College life is full of financial scenarios you might see in the real world. Taking out student loans, paying bills and managing expenses and saving money all require strategic planning and decision making.

Your financially savvy Extra Credit team has provided some tips and resources for saving money and building a solid financial foundation:

UMBC Office of Financial Aid & Scholarships – http://financialaid.umbc.edu/

Financial aid can come in the form of grants, work, student loans, parent loans, scholarships and other awards. A counselor is available to help walk you through your options.

 UMBC's Payment Plan – http://sbs.umbc.edu/payment-plan/

UMBC's Monthly Payment Plan (MPP) can help you budget your out of pocket costs not covered by financial aid. The plan enables you to pay tuition and fees as well as university room and board on an installment basis.

 Financial Smarts @ UMBC - http://financialsmarts.umbc.edu/

This site provides students with information about credit, budgeting, investing, job seeking and other finance-related topics. Includes videos and links to relevant sources. For ongoing announcements and updates on financial education and literacy opportunities at UMBC, join the Financial Smarts myUMBC Group at http://my.umbc.edu/groups/financialsmarts

 Rent your textbooks:http://bookstore.umbc.edu/SiteText.aspx?id=20462

Not all textbooks are available to rent, but for those that are, this can significantly cut down on your book budget for the semester! Renting can often be a good option for your non-major courses.

 Carpool with Zimride: https://www.zimride.com/umbc

It’s simple, carpooling saves on gas. UMBC has partnered with Zimride by Enterprise to help connect you to other UMBC students in your area who are looking to carpool.

 360 Degree of Financial Literacy - https://www.360financialliteracy.org/Life-Stages/College-Students

Financial education is a lifelong endeavor. This web site offers general information for managing personal finances and developing money management skills.

Some other tips include:

• Using an app to manage your money – There’s an app for that! Online Banking, websites like Mint.com, and budgeting spreadsheets can provide you with plenty of ways to keep your finances organized.

• Keeping an eye out for student discounts – From museums, to movie theater tickets, to cell phone plans --- don’t hesitate to ask retailers and businesses if they offer student discounts!

• Planning for big expenses in advance - Putting a little money aside each pay check will help you avoid the strain of having to decide between splurging on an afternoon at the mall or paying for school expenses such as text books or meal plans.

• Being conservative with credit cards – Having a credit card or two can be good if you use them strategically. Start by maintaining one card and make at least one charge to it every month, such as gas or groceries.

And for fun:

Weekly Run-Down of Free or Cheap Entertainment in Baltimore - http://baltimorecollegetown.org/explore-baltimore/weekly-cheap-and-free

Do you have some financially savvy ideas you would like to share? Feel free to post them below!

The UMBC Cyber Defense Lab presents

   Creating Educational Cybersecurity Assessment Tools

Alan T. Sherman
Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering
University of Maryland, Baltimore County

12:00–1:00pm Friday, March 9, 2018, ITE 229, UMBC

The Cybersecurity Assessment Tools (CATS) Project provides rigorous evidence-based instruments for assessing and evaluating educational practices. The first CAT will be a Cybersecurity Concept Inventory (CCI) that measures how well students understand basic concepts in cybersecurity (especially adversarial thinking) after a first course in the field. The second CAT will be a Cybersecurity Curriculum Assessment (CCA) that measures how well students understand core concepts after completing a full cybersecurity curriculum. These tools can help identify pedagogies and content that are effective in teaching cybersecurity.

In fall 2014, we carried out a Delphi process that identified core concepts of cybersecurity. In spring 2016, we interviewed twenty-six students to uncover their understandings and misconceptions about these concepts. In fall 2016, we generated our first assessment tool—-a draft CCI, comprising approximately thirty multiple-choice questions. Each question targets a concept; incorrect answers are based on observed misconceptions from the interviews. In fall 2017, we began drafting CCA questions. This year we are validating the draft CCI using cognitive interviews, expert reviews, and psychometric testing. In this talk, I highlight our progress to date in developing the CCI and CCA. Audience members will be given an opportunity to answer sample questions.

Presently there is no rigorous, research-based method for measuring the quality of cybersecurity instruction. Validated assessment tools are needed so that cybersecurity educators have trusted methods for discerning whether efforts to improve student preparation are successful.

Joint work with Linda Oliva, David DeLatte, Enis Golaszewski, Geet Parekh, Konstantinos Patsourakos, Dhananjay Phatak, Travis Scheponik (UMBC); Geoffrey Herman, Dong San Choi, Julia Thompson (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)

Alan T. Sherman is a professor of computer science at UMBC in the CSEE Department and Director of UMBC’s Center for Information Security and Assurance. His main research interest is high-integrity voting systems. He has carried out research in election systems, algorithm design, cryptanalysis, theoretical foundations for cryptography, applications of cryptography, and cybersecurity education. Dr. Sherman is also an editor for Cryptologia and a private consultant performing security analyses. Sherman earned the PhD degree in computer science at MIT in 1987 studying under Ronald L. Rivest. www.csee.umbc.edu/~sherman

Support for this research was provided in part by the National Security Agency under grants H98230-15-1-0294 and H98230-15-1-0273 and by the National Science Foundation under SFS grant 1241576.

The post talk: Creating Educational Cybersecurity Assessment Tools, 12pm Fri 3/9 appeared first on Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering.

The UMBC Cyber Defense Lab presents

   Creating Educational Cybersecurity Assessment Tools

Alan T. Sherman
Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering
University of Maryland, Baltimore County

12:00–1:00pm Friday, March 9, 2018, ITE 229, UMBC

The Cybersecurity Assessment Tools (CATS) Project provides rigorous evidence-based instruments for assessing and evaluating educational practices. The first CAT will be a Cybersecurity Concept Inventory (CCI) that measures how well students understand basic concepts in cybersecurity (especially adversarial thinking) after a first course in the field. The second CAT will be a Cybersecurity Curriculum Assessment (CCA) that measures how well students understand core concepts after completing a full cybersecurity curriculum. These tools can help identify pedagogies and content that are effective in teaching cybersecurity.

