Please join us on Wednesday, March 27, 2024, from 3-5 pm for the Emergency and Disaster Health Systems Graduate Speaker Seminar Series via WebEx. The speaker's information and seminar topic can be found below. Please help us welcome this week’s speaker by attending the seminar, and please bring your questions and discussion points!

We hope to see everyone there!

All majors are welcome!

Speaker Information:

Jonathan Bratt, MS

Assistant Vice President, Enterprise Resilience

University of Maryland, Baltimore

Seminar Topic:

“Emergency Management in Healthcare”

Speaker Bio:

Jonathan Bratt, MS

MS: Rochester Institute of Technology’s Center for Advanced Defense Studies – Counterterrorism & Emergency Management

BS: University of Maryland, Baltimore County – Emergency Health Sciences 

Jon joined UMB in 2018 where he was appointed as UMB's inaugural emergency manager. Following the COVID response, Jon was promoted to Assistant Vice President in 2023 where he now leads the institution’s, Environmental Health & Safety, Public & Occupational Health, and Emergency Management programs.

Before joining UMB, Jon held the position of Director of the Regional Programs Division at the Maryland Institute for Emergency Medical Services Systems. There, he led a team tasked with managing various facets of the state's emergency medical services, including pre-hospital care, hospital specialty accreditation, and system evaluation.

From 2008 to 2012, Jon was part of FEMA's Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) Branch, serving as Deputy Team Leader for the Domestic Emergency Support Team. During this tenure, Jon actively supported the Department of State’s Prevention of Nuclear Smuggling Program, collaborating with foreign governments to devise operational strategies to counter and respond to nuclear weapons incidents.

Governor Hogan appointed Jon to the Governor's Emergency Management Advisory Council in 2020, where he assumed the role of chair of the legislative subcommittee.

Jon's commitment to public service extends beyond his professional roles. He has been serving as an EMS provider since 2001, maintaining an active role as a paramedic/firefighter in Maryland. Additionally, Jon serves as a Deputy Team Commander with the NJ-1 Disaster Medical Assistance Team.

Location: 900 Walker Ave, Room 114, or online via Webex

Join Webex Meeting

Meeting number:

2633 827 4060

Meeting password:

36350242

Join by phone

+1-202-860-2110 United States Toll (Washington D.C.)

Attendee access code: 36350242

Global call-in numbers

Please note that the Dept of Emergency and Disaster Health Systems (EDHS) has temporarily moved (due to renovations of Sherman Hall) to the 900 Walker Building. Address is 900 Walker Ave. (building located behind the Walker Apartments, towards Wilkins Ave.) in the main EHS classroom Walker 114. Enter the front doors and follow the signs to the department area & classroom (Room 114). Link to map (see upper right corner on Walker Avenue, it is the building entitled Baltimore County Courthouse): https://mcac.umbc.edu/maps-and-directions/

Over two weeks at the end of January, six UMBC faculty woke up early to deliver lectures and lead workshops with students more than 9,000 miles away, in the small Asian nation of Brunei, located on the island of Borneo. The online talks were part of the Diversity in Cybersecurity, Brunei conference, organized jointly by Edah Hasnal, an advocate for gender diversity in the tech sector in Brunei, and Carolyn Seaman, director of the Center for Women in Technology (CWIT) at UMBC.

The idea for the conference was born out of an internship that Hasnal completed with Seaman in the fall of 2021 through the Young Southeast Asian Leaders Initiative, a U.S. State Department-funded leadership development program. During the internship, which was conducted remotely due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Hasnal created a series of short videos highlighting tech workers in Brunei. She also worked with Seaman to propose a follow-up project that ultimately turned into the Diversity in Cybersecurity, Brunei conference.

The goal of the conference was to share cybersecurity concepts and career paths with women interested in the tech sector. Out of around 50 applicants, the organizers picked 10 women with varying backgrounds. 

“We wanted to keep the conference relatively small, so that we could connect the participants with further opportunities,” Hasnal says. She says she was inspired by the stories of the women who attended, including a woman who worked as a cleaner while pursuing a tech education. Hasnal also says that Brunei is working to diversify its economy, and she sees the tech sector as a natural area of growth. 

Seaman recruited speakers from across UMBC to join the conference virtually and share their cybersecurity knowledge with attendees. Karuna Joshi, information systems, Deborah Kariuki, education, Christine Mallinson, language, literacy, and culture, Vandana Janeja, information systems, and Sreedevi Sampath, information systems, gave talks on topics ranging from cloud computing security to AI deepfake detection.

“The great thing about having women trainers who come from different backgrounds was that it was both insightful and inspiring for us all,” Hasnal says. 

It was wonderful to have CWIT’s reach extend so far through participation in the conference, Seaman says. “We’ve been dedicated to increasing gender parity in the tech industry, and we could see that many of the same issues and same goals we have are shared by people on the opposite side of the world.”

Here are the deadlines for the Senate Elections.

Port Discovery’s Learning and Visitor Experience Department’s mission is to engage all of our visitors, both adults and children, throughout the museum’s exhibits and play spaces (floor) in innovative, play-based educational experiences and programs. This includes informal interactions, as well as pop-up programs and more structured activities and workshops throughout exhibits and play spaces.