Friday, October 17 was not only our second Retriever Day of the year, but it was also the greatly anticipated grand opening of the Performing Arts and Humanities Building! And indeed, it was a grand day—complete with representatives from the university, the arts community, and policy makers. I was so moved by the event that I’m just going to share with you what other people had to say.

Scott Casper, Dean of the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences, welcomed us all and declared that this building was going to be a place where we could all ask the important questions, “Who are we? Where do we come from? And, what matters?”

Next, was senior Music major and Linehan Artist Scholar, Erika Koshco who spoke about the shared “hunger to create and grow,” and who has already discovered that the PAHB is a place that will “allow our craft to come alive.”

We received sincere congratulations and recognition for our commitment to the arts from the House of Delegates, with County Executive Kevin Kamenetz foreseeing that UMBC will “quickly become the hub for arts for the region.”

 I learned that Maryland recently passed a law stating that any new building must include a public art installation in its construction plans. UMBC is the inaugural location to enact this legislation, with the help of artist Thomas Sayre and his sculpture, Forum. Sayre was selected from a national search led by UMBC and the Maryland Arts and Humanities Council. Sayre shared that he hopes his sculpture will become a destination and our community will begin to say, “meet me at the earth cast arches.”

The earth cast sculpture by Thomas Sayre.

Jeannie Howe, Executive Director of the Greater Baltimore Cultural Alliance, applauded UMBC and Dr. Hrabowski for making the arts such a priority; “You have placed the arts and humanities on a pedestal at equal footing with STEM programs, right where it should be.”

Just before the official ribbon cutting, and as he proved the practically perfect acoustics of the grand recital hall by not using a microphone, Dr. Hrabowski left us with these words, “Choice, not chance, determines your destiny. We choose the arts and humanities.”

Dean Casper, Erika Koshco, President Hrabowski, and the Ribbon Cutting!

Walk In Advising Hours October 20th-24th

Monday - Thursday

3pm-4pm

Please remember that Walk-in advising may not be used for registration advising appointments. For information on signing up for an appointment for registration clearance, please read the information posted here.

Advisors are also available by appointment.

Have a heart for justice? Like glow in the dark events? 

As part of Relationship Violence and Prevention month, UNITED Christian Council is hosting Glow for the Girls, a 5K to raise awareness about the realities of human trafficking, specifically sex trafficking locally and internationally.

The walk/run is open to everyone, FREE for UMBC students and $20 for non-UMBC students. Donations will be given to local and international organizations working to combat human trafficking. There are also perks for donating! 

To register for the walk, create a team, donate, or learn more about human trafficking go to:

www.raisingkarma.com/glowforthegirlsumbc

*(Meeting at the Commons Terrace (rain location-Sportszone) and walking/running the inner loop. After party [Sportszone]: Student-documentary showing: "A Single Seed" and Q&A session).

• TV weather forecasters referring to "normal" temperatures (as in, "Today's high of 74 was ten degrees above normal") when they mean "average." There are two problems here. First, the average high temperature for a given date encompasses many past instances of higher-than-average temperatures for that day, as well as many instances of lower-than-average temperatures for that day. There is nothing abnormal about a day on which the temperature does not exactly equal the long-term average. Second, average temperatures are increasing over time due to climate change--so more and more, the average temperature is not "normal" at all. A hundred years from now, when the polar ice caps have melted and coastal cities are under water, will the weather forecasters be saying "Well, today's 120 degree high temperature seemed hot, but that's perfectly OK, because 120 degrees is normal for this date"?

• "Nelson Cruz led the American League in six offensive categories." "218 high temperature records were broken today." Those sentences seem to be telling you something very specific. But do you see the problem? I think of it as the "statistical numerators for which there are no agreed-upon denominators" problem, though there is probably a  better name for it. Here's the issue: Exactly how many offensive categories are there in baseball? (There is no answer, because there are infinite ways to keep track of information about players' performance). Exactly how many places are keeping track of temperature records, and do those places overlap? If you don't have answers to those questions, the initial pieces of information are essentially meaningless.

• The use of the phrase "statistical dead heat" or "statistical tie" to describe a polling result where the difference in support for two candidates is within the poll's margin of error: "Candidate A leads Candidate B by 52%-48% in the latest poll, but the margin of error is +/- 4%, so it's a statistical dead heat." Wrong! This is not a tie. A more appropriate interpretation of this poll result is: "While we don't know for sure that Candidate A leads Candidate B by 52%-48% among the population sampled, that's the most likely scenario. And while there's a small chance that support for the two candidates among the population sampled is 50%-50%, there's an equal (small) chance that Candidate A's lead is twice as large as the poll indicates."

The Society of Research Administrators International / Chesapeake Chapter is soliciting presenters and session proposal ideas for the 2015 Chapter meeting to be held in Baltimore, Maryland at the John Hopkins University on March 20, 2015. You can present by yourself or with a panel or topics related to research administration, practices or procedures. The call for proposals will be posted soon to the SRA/Chesapeake Chapter website.

For more information or to forward an idea for a presentation, please contact Tim Sparklin, 5-2737 or sparklin@umbc.edu