Rebecca Boehling is researching denazification in post-WW II Germany.

“Learning from Post-World War II Germany”

UMBC faculty are recognized for creating new perspectives in history and often help shape the present and future by serving as advisors to governmental and organizational programs.

Rebecca Boehling, associate professor and graduate director in the Department of History, is researching denazification in post-World War II Germany under Allied occupation. Denazification was an important part of the Allies’ program to transform Germany from an authoritarian state into a democratic nation that would again cooperate in international life. Boehling proposes that because there was not a structural change-oriented, consistent approach to denazification during the U.S. occupation period, there were lasting repercussions for postwar German society as well as for the victims of Nazism and the international community.

She is currently serving on an historians’ advisory panel to the U.S. government that helps oversee the declassification of U.S. government documents related to Nazi and Imperial Japanese war crimes committed during World War II. This declassification project is based on the Nazi War Crimes Disclosure Act that former President Clinton signed into law in January 1999.

In the fall of 2000, Boehling received a fellowship at the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies, part of the United States Holocaust Museum in Washington, D.C. She says, “The invited lecture that I gave on denazification prior to my fellowship drew a considerable audience. In fact, it was this experience and the many follow-up inquiries from the audience, journalists and Justice Department officials that convinced me this was a topic that Americans wanted and needed to understand better. That was why I decided to apply for the fellowship.�

Boehling was able to help museum staff answer inquiries from Holocaust survivors and their families about the denazification process itself as well as about where records of individual denazification proceedings could be found. After starting the research there, she went on last summer to begin the primary research in archives in Germany, where she hopes to return this summer.

Boehling�s work on denazification is intended to result in a book that compares the practice in the three Western zones (British, French, U.S.) of occupied Germany from 1945 until 1952.

 
Cleopatra Borel won the women’s shot put in the NCAA Division I Track and Field Championships.

“UMBC’s First Division I Champion”

UMBC Retrievers know how to win both on and off the field.

Senior Cleopatra Borel won the women’s shot put in the NCAA Division I Track and Field Championships, held at the University of Arkansas’ Randal Tyson Track Center on March 9. Borel’s next-to-last throw, a personal best of 17.50 meters (57’5″), outdistanced Kansas State’s Austra Skujyte (55’9″) and Iowa State’s Lisa Griebel (54’10.25″) to capture UMBC’s first Division I national title.

“Last year was my first time competing in the national championships, and I was nervous. But the competition is a lot of fun, something I always look forward to,” said Borel, who is an academic star as well, maintaining a 3.4 GPA.

A native of Trinidad and Tobago, Borel earned a pair of All America citations last season, with top eight finishes in the shot put at both the indoor and outdoor championships. She credits preparation as the key to her success.

Borel is an interdisciplinary studies major focusing on “Studies in Health Psychology.� She plans on attending graduate school after leaving UMBC, but may have to delay while she trains for the 2004 Olympics in Athens, Greece.

ESPN2 aired Borel’s winning throw on Sunday, March 10. Hear an interview with Borel at http://www.sportscastproductionsinc.com/Media/WSP.htm.

became director of the Center for Women & Information Technology. McCann is known for her scholarly contributions to the history of American reproductive politics in the 20th century, and her book Birth Control Politics in the United States, 1916-1945 (Cornell University Press, 1994), was the first to place the birth control debate in the wider political context of the period. McCann is working on a follow-up, Birth Control, Eugenics and the Foundations of Demography, under contract with the University of Pennsylvania Press, which examines gender and race in international population politics after 1945. This year, Routledge will publish McCann�s Feminist Theory Reader: Local and Global Perspectives, co-edited with Seung-kyung Kim of the University of Maryland College Park.

 
Kevin Eckert, professor of sociology and anthropology, is a prominent scholar in the field of gerontology.

“A Collaborative Approach to Improving Eldercare”
  

Kevin Eckert, professor of sociology and anthropology, and co-director (with Jay Magaziner) of the new interdisciplinary Gerontology Doctoral Program with University of Maryland Baltimore, frequently works with other prominent scholars to advance the field of gerontology. Most recently, he has co-authored a new book, Assisted Living: Needs, Practices, and Policies in Residential Care for the Elderly (with S. Zimmerman and P.D. Sloane of