The week of Thanksgiving break is a high-traffic holiday. Peaking on Tuesday, with high-traffic intervals on Wednesday, it is difficult for people to get where they want to go without at least a day allocated for travel. UMBC is only closed the day of and after Thanksgiving. This long-standing schedule should change in order to give all students, in and out of state, the travel time necessary to get home or to a holiday destination.

Choosing optimal times to travel is necessary when planning to leave for a holiday weekend. Having Tuesday night and Wednesday dedicated to travel is a must. Studies show that peak hours of traffic occur on Tuesday evening and various instances on Wednesday. However, there are specific junctures on both days where the traffic lulls.

On Tuesday after 8 p.m., traffic is relatively low on the often congested highway I-95. However, traveling on a Tuesday night is impossible if someone has classes the next day. Traffic on Wednesday peaks in the afternoon but is normal before and after. Again, picking an ideal time on Wednesday is impossible with classes at various times of the day.

UMBC’s out-of-state student population is only an estimated five percent. However, that small percentage is still over 500 undergraduates who will have trouble getting home on time, especially if they have evening or night classes.

Marissa Gabel, a statistics and dance double major from New Jersey, stated that since train tickets during the holidays are expensive and limited she has to, “book so far ahead that [she] often ends up having to plan for skipping class or hoping that professors cancel class.”

The vast majority of UMBC students are in-state. However, that does not necessarily mean that each in-state student has an easy commute back home. Maryland, although not a very large state, still has areas that are easily an hour or two from campus. Traffic can also conflict with an in-state student’s holiday if their family is planning to travel.

John Hutchison, a junior mechanical engineer major, lives 45 minutes away from campus. He stated, “I do not end up getting home until the late afternoon/evening which complicates things because it makes my family have to wait before we leave [we always go to see relatives in New Jersey for Thanksgiving]. Since I do not get home until late, usually we end up having to leave early Thursday morning.”

Many professors cancel class on Wednesday. However, planning a schedule based on that assumption is a gamble that does not always pay off. When the professor does not cancel, there are still students who have no choice — like Gabel who buys her ticket home ahead of time — but to skip class.

On canceling classes, Hutchinson said, “some of my professors do cancel class on Wednesday, but some do not … having to stay at school all morning just to go to a 4 p.m. class is extremely annoying.” Gabel also says, “since most professors cancel class anyways, it would be a consistent decision school-wide … plus it’s a nice break for the teachers as well!”

Giving the Wednesday before Thanksgiving off would be very beneficial for in-state and out-of-state students, and for professors and staff alike. Although UMBC is a state school with many commuter students, that does not negate the necessity for an extra day of travel time.

For the first time in University of Maryland, Baltimore County history, a UMBC student, Naomi Mburu, has been selected to receive the prestigious Rhodes Scholarship.

The oldest international scholarship in the world, The Rhodes Scholarship was established in 1902. Students are selected each year from a pool of applicants that includes students from 320 United States Universities and colleges.

Mburu, senior chemical engineering major, is one of 32 students out of the 866 applicants to receive the award for the 2018 academic year. A Meyerhoff Scholar, MARC U*STAR Trainee, and a peer mentor for freshmen and sophomores pursuing chemical engineering and physics, Mburu is a first generation American. Her parents immigrated from Kenya.

According to the Baltimore Sun, “Hrabowski … got goosebumps and tears in his eyes when he learned Mburu had been selected. He was one of the school officials who recruited her to UMBC, with the promise that she would be able to attend any graduate school of her choosing afterward.”

Mburu’s future plans include pursuing a Ph.D. in engineering science at the University of Oxford.

This fall, hundreds of students from across the East Coast gathered to present their research and compete for awards at UMBC’s Undergraduate Research Symposium in the Chemical and Biological Sciences (URS). Fifty-two of the student scientists attend UMBC and participate in a program designed to provide research opportunities to a broad range of students in STEM and boost their confidence, increase the likelihood they pursue STEM graduate degrees, and set them on a path to success.

The program is UMBC STEM Building Infrastructure Leading to Diversity (BUILD).  Eight BUILD students won awards, which is a good sign for the effectiveness of this relative newcomer among UMBC’s cohort programs. UMBC is one of 10 lead institutions on the STEM BUILD initiative nationwide and received $18 million from the National Institutes of Health to launch it in 2014 with the goal to “create a national model of comprehensive support to expand and increase the success of students in STEM.”

