Many of you have been successfully utilizing our new process through PMP DocuSignwhich has allowed us to capture the necessary signatures and approvals for the PMPs.  For those who have not yet had an opportunity to submit a PMP via DocuSign, it is important to remember that a discussion with the next level reviewer, as well as the PMP review meeting with the employee, should take place prior to initiating the online DocuSign process for signatures.

Once the PMP form has been reviewed by the appropriate approver, and presented to the employee, you are ready to submit your completed PMP through PMP DocuSign.  For ease of submission, you will need the employee’s ID (this can be found in the Directory).  Please save the PMP form attachment using the following format:  Employee’s Last Name_First Name.  For example, Abrams_James.

Additional tools and resources, including the PMP forms, can be accessed here.  Questions around the PMP process should be directed to James Abrams, Employee/Labor Relations Manager at jabrams@umbc.edu.

Danilo Symonette, Robin Bailey, and Hye-Jin Park are earning their UMBC degrees this month having researched in top labs and being invited to present their findings to colleagues across the country. They sound like phenomenal Ph.D. students, but they’re actually all undergraduates.

Symonette ‘20, computer science, has earned one of the most prestigious graduate fellowships in the U.S. after completing years of research in artificial intelligence. Bailey ‘20, biological sciences, conducted research at Harvard Medical School’s Joslin Diabetes Center. Hye-Jin Park ‘20, psychology, researched the experiences of Asian immigrants in the United States, including discrimination and resilience. 

Their interests vary greatly, but each celebrates the impact that UMBC mentors have had on their college careers, including the chance to access incredible opportunities.

Finding a community

When Symonette transferred to UMBC from the College of Southern Maryland in La Plata, Maryland, he knew he wanted to study computer science and conduct research on artificial intelligence, which he sees as a “revolutionary” field. He quickly found a supportive community of friends and mentors at UMBC, and became a McNair Scholar. 

UMBC’s McNair Scholars program is a Federal TRIO program that supports students from disadvantaged and underrepresented groups in preparing for graduate education. The program emphasizes intensive research experiences and mentoring. Symonette’s McNair mentors helped him define and achieve his goals and navigate challenges along the way. 

“Being a McNair Scholar has entirely shaped my experience at UMBC and given me the community I needed to support my ambitions and pursue opportunities,” says Symonette. The program also introduced him to some of his favorite people at UMBC.

The value of mentorship

Don Engel, assistant vice president for research, is Symonette’s advisor on the award that supports his artificial intelligence work. He has been one of his most impactful mentors over the years. “Don Engel gave me the freedom to explore any and all of my ideas,” says Symonette. “He advised me on career decisions, wrote countless letters of recommendation, and always supported and believed in me no matter how lofty my goals seemed.” 

Engel connected Symonette with the neuro-AI lab at the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Lab, where Symonette is currently interning. Symonette accepted a full-time job offer to work at APL starting in June. This allowed him to explore his interests at the intersection of computer science, neuroscience, and psychology, and further refine his graduate school career goals. 

“Danilo is one of the most talented and motivated students with whom I’ve had the pleasure to work. He has been a wonderful teammate to a broad range of student, faculty, and external research collaborators,” shares Engel. “I’m looking forward to following Danilo’s career, which I’m sure will be exciting and impactful.”

Symonette has also found mentors outside his discipline who have helped him develop a well-rounded perspective. They include Simon Stacey, director of the Honors College; former UMBC professor Marie DesJardins, now a dean at Simmons College; and Christy Ford Chapin, associate professor of history. Symonette says that Chapin helped him elevate his grad school essays and fellowship applications “to the highest level they could be.”

Exploring opportunities beyond UMBC

In addition to connecting Symonette with mentors, the McNair Scholars program also provided him with travel funding to visit several graduate schools across the country. 

In 2018, he completed the Louis Stokes Alliances for Minority Participation (LSAMP) summer research program and focused on machine learning. The following year, he attended the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program at the Institute on Teaching and Mentoring, which was sponsored by the Southern Regional Education Board. “I saw a slew of Ph.D. students from underrepresented backgrounds come on stage and encourage me to pursue graduate education,” Symonette shares.

In 2019, he headed to MIT and studied models that detect confusion in features that rely on voice. His work was used as a foundation to develop sensors for a teacher education platform, to make it more effective. 

“That experience equipped me with the inspiration, motivation, and knowledge to plan my next steps,” he says. Over the next 18 months, Symonette explains, “I was accepted to the top computer science Ph.D. programs in the world and won the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship.” 

