technical and computational expertise.

Fellowship Details
* Duration: One Year (Starting Fall 2026)
* Funding: Support for Fall 2026 and Spring 2027, including tuition, health insurance, and stipend. Note that summer will be supported at 20 hours per week.
* Focus Areas: Earth and Environmental Science (Students may come from any department but must have these focus areas for their research). 

Fellowship Eligibility
* Must be a PhD candidate at UMBC who has completed their dissertation proposal defense by the time of the appointment.
* Must have a research focus in Earth or Environmental Science.
* Must demonstrate interest in using advanced computing High Performance Computing (HPC) in the research. They should describe how they plan to incorporate HPC into their research.
* Students who are already using advanced computing will not be considered for this call. Fellowship Expectations
* A fellow is expected to continue with their research topics identified in their dissertation proposal defense and continue to be mainly advised by their PhD advisor(s)
* A fellow is expected to engage with the SCIPE team and Cyber Infrastructure Professionals (CIPs)
* A fellow will be expected to present the progress of their work during the fellowship year.
* A fellow's work will have the UMBC SCIPE grant in acknowledgment of all work developed through the fellowship. A final publication is an expected outcome of this fellowship.
* A fellow is expected to participate in CGC-SCIPE related events, such as workshops and seminars.
* Fellowship stipend will be based upon the current Information Systems Department stipend rate.
* Previously awarded fellows are not eligible.
* As this is a full time fellowship, fellows may not be supported by another grant funding source or full time support.

Applicants should submit a one-page research statement outlining the research question and approach, the type of data used or planned, and how HPC will be incorporated or enhanced through the fellowship. Please attach a copy of your CV or Resume and provide at least one Letter of Recommendation (preferably from your PhD advisor).

Please submit via this Google Submission Form by July 10, 2026.
If you have any questions, please contact Dr. Vandana Janeja (vjaneja@umbc.edu).

When Demetrie Garner moved from Maryland’s Eastern Shore to Baltimore, he found a wealth of opportunities in Baltimore, a strong spiritual practice, and a supportive network of friends and family. They became necessary anchors for recovering from opioid dependency and managing the workload of a full-time job while earning a bachelor’s, a master’s, and now a doctorate in public health from UMBC. 

“My story has a lot of twists and turns. I came to Baltimore in 2018 for treatment for opioid use disorder after experiencing homelessness, incarceration, hospitalizations, and treatment programs. Recovery was a process of 26 years,” says Garner, who now works in the Baltimore City Mayor’s Office of Overdose Response. “When I came to Baltimore, I had a clean slate. I was able to go through an expungement process of criminal records, which was a list of misdemeanors that happened during my drug and alcohol addiction. My journey to UMBC began as an adult learner, at 40 years old, after a year in recovery.”

Understanding the bigger picture

The inspiration to pursue a bachelor’s degree came from working as a recovery specialist at Franklin Square Hospital in Baltimore County, where he supported patients who had overdosed or were experiencing substance use disorders, many of whom faced significant social and economic conditions that negatively affected their health. Although he connected patients to treatment and recovery resources, he questioned why so many returned to the emergency department with the same challenges. That curiosity sparked a desire to better understand the systems, policies, and social factors driving addiction and recovery. 

“I wanted to understand how healthcare is failing people in recovery,” says Garner. “I decided to go back to school. The logical step was to study public health.” Making the leap from working full-time and being a full-time student without a driver’s license posed many challenges. Thankfully, in addition to his faith, friends, and family, Garner also had a team of mentors at UMBC’s School of Public Policy that continue to support him to make his vision possible.

Garner immersed himself in public health research and learned about comorbidities, where patients are managing multiple health needs like substance dependency and mental health. He found that having multiple health needs with little to no healthcare is also exacerbated by homelessness, lack of transportation, inconsistent healthcare, or an environment not conducive to recovery. The emergency room could treat the symptoms but not the root causes. 

“My undergrad journey into public health was transformative because the curriculum I was learning for the core courses in public health also exposed me to psychology and epidemiology,” says Garner. “UMBC helped me understand what was needed for me to actually serve. If I wanted to be of service, then I needed to understand not just what leads people into substance use disorder but also what drives the research.”

No limits in sight

Each learning moment inspired great curiosity. Garner sought faculty for advice and opportunities. A game-changing moment came in a research methods course with Pamela R. Bennett, professor of public policy. Bennett encouraged Garner to think beyond what was stated in the research and analyze what was in between the lines.  

“I got a D in one discussion post, so I went to Dr. Bennett’s office hours. She told me to stop synthesizing information and to start thinking critically,” says Garner. “That was a game changer because I translated what she said to me into my work.”

Another game-changing moment came in Lauren Hamilton Edwards‘ class. Hamilton Edwards, associate professor of public policy, told the class at the beginning of the semester that everyone had an A until they didn’t. Garner interpreted that as an incentive to do his best every day. “From the beginning, she gave me the kind of nurturing I needed,” says Garner. “Now, when I have an intern, I make sure that I’m the “Dr. Lauren Hamilton Edwards” to that intern, as she was with me.”

Additional supports like the McNair Scholars Program gave him the foundation and confidence to pursue graduate school, and his first experience presenting his research at UMBC’s Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement Day was a humbling experience, he says. 

Garner is thriving thanks to the support of the faculty and staff in the public policy and sociology, anthropology, and public health departments, who recognized his potential.

“Associate Professor Andrea Kalfoglou called me Dr. Garner long before I believed it myself. My faculty advisor, Katie Birger, associate teaching professor, recognized my potential early on and encouraged me to pursue the B.A./M.A. pathway,” says Garner. “Now, with Professor Nancy Miller‘s mentorship, I am on track to finish my coursework by the end of the fall semester and begin my dissertation proposal in the spring of 2027.”

“Don’t be afraid”

As Garner’s expertise in public health and policy grew, so did his career opportunities. Today, he serves as the quality assurance manager for Baltimore City’s Behavioral Health Consent Decree. His work focuses on improving outcomes for people experiencing homelessness, substance use disorders, and behavioral health crises, giving him a unique perspective on how public safety and public health intersect to advance overdose prevention and crisis response.

“I no longer see those 26 years to recovery as a period of failure. They gave me lived experience that I now use to help others entering recovery,” says Garner, who, throughout that time, drew strength from the unwavering faith of his grandmother, Hazel Parker; his sister, Shontell Cooper, and his mother, Clara Turner, who never stopped believing change was possible. He hopes his story inspires others to begin their own path to healing. 

“UMBC offered me, someone with a lived experience of homelessness and substance use disorder, a door that I would normally not have access to,” says Garner. “College is an opportunity to discover who you are and what matters to you. Don’t be afraid to engage with professors, challenge ideas, and use your voice.”

Learn more about UMBC’s public health programs.