“The BUILD participants at URS exemplify the objectives of the program,” says Laura Ott, STEM BUILD active learning coordinator and director of UMBC’s Science Education Research Unit. All BUILD participants complete summer research, either in opportunities they arrange themselves or in small groups on campus organized by the program. BUILD students also receive financial support and extensive academic advising.

STEM BUILD is also a scientific study, so participants’ progress is carefully tracked to try to tease out which supports have the biggest impact on student success. “By participating in the BUILD program, they’re helping us explore novel strategies to increase participation in undergraduate research for all students,” Ott says.

Teodora (“Roxie”) Danaila ’20, biological sciences, Arjun Sharma ’20, biological sciences, and Amber Thompson ’20, biochemistry and molecular biology and mathematics, worked together to characterize antibiotic resistance genes present in local freshwater samples. Their team won second place in their biochemical and molecular biology group at URS. Mohammed Arafat ‘20, psychology; Yasmin Khan ‘20, biological sciences; and Sharanja Mathyvannan ‘20, pre-mechanical engineering, completed a similar project and won second place in their group.

Caitlin Kowalewski ’14, biological sciences, M.S. ’15, applied molecular biology, and now research coordinator for the College of Natural and Mathematical Sciences; Josh Wilhide, M.S. ’10, chemistry, and manager of UMBC’s Molecular Characterization and Analysis Complex; and their assistants, Dave Varisco and Tim Cain ’18, chemistry education, mentored the students in the on-campus, three-week “Summer Bridge” experience.

“Ms. Kowalewski was able to get me to step my game up and allowed me to see what I was capable of,” Arafat shares. “If you ever had questions or were having trouble,” Danaila says, “they were there.” The mentors “allowed us to relay ideas back and forth with people who had much more experience and knowledge than us,” adds Sharma.

Presenting at the symposium had benefits, too. “It allowed me to explore fields of research that may interest me, and also helped me improve my presentation and research methods,” Sharma says. Thompson appreciated the opportunity to speak with students from other schools. “I was interested in how they got into their labs and what it was like for them in a different lab environment,” she shared.

“I felt that my role in mentoring the students was not only to teach them the laboratory skills, but to help them grow as scientists and researchers,” Kowalewski says. She was impressed by their rapid progress in the content-intensive program. “The fact that they were able to understand the information and present it well enough to win an award at URS was a testament to all of their hard work,” she says. Overall, the summer experience under Kowalewski’s tutelage is intended to build the students’ proficiency in a wide range of scientific techniques and prepare them for independent research opportunities.

Temiloluwa Okusolubo ’19, biological sciences, and Ifeoma (“Fefe”) Azinge ’19, biological sciences, are in their second year of BUILD participation and both earned first place in their biochemical and molecular biology groups at URS for independent research. Okusolubo studied the folding of serpin proteins, which are implicated in various diseases related to lung function, at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. Azinge’s research at the National Institute on Aging in Baltimore focused on calcium transport in sweat glands, which is critical for temperature regulation.

Okusolubo and Azinge’s successes are the kind of outcomes that UMBC STEM BUILD hopes to facilitate, using systems that other schools can eventually adopt. Ott is proud of the students in the program, she says, “and I have high hopes for where they’ll go in the future.”

Image: Students and faculty at the 2017 UMBC Undergraduate Research Symposium. Photo by Mohammed Arafat ’20.

Qatar, Israel and Pakistan number among the countries whose flags hang in the Commons. However, adherents of the majority religions in these countries have tremendous difficulty finding food to eat in that same building.

Observant Jews and Muslims adhere to religious dietary restrictions that complicate on campus dining. If religious students live on campus, they are sometimes forced to compromise their religious principles. A school truly dedicated to fostering a diverse and inclusive community needs to create an accessible campus space where students can comfortably practice their religion.

Yusra Ahmed, a sophomore biology and psychology major, is the secretary of the Muslim Student Association. Last year, Yusra had to modify her stance on halal foods to maintain a nutritious diet.

“I was living on campus as a student when I first came here last year,” says Yusra, “I was trying to eat [halal] but it was very difficult so I changed. I now eat chicken and beef.”