Today, he describes the LSAMP and McNair programs as “the vehicles through which I arrived at many of the pivotal moments in my journey.”

Inspiring younger students

While focusing on his courses and research at UMBC, Symonette also enjoyed gaining early experience as an educator. He served as a teaching assistant for Computer Science 202, inspired by his own earlier challenges with the course. 

“I struggled a lot in CS202 when I came from community college,” Symonette recalls. “Seeing all the errors and mistakes troubling students during office hours and being able to help them through those same situations…was extremely rewarding.” 

Symonette also found ways to connect with younger students, to encourage them to pursue degrees and careers in computing. He served as the head of outreach for UMBC’s Computer Science Education Club, establishing strong partnerships with local high schools.

“I wanted to expand our outreach efforts so that more people could volunteer,” he says. He connected with Lori Hardesty, associate director for applied learning and community engagement at UMBC’s Shriver Center, to ensure the program would have the structure to be successful in the long term. 

“We managed to get a consistent group of students volunteering at Landsdowne High School last semester and supporting the high school’s computer science and robotics club,” says Symonette. “It’s been great to connect with high school students, especially at a school like Landsdowne. There are students from similar backgrounds as me that I have a chance to inspire. It continues to motivate me to do research in AI and education.” 

After working at APL for a year, Symonette will begin a Ph.D. program in computer science at Stanford University in fall 2021, with the goal of becoming a professor. “I’m looking forward to broadening my perspective, accessing opportunities, and developing as a researcher and educator—everything that comes with studying in a top-tier Ph.D. program,” he says. “I can’t wait to bring all of that back to my community.” 

The importance of connections

Like Symonette, Bailey is a transfer student who found support within a scholars program. When she transferred to UMBC from Howard Community College, she was eager to find a welcoming group of friends and mentors. She found that community in the MARC U*STAR Scholars program. 

The MARC program is designed to increase diversity and inclusion in the biomedical research field, with an emphasis on preparing undergraduate students for Ph.D. programs. “I was the only transfer student to enter my cohort, and feared I would feel like the new kid,” she shares. “Fortunately, the MARC community welcomed me with open arms and treated me as though I had always been at UMBC.” 

Robin Bailey with an award from UMBC. Photo courtesy of Bailey.

The MARC program connected Bailey with faculty across campus who supported her during her UMBC career. Phyllis Robinson, professor of biological sciences and director of the MARC program, is one of Bailey’s research mentors, who has provided her with a safe space to share her worries. 

“Dr. Robinson has been an unwavering pillar of support in my journey at UMBC,” Bailey says. “She pushes me to be the best I can be in my education and in my personal life.”

Jacqueline King, assistant director of the MARC program, has also supported Bailey’s academic career. “She always encourages me to get out of my comfort zone,” Bailey explains. 

Bailey has found a mentor Juan Valdez ‘12, M.S. ‘13, Ph.D. ‘20, biological sciences, as well. “Juan never fails to remind me that I am capable of doing anything I set my mind to,” she says. “He has unconditionally supported me even when I doubt myself.”

From UMBC to Harvard and UPenn

Bailey also valued the chance to connect MARC U*STAR Scholars at other institutions. This includes participating in the 2018 Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students in Indianapolis, Indiana. There, she received an award for her oral presentation on light-sensitive retinal proteins.

Robin Bailey at the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students. Photo courtesy of Bailey.

She was invited to participate in a summer internship at Harvard Medical School. There she conducted research at the Joslin Diabetes Center under Alexsandar Kostic, an assistant professor of microbiology. She and research technician Melissa Tran investigated the role of bacteria in pancreatic development. 

Robin Bailey at Harvard. Photo courtesy of Bailey.

Through that experience, Bailey learned new research techniques that helped prepare her for a future career in science. “The friendships in the Kostic lab made Boston feel like a home away from home,” she says.

Bailey will graduate with departmental honors in recognition of her thesis, based on research she conducted in the Robinson lab. She will also receive the Faculty Award for Excellence in Biological Sciences. After graduation, Bailey will pursue her Ph.D. in cellular and molecular biology with an emphasis on gene therapy and vaccines at the University of Pennsylvania’s Perelman School of Medicine. 

