Dear Campus Community and Valued Riders,

UMBC Transit will be closed for Spring Break from Monday, March 16th through Friday, March 20th. We will operate on an interim schedule on the following dates:

• Saturday, March 14th
• Sunday, March 15th
• Saturday, March 21st
• Sunday, March 22nd

For your convenience, here are some alternative transit options available while UMBC Transit is closed:

1. Baltimore Link
   • Route 32: UMBC - Patapsco
   • LocalLink 76: CCBC - Downtown
   • LocalLink 37: Old Court Metro to UMBC
   • CityLink PURPLE: Paradise/Catonsville
2. RideShare Services
   • ZipCar
   • Lyft
   • Uber

Please check here for the latest Transit news and updates. If you need more help, please do not hesitate to reach us during regular operating hours at 410.455.2454 or transit@umbc.edu.

Safe travels,

Transit Team - Driving Student Success

Congratulations to the College of Engineering and Information Technology (COEIT) for being awarded a BreakingGround grant! Their project – the COEIT Undergraduate Student Voice & Experience Survey – will contribute to UMBC's continued commitment to fostering collective thriving and civic agency.

COEIT has launched a comprehensive undergraduate student climate survey, assessing student experiences around belonging, inclusion, and support across the college. The BreakingGround Award will support COEIT to deepen student capacity to make meaningful contributions to culture change within the college. Students will learn facilitation skills that support peer-led conversations around inclusion and belonging in the college through co-facilitator training that equips student leaders with foundational skills in inclusive dialogue and peer-centered facilitation. Trained student co-facilitators will assist in leading focus groups that gather richer, more nuanced student perspectives on challenges and improvements within COEIT. Student organizations will also host events for students to complete the survey and participate in reflections, offering engineering and computing students an opportunity to engage with civic agency as a practical, lived experience. Student-identified priorities will be shared with COEIT leadership and used to inform planning for the next phase of a multi-stage climate assessment extending to graduate students, faculty, and staff.

Jeanne van Briesen, Dean of the College of Engineering and Information Technology, said, "This award will enable authentic engagement of students with COEIT's efforts to understand and improve the climate of belonging for all." Similarly, Jess Myers, Associate Director of the Center for Women in Technology, has this to say about the project:

This project represents an important moment for COEIT - marking the first COEIT - specific undergraduate climate survey in nearly ten years and centering student voices through collective engagement and reflection. It reflects a shared commitment to listening, learning, and building community together, and invites students to play an active role in shaping the climate and future of their college.

Congratulations to the College of Natural and Mathematical Sciences (CNMS) and the Center for Religion, Spirituality, and Pluralism (CRSP) for being awarded a BreakingGround grant! Their project – Centering Wonder: Science, Spirituality, Religion, and Collaborative Empowerment in the UMBC Community – will contribute to UMBC's continued commitment to fostering collective thriving and civic agency.

CRSP and CNMS are launching an event series that explores the intersections of science and faith in the UMBC community. The pilot event on March 25, 2026 will feature a public lecture by Dr. Patricia Fosarelli – a pediatrician, theologian, author, and faculty member at both the Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and St. Mary's Ecumenical Institute – along with pre-lecture small-group discussions and a post-lecture Q&A. The series aims to empower community members, particularly students in STEM, pre-health, philosophy, and religious studies, to integrate their whole selves into their academic and professional lives. This seed funding will support the pilot event and a follow-up event in the fall, with the goal of establishing a sustainable model for ongoing programming that fosters civic agency, interfaith understanding, and holistic professional development.

Matthew Hoffman, Director of the Center for Religion, Spirituality, and Pluralism, said:

Centering Wonder is a great example of the integrated, collaborative work we support in the Center for Religion, Spirituality, & Pluralism at UMBC. We know that many members of our campus community connect to religion and spirituality as important forms of meaning-making and community connection, as well as for career and academic exploration. Through this program, we hope to celebrate the overlap of wonder that exists when we connect our identities with academic endeavors. At its best, this project highlights UMBC's value of inclusive excellence as a distinctive and transformative approach to higher education.

William R. LaCourse, Dean of the College of Natural and Mathematical Sciences, said:

In the College of Natural and Mathematical Sciences, faculty, staff, and students seek truth and fundamental knowledge as a means to understand the world around us for the betterment of all. Individuals bring a complex constellation of identities related to science, religion, and spirituality with them to all of their work. Becoming aware of what drives ourselves and others is a critical step toward finding personal harmony and building the foundation for a stronger UMBC culture grounded in tolerance. I hope this series will help those seeking truth to find it in themselves and others.