Even students who only eat halal meat have difficulty knowing whether their food is actually halal. At a meeting between MSA and dining services, MSA President Ahmed Wadi reported that several Muslim students saw Commons employees using utensils that have touched non-halal meat to prepare halal food.

When Muslim students need to remind staff to change their gloves or use clean utensils, it shatters the trust between the Muslim community and UMBC dining. Students cannot always verify that employees are properly separating food when there is no student there to remind them.

Jewish students also have a difficult time finding food because the only kosher options on campus are prepackaged foods from Outtakes and the Kosher Korner in True Grit’s, which is only open from dinner on Sunday through lunch on Friday.

Jewish students cannot live comfortably or healthily with these limited options. Additionally, MSA representatives articulated that they are alienated by a dearth of authentic Middle Eastern food.

Inclusive kosher and halal dining options must include food that people can enjoy. Asking a group of students to exclusively subsist on cold-cuts for two days a week or completely Americanized halal food is not inclusive.

Rabbi Jeremy Fierstien, the Executive Director of UMBC Hillel, insists that poor meal offerings have practical repercussions.

“The problem is that if we can’t offer a comfortable Jewish communal life, the national Jewish community is not going to take this place seriously,” says Fierstien.

The Muslim community has been able to effect some change through student voices. Conversations between the MSA and Dining Services yielded several food truck collaborations. Soon colored utensils will be used to decrease the chance of cross contamination with non-halal foods. In the meantime, however, Muslim students choose to live off-campus or compromise their morals to maintain a healthy diet.

The picture for UMBC Jews is even grimmer. Due to scant kosher offerings, religious Jews do not have the option of living on campus. Consequently, there are few student voices demanding more kosher options at UMBC.

According to the Chartwells Resident District Manager Tom DeLuca, despite ongoing talks, the current kosher dining options are not expected to provide observant Jews a comprehensive meal plan. This effectively renders it impossible for observant Jews to live on campus.

“Seven meals a week 3 meals a day … [our kosher program] is not at the moment currently designed for that,” says DeLuca.

A diverse, inclusive school should not force religious minorities to violate their principles or choose other universities because of limited options. True inclusivity requires UMBC to design kosher and halal preparation spaces into future infrastructure so that all UMBC students can enjoy a healthy and happy campus life while practicing their religion.

With hate crimes against Jews and Islamophobia on the rise, it is critical to send a clear message now.

UMBC’s Chapter of Young Alumni made a difference in our community this month, volunteering at two locations — and having a blast doing so together.

The Walters Art Museum has a full time opening for a dynamic and energetic individual to work in the Museum Advancement Division as the Development Coordinator. The Development Coordinator manages and expands the pool of donors ($1,000 and above), institutional donors, and committee and governance prospects through comprehensive and proactive research. Reporting to the Development Manager, this position provides ongoing donor stewardship and cultivation support across the Development Department through the use of prospect research and moves management.

Attention ECON, FEIC, BTA, and Accounting December Grads

Student Affairs Business Services Center is seeking TWO Accounting Associates.

FULL POSITION DESCRIPTION AND APPLICATION PROCEDURES CAN BE FOUND HERE

Closing Date:     Best consideration by December 3, 2017
Salary:    Pay Range 9 (Starting at $35,728) based on the University System of Maryland Pay Program

DUTIES:  Provides full-performance level of business management services work requiring a working knowledge of, and the ability to apply, Generally Accepted Accounting Principles (GAAP) and skill in applying basic analytical skills to review revenues, prepare forecasts, and reconcile accounts.    Specific duties include:  coordinate the Accounts Receivable function for multiple departments to include Events and Conference Services, Commonvision, Flat Tuesdays, Game Room, Transportation Services, University Health Services, Career Center, and others as needed; supervise all cash handling by employees in the Division of Student Affairs; oversee the accurate preparation of complex deposit transmital documentation; supervise the on-line ticketing revenue process and other specialized revenue programs for the Division of Student Affairs; analyze all revenue generation in the Division of Student Affairs to propose improvements in procedures and processes; prepare monthly reports on revenue generation using multiple data sources and include explanations of budget variances; manage internal control policies and procedures for the Division of Student Affairs; and perform other duties as assigned.