Finding your own path

Hye-Jin Park initially connected with UMBC through her sister, Hyun Jung Lee ‘16, visual arts, an alumna. She recalls coming to UMBC, noticing the diversity of the campus, and being excited to make friends, but also feeling incredibly shy. After a few months of accompanying her sister to meetings for groups on campus, she realized she was ready to branch out and explore her own interests.

One of these interests was psychology, which Park became fascinated with through a high school AP psychology course. She heard a graduate student talk about research being conducted in the lab of Charissa Cheah, professor of psychology, on the experiences of Asian immigrants. Her interest was piqued—she had to apply.

Conducting meaningful research

Born in Korea, Park and her family immigrated to the United States when she was about five years old. Her Korean heritage played a big role in her UMBC experience, including as a researcher, in an unexpected way.

When she started working in Cheah’s lab, Park had not spoken the Korean language regularly in about 15 years. She was no longer fluent in Korean and couldn’t read or recognize the Korean alphabet, but she knew that speaking Korean would be a great asset in her research. She decided to teach herself Korean, relying on her mom and sisters to re-learn the basics.

As a freshman, Park supported the lab’s research through data entry, but her responsibilities quickly grew. Before long, she was administering behavioral tasks to children and interviewing parents for data collection. 

By her junior year, Cheah had become one of Park’s closest mentors and a guide to meeting others in her field. “Dr. Cheah has been the biggest influence in my UMBC experience,” she says.

Building confidence, growing impact

Park’s experience in the lab also helped her build confidence and a commitment to supporting younger students. She worked as a writing fellow in the psychology department, helping other students develop their skills writing and formatting academic papers. She joined CRU, a Christian student group, and became a member of Psi Chi, the international honors society for psychology. 

Park also presented research at UMBC’s Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement Day in both 2019 and 2020, after earning Undergraduate Research Awards each year. 

Off campus, Park completed an internship at Verbal Beginnings, an organization that provides applied behavioral analysis therapy and teaches various skills to children on the autism spectrum. This experience gave her an opportunity to plan lessons and learn from a professional team coordinator how to modify plans to meet the children’s needs. 

Park was recently selected for the 2020 Society for Research on Adolescence Undergraduate Scholars Program. This honor would have funded her participation in the group’s annual conference in San Diego, set for March 2020 prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. “It was an honor to be accepted into the program. Even though the program got canceled due to the pandemic, I was able to connect with my mentors in the program,” she shares. 

After graduation, Park will pursue her Ph.D. in human development at Michigan State University.

Banner image: Danilo Symonette, right, with his friends at a restaurant. Photo courtesy of Symonette.

UMBC has made great strides in increasing its number of women faculty members in STEM through the ADVANCE program. Now, through the CNMS Scholars Program, these women are serving as mentors to the next generation of scientists and engineers committed to the advancement of women in STEM. The CNMS Scholars program is specifically designed to boost the representation of women in STEM fields that haven’t reached gender parity, from physics and bioinformatics to chemical engineering.

This spring, five women will graduate from UMBC as CNMS Scholars, including Olivia Norman ’20, physics, and Jada Damond ’20, chemical engineering. The financial support, mentorship, and sense of community the program offered created an environment that helped them thrive. Importantly, “CNMS Scholars are paired with our most experienced faculty, who go beyond mentoring to act as champions of these promising future leaders,” says Bill LaCourse, dean of the College of Natural and Mathematical Sciences (CNMS). 

Norman’s CNMS Scholars mentor was Theodosia Gougousi, professor of physics and a member of UMBC’s Women in Science and Engineering (WISE) group, affiliated with the ADVANCE program. Damond worked with Jennie Leach, an associate professor of chemical, biochemical, and environmental engineering (CBEE), and a member of UMBC’s 4th ADVANCE cohort.

A nudge in the right direction

The coming weeks will hold excitement for new beginnings and also poignant goodbyes for Olivia Norman, as she prepares to leave UMBC and Maryland. After graduation, she will head to a Ph.D. program in atmospheric science at MIT—a goal realized through research opportunities during her time as a Retriever. 

Norman chose to transfer to UMBC as a sophomore specifically to access UMBC’s unique research opportunities. She has been working with Zhibo Zhang, associate professor of physics, on a project involving “polluted dust”—dust particles mixed with pollutants in the atmosphere. They are working to understand how this dust affects cloud formation and climate.

Zhang and Norman have found their work together rewarding. “He always pushes you to ask questions and seek out things that you’re interested in to inform your research, while also helping nudge you in the right direction if you are feeling a little lost,” Norman shares. 