The BreakingGround initiative provides grants of up to $2,500 to UMBC faculty, staff, and students who want to launch or strengthen educational and community-building projects. These projects should, as a part of their work, foster civic agency: the ability to initiate and make meaningful contributions to social change. For more information, visit this website: https://civiclife.umbc.edu/breakingground/

commonvision, UMBC Student Design and Print Center will be closed March 14 – 22 for Spring Break. 

We close Friday, March 13 at 5 p.m. and reopen Monday, March 23 at 9 a.m.! All questions and inquiries can be sent to commonvision@umbc.edu 

Mechanical engineering senior Caly Ferguson will be honored with a “25 Under 25” award at the upcoming meeting of the National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE), held March 18 – 22 in Baltimore. The award recognizes exceptional students and young professionals under the age of 25 who are making a measurable impact in science and technology fields through leadership, innovation, entrepreneurship, and community advancement. 

Ferguson is a Meyerhoff Scholar and current president of the UMBC chapter of NSBE. Last year he was one of three UMBC students recognized with the prestigious Goldwater Scholarship, established to promote a strong STEM workforce in the U.S.

Since his first year at UMBC, Ferguson has worked in the lab of Ramana Vinjamuri, an associate professor of computer science and electrical engineering, on a project to develop a prosthetic forearm and hand. The device employs machine learning to interpret electrical signals from the nerves in the arm and translate them into desired movements of the prosthetic hand. Ferguson is interested in a career developing biomedical devices—in particular making them more affordable so that more people can benefit from them. 

“I am truly blessed to be considered as one of the awardees for this esteemed honor,” Ferguson says. “I feel as though God, my family, my friends, and all of my mentors and colleagues have played such integral roles in my successes over the past years.”

Ferguson says being a part of the NSBE community has positively shaped his career trajectory and he plans to stay involved with the society after graduation. He is running for a regional executive board position with the organization at this year’s annual meeting.

“One of the things I am most proud of is seeing the consistent growth of the organization on campus throughout my undergraduate career,” he says. “I know that this student org will continue to rise and achieve amazing feats after I graduate from UMBC.”

UMBC researchers have secured a $1,031,000 congressional earmark to launch a vital new initiative tackling the escalating threat of flooding in Maryland’s most vulnerable communities.

Led by Alan Yeakley, professor, and Dillon Mahmoudi, associate professor, both in geography and environmental systems, the project establishes the UMBC Laboratory for Flood Risk Impact Assessment and Adaptation in Impoverished Maryland Communities. This lab will serve as a hub for analyzing and tracking the impacts of rising flood risks on low-income populations in both urban and rural areas across the state. Yeakley and Mahmoudi will bring on two postdoctoral researchers and graduate and undergraduate research assistants, who will gain critical skills in community-engaged research and data analytics while supporting the work.

The project focuses on communities along the Chesapeake Bay and its major tributaries, including historically underserved neighborhoods in Baltimore such as Turner Station. Researchers will investigate how the legacies of blockbusting and redlining have heightened flood vulnerability in low-income areas and assess whether flood mitigation resources have been distributed equitably. The team will also evaluate the current state of adaptation strategies at every level—from individual households to the city, county, state, and federal governments.

Through hands-on workshops, interviews with residents, and discussions with government agency personnel, the lab will document communities’ existing adaptation methods and raise awareness of growing hazards. Advanced computer modeling completed in UMBC’s state-of-the-art geographic information systems (GIS) laboratory will help quantify predicted risks, which researchers will share with affected communities along with practical, low-cost strategies to enhance resilience. This approach will foster opportunities to co-create solutions, in alignment with UMBC’s commitment to bidirectional partnerships with our neighbors as we all seek to address environmental challenges.

“We’re thrilled to be able to help local communities experiencing flooding along the Chesapeake Bay,” Yeakley says. “We hope to learn what they are already doing to mitigate these hazards, and to suggest strategies that might improve their resilience to ongoing and future threats to their properties and their lives. We also hope that, eventually, communities will share successful strategies with each other directly, creating a grassroots network of neighborhood and environmental stewardship.”