While college students rightfully bemoan unpaid internships as a manipulative institution, at our university, the seats we sit on are made by prisoners being paid as little as 17 cents per hour. This is partially due to the loophole in the 13th Amendment, which permits slave labor as part of criminal punishment.

According to an inmate who wrote for The Guardian in 2018, “anybody convicted of a crime after 1865 could be leased out by the state to private corporations who would extract their labor for little or no pay.”

In an article The Retriever published in 2017, we wrote that University of Maryland, Baltimore County is state-mandated to buy its furniture from the Maryland prison system by the Code of Maryland article §14–103 (a.1.).

In January, The Baltimore Sun published the data behind how much prisoners are actually paid: “… for jobs within the correction division last year ranged from 90 cents a day to $2.75 a day, depending on skill level. Participants in [Maryland Correctional Enterprises], meanwhile, made between 17 cents an hour for an unskilled worker to $1.16 an hour for a warehouse team leader.”

The entirety of the University System of Maryland spent $10,034,713 on MCE furniture in 2018, making up 18.2% of their sales.

And yet, people in prisons earn $0.17- $1.16 per hour? The total sales of MCE from 2018 was $55,003,182. 

According to Inside Higher Ed, “Every U.S. state except Alaska features some sort of correctional enterprise, where inmates make goods like license plates and desk chairs. And in several states, public universities are required to buy from those entities.”

They continue on, citing USM directly: “The University System of Maryland and the State University of New York system are required to use their state’s correctional enterprise as a “preferred source” along with state industries that employ the blind.”

MCE states that a large part of their mission is “to teach strong work ethics, increased responsibility and self-esteem to create positive personal change.” That would mean a lot more if the compensation wasn’t so meager for the inmates who are being exploited. And USM has made it so that their universities rely on incarceration for their furniture.

And in 2018 in Maryland, The Baltimore Sun reported that more than 70% of Maryland’s prison population was Black. But Black people made up only 31% of Maryland’s total population when the article was published. The facts speak for themselves. 

The USM, which prides itself on having a mission statement that aims to improve the quality of life in Maryland, is paying literally millions of dollars a year to a corrupt system that benefits off of slave labor. 

Many argue that slavery was never abolished in the United States in the first place, only reformed. According to The Atlantic, “Section 1 of the Amendment provides: ‘Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.’”

I don’t think I will ever feel fully comfortable sitting on furniture on campus. That’s how it should be. USM is complicit in this labor system. In the aftermath of the murders of Breonna Taylor, George Floyd and Ahmaud Arbery, the USM schools have all put out statements offering sympathy and support to students. Yet our system, along with so many corporations including Starbucks and Victoria’s Secret benefit from prisons. 

Does that mean you’re a bad person for wearing PINK sweatpants and drinking a vanilla latte with your name spelled wrong? No, I’d argue it’s more about the corporation than about the individual. And it’s difficult to escape, even if you’re trying to boycott these companies. There are just so many. 

USM has a choice. Offering work to incarcerated people in order to offer them opportunities once they are released from prison is generally positive and providing optional work to those who want to do it makes sense. But exploiting them by paying them pennies a day while the minimum wage in the “outside” world is $10.10 is wrong. 

USM’s 18% of MCE sales is a powerful thing. Striking on purchases of prison labor is also powerful. This is a time of reflection. Our universities have power. Use it for good. Divest and put political pressure on Annapolis to raise the minimum wage for prisoners. Silence and inaction are complicities. 

The post University System of Maryland: Stop buying into current prison labor system appeared first on The Retriever.

Kuali COI Module Updates

Starts Saturday, June 13, 2020!

Dear PI’s & Faculty,

The ORPC wants to inform you we have been working with Kuali to update UMBC’s conflict of interest disclosure form and processes. This next stage in the COI disclosure process makes the form easier to read, removes Master Contract duplicate reporting, provides more complete disclosures of projects (awards and proposals), and improves financial entity data capture to ensure COI management plans capture potential conflicts. Subsequently, an upgrade to the existing Kuali module is scheduled for June 12, 2020.

We ask that you do not log into Kuali COI beginning 12:00 am Friday, June 12, 2020 through 12:00 am June 13, 2020. This will allow the system to correctly transfer your disclosure records in the COI upgrade.

What this means for you

In general, the processes of COI disclosure for proposals and awards (projects) have not changed. Kuali COI will continue to send you emails requesting you to update annual disclosure when you are identified in project(s) as a “key person, such as the Principal Investigator.  Beginning with the upgrade, as you log into Kuali COI,  a new reporting format with an updated list of your disclosed projects(s) will appear.  Kuali COI will highlight any new projects that require action from you, including relationships to financial entities.  Nothing is required from "negative disclosures" of COI or for projects previously disclosed.   

Next Steps

Again, as a reminder, do not login Kuali COI anytime on June 12, 2020. Starting June 13, 2020 log into your Kuali COI dashboard to become familiar with the changes and to review your disclosure record. Then, update as requested.  The OPRC will update the COI User Guide with screenshots to assist with your disclosures. Of course, if there are any questions, please do not hesitate to contact us at compliance@umbc.edu.

Unfunded Agreements

Our COI and OSP teams have been working with Kuali to create a one-stop reporting portal for your entire Research and Creative Achievement (RCA) portfolio. This involves transitioning unfunded agreements into Kuali.  We started with Data Use Agreements and CRADA’s and will be transitioning to others such as Material Transfer Agreements (MTA’s), Non-Disclosure Agreements (NDA’s), etc. as well.  Please review our Kuali implementation schedule for more information.

Important Reminder: You MUST submit RT tickets and supporting documentation to the AAOU SSC by the deadlines shown on the AAOU SSC deadline calendar. DO NOT use the HR deadline calendar for submission of RT tickets to the AAOU SSC, or you may miss the deadline.

The standard for student appointments is that they be placed on payroll in an hourly status.  There are instances, however, when the nature of work prevents departments from measuring work on an hourly basis.  In those instances, a request must be submitted to the back-office payroll manager prior to placing the Student employee on payroll in a zero-compensation status, or on a one-pay appointment for approval. 

ONE PAY APPOINTMENTS (Requires Pre-approval):

If you need to submit a student into a one pay appointment, the following information must be submitted:

·        Written request to the HR Payroll Manager (electronically), copying the AAOU SSC Business Specialist (Mike Renda) and Associate Director (Vania Cruz)

·        Will the appointment be project-based and for a limited number of hours?

·        Will the work be completed in less than 4 weeks (2 consecutive pay periods)?

·        Will this student be returning to the department within the same semester for another one-pay appointment?

·        Has the student already completed the work and the department neglected to submit the initial payroll packet.  This should be rare and department should have this type of payment preapproved by HR.

After you have received your approval from HR to place students into a one pay appointment, you need to submit an RT request to the AAOU SSC, as you normally would, and you must include the approval of your request from HR as an attachment to your ticket.

ZERO COMPENSATION APPOINTMENTS:

In some instances, a department may need to place a student employee on payroll at zero compensation based upon the nature of work. These may be submitted via the normal new hire/concurrent job process.  This work is: 

·        Not measured on an hour for hour basis; (Examples: Student Notetakers (paid by the number of lessons submitted), Retriever writers (paid flat amount by the article), Students who make their dorm room available during tour (paid flat amount by the day))

·        A special project that will last beyond 4 weeks, but requires sporadic hours; work output is based on project deliverable vs number of hours worked.  The Student has a specific period to get the work completed and then lump sum payment will occur.  In this instance, the department should be able to approximate the number of hours it will take to complete the work.  As long as the number of hours divided into the flat amount is equal to or above the current minimum wage, the zero-comp appointment will be processed.

Organic Vegetable and curated grocery delivery.

Every order helps feed 3 people in need through Table Field’s partnership with the Maryland Food Bank.  http://www.tablefieldcatering.com/grocery-delivery.html

Organic Vegetables and curated grocery delivery service.  Weekly and Bi-monthly available.

Every order helps feed 3 people in need through Table Field’s partnership with the Maryland Food Bank.

Call for Chapters 

Race, Ethnicity and the Covid-19 Global Pandemic

Editors: 

Melvin E. Thomas, Ph. D.  Associate Professor, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, North Carolina State University

Loren Henderson, Ph. D.  Associate Professor of Sociology, Anthropology, and Health Administration and Policy, UMBC Innovation Fellow, University of Maryland Baltimore County

Hayward Derrick Horton, Ph. D.  Professor of Sociology, State University of New York-Albany

Dear Colleagues 

We are seeking proposals for chapters for possible inclusion in the forthcoming edited volume, “Race, Ethnicity and the Covid-19 Global Pandemic.“  This volume will present the most authoritative and up-to-date theory and research on the causes and consequences of the covid-19 pandemic on racial and ethnic minorities in the U. S. and world.    These original essays will provide a critical examination of the progress and direction of debates, as well as a foundation for future research.  Please send your proposed title, abstract (no more than 400 words), name, and affiliation to melvin_thomas@ncsu.edu by July 30, 2020.

We are particularly interested in chapters that address the following issues:

1.      Discussions that apply social science theories to enhance our understanding of racial disparities in covid-19 infections and deaths in the U.S. and/or globally.

2.      Multivariate analyses of the racial disparities.

3.      Cross-national studies of the covid-19 pandemic and how it impacts racial, ethnic or religious minorities.

4.      Qualitative studies of how racial and ethnic minorities deal with covid-19 related issues.

5.      Historical analyses of pandemics and their impact on racial and ethnic minorities.

6.      Analyses that link racism in the U.S. healthcare system to covid-19 deaths.

7.      Analyses that provide solutions to racial and ethnic disparities linked to disparate covid-19 infections and deaths that can be that can used to mitigate the impact of future pandemics.

 CHAPTER FORMAT 

Standard format will help ensure coherence. Full chapter should be within 7000 -8000 words (approximately) including, reference, tables, figures etc.   

Please send abstracts of 300–400 words, and a biography of each author of 50–80 words, to Melvin Thomas at melvin_thomas@ncsu.edu by July 30, 2020^.  Please give the subject header as “Race, Ethnicity and Covid-19  Proposal’. Notifications of acceptance will be sent no later than August 31, 2020. Chapters of 7,000 to 8,000 words will be due by October 30, 2020.