Zhang suggested that Norman join the lab when he noticed her performing exceptionally well in one of his courses. Since then she has made significant contributions to the group’s progress. Now she is participating in the NSF-funded Cyber Training program, which brings together researchers from data science, atmospheric physics, and high-performance computing—a program initially designed for graduate students and early-career faculty.

While it is bittersweet for Zhang to see Norman leave UMBC for her graduate studies, “I have no doubt that Olivia will soon rise as a young star in my field who will lead us to new and exciting scientific discoveries,” he says.

Growth and discovery

CNMS Scholar Jada Damond is also heading to an exceptional Ph.D. program—UMBC’s program in environmental engineering. This offers her a chance to continue research she is committed to moving forward. 

Through the CNMS Scholars program, Damond realized the value of mentorship and a community of support. “I gained a really powerful network, and I learned a lot more about the opportunities the campus has to offer,” she shares. In particular, she’s grateful to her program mentor, Jennie Leach, who has offered her both professional and personal support. 

“Dr. Leach facilitated my transition to UMBC’s Ph.D. program by offering advice about the program and sharing her own experiences with getting a Ph.D.,” Damond says.

“It’s been really fun to know Jada first as a sophomore, new to engineering, and now, as a senior entering graduate school,” Leach says. “I am so excited to witness all the great things she will accomplish in her career ahead.”

Damond looks forward to continuing research with Upal Ghosh, professor of CBEE, and collaborators at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center on methods for better measuring mercury levels in water. She’s passionate about the work, she explains, because measuring mercury is a difficult problem and also an important one to solve to protect human health. 

She’s also grateful for Ghosh’s ongoing support. At the numerous national and regional conferences Damond has attended with the lab, “Dr. Ghosh always makes sure to introduce his students to other professionals in the field relevant to the specific work that they do, so I have been able to broaden my network,” she says. 

On the academic side, Ghosh “is always making sure his students are on track in their studies,” she says. “He was eager to spend time reviewing concepts that were new to me, and would give me resources to point me in the right direction.”

Damond’s goal is to pursue environmental consulting work. She enjoyed tutoring chemical engineering courses and mentoring younger CNMS Scholars so much that she also hopes to find a way to teach throughout her career.

“Tutoring helped to improve my communication skills, as I had to explain concepts in a way that the students would understand, while making sure that they could replicate those explanations,” she says. “It was very rewarding when they left a tutoring session feeling more confident about the subject than they did going in.”

Building a network

In addition to supporting young women on their way toward success in STEM fields, the CNMS Scholars program is also all about building a community among the scholars. Caitlin Kowalewski, assistant director of undergraduate initiatives in CNMS, coordinates regular activities for the group. This helps the scholars build relationships with each other and with others members of the UMBC community, such as potential research mentors, leading administrators, and alumni in STEM careers.

“I think the main thing I’ve gained from being a CNMS Scholar was this ability to build a network with people in different levels of their education and professional careers, both in and outside of my department,” Norman shares. “That has been a major plus of being in the program.”

Regular lunches and informal activities like craft projects with just the scholars “allowed us to connect with each other over shared experiences,” Damond says. “Caitlin was really good about getting us together,” adds Norman. “It gave us that opportunity to reach out to other people in a low-key setting.”

Representation in STEM

Both Norman and Damond feel strongly that the program has shaped their futures. Damond wasn’t sure about pursuing a Ph.D. until Leach helped her see the career options the degree could offer her, even if academia is not her goal. For Norman, the program has made her want to do more than make advances in atmospheric science.

“Being a CNMS Scholar has made me interested in not just doing research, but making sure that where I do research and how I do research is reflective of the scholars program itself,” Norman shares. “I want where I am to have an ongoing conversation about progress being made toward fair representation in STEM.”

Kowalewski is confident Norman and the other scholars will make a difference wherever they go. “I could not be more proud of all that these bright, engaging young women have accomplished during their time at UMBC,” she says. “I have no doubt they will help to pave a stronger path for the advancement of women in STEM in their future careers.”

Additional graduating CNMS Scholars include Ashley Mitchell ’20, biochemistry and molecular biology; Alida Hartwell ’20, bioinformatics and computational biology; and Laina Colony ’20, chemical engineering. To support UMBC’s CNMS Scholars program visit giving.umbc.edu.

Banner image: Olivia Norman ’20 (left of center) relaxes with Zhibo Zhang (center) and other members of the lab group. All photos by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.