In fall 2014, we carried out a Delphi process that identified core concepts of cybersecurity. In spring 2016, we interviewed twenty-six students to uncover their understandings and misconceptions about these concepts. In fall 2016, we generated our first assessment tool—-a draft CCI, comprising approximately thirty multiple-choice questions. Each question targets a concept; incorrect answers are based on observed misconceptions from the interviews. In fall 2017, we began drafting CCA questions. This year we are validating the draft CCI using cognitive interviews, expert reviews, and psychometric testing. In this talk, I highlight our progress to date in developing the CCI and CCA. Audience members will be given an opportunity to answer sample questions.

Presently there is no rigorous, research-based method for measuring the quality of cybersecurity instruction. Validated assessment tools are needed so that cybersecurity educators have trusted methods for discerning whether efforts to improve student preparation are successful.

Joint work with Linda Oliva, David DeLatte, Enis Golaszewski, Geet Parekh, Konstantinos Patsourakos, Dhananjay Phatak, Travis Scheponik (UMBC); Geoffrey Herman, Dong San Choi, Julia Thompson (University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign)

Alan T. Sherman is a professor of computer science at UMBC in the CSEE Department and Director of UMBC’s Center for Information Security and Assurance. His main research interest is high-integrity voting systems. He has carried out research in election systems, algorithm design, cryptanalysis, theoretical foundations for cryptography, applications of cryptography, and cybersecurity education. Dr. Sherman is also an editor for Cryptologia and a private consultant performing security analyses. Sherman earned the PhD degree in computer science at MIT in 1987 studying under Ronald L. Rivest. www.csee.umbc.edu/~sherman

Support for this research was provided in part by the National Security Agency under grants H98230-15-1-0294 and H98230-15-1-0273 and by the National Science Foundation under SFS grant 1241576.

The post talk: Creating Educational Cybersecurity Assessment Tools, 12pm Fri 3/9 appeared first on Department of Computer Science and Electrical Engineering.

According to the Center for American Women in Politics, in 2017 women held under 20 percent of seats in the United States Congress: 105 out of 535 seats, plus five of six non-voting delegate positions in the U.S. House of Representatives. The UMBC Gender and Women’s Studies Department wants college women to know that increasing the representation of women in government is possible, and that the country’s future leaders can start their journey in college.

“Over the last five years of running the Elect Her program we have had more women running for SGA office, and more women participate who didn’t know they were going to run or join a campaign. That matters,” says Kate Drabinski, senior lecturer in gender and women’s students. “Whether or not women run for office here, the program reminds all of us that we can do it, that we are the leaders we think we need.”

Elect Her is a nationwide training program begun in 2009 by the American Association of University Women. It is currently led by Running Start, a non-partisan organization working to support equal representation of women in government.

Across the U.S., Elect Her trainings offer women communication and organization strategies to campaign for student government or to pursue other leadership opportunities. Rina Shah, a Republican strategist, media commentator, and entrepreneur, will speak at UMBC’s Elect Her event on March 9, 2018, along with Sarah Elfreth, Democratic candidate for Maryland Senate, District 30. Students interested in attending the event, 10:30 a.m. – 3:30 p.m. in Fine Arts 011, can register online.

Shah, who is from West Virginia, grew up listening to her father discuss politics at home and seeing him be involved in a gubernatorial campaign. “My dad immigrated from Uganda and saw civic engagement as the beauty of being American,” she reflects. “I got a sense that being involved in the process was cool because we get to have a say in how our government functions.”

Shah’s path to politics began in college through journalism and leadership, first as an assistant managing editor her campus conservative publication and later as president of her school’s Panhellenic Council. After college, she worked briefly as a field reporter for a local television station. As she interviewed people, she learned more about issues affecting West Virginians, and found herself wanting to advocate for them. “People wanted me to take messages back to government officials, thinking I was somehow involved,” she says.

Shah moved to Washington D.C. for an internship with the National Association of Community Health Centers before going on to become a senior-level aide for two Republican Members of Congress in Capitol Hill in 2011. Seven years later, she opened her own political consulting and government affairs practice and co-founded the Women Influencers Network, which provides campaign training and internships for women interested in running for elected office anywhere in the U.S.

Elfreth was raised in New Jersey, where her parents, an engineer and a parole officer, were involved in labor unions, but it wasn’t until she was a student at Towson University that she became involved in government. “I fell in love with the ability to have a voice in the process when I visited Annapolis to advocate for student voting rights,” she says.

Elfreth’s experience in state-level leadership and government grew quickly when, in her senior year of college, then-Gov. Martin O’Malley appointed her to be the student member of the University System Board of Regents. Through that role she met with students and university leaders across Maryland, including UMBC President Freeman Hrabowski. She pursued a career in government relations, including as government affairs director for the National Aquarium, prior to deciding to run for office herself.

Both women were motivated to get involved in government, and to support the next generation of women leaders, to promote democracy and to help their communities. They stress that democratic engagement and leadership development must begin at the local level—on campus, at a place of worship, in a school club or neighborhood association.

“Experience comes through engaging with your community by applying your strengths, whether that be communications, policy, advocacy, fundraising, or technology,” says Shah.

Elfreth is focused on ensuring that government reflects the needs and interests of the people it serves, and she suggests that inspiring and preparing more women to run for office at all levels is key. “In order to shake up this culture for women and people of color, we have to continue to be involved,” she says. “We cannot afford to give up now.”

Banner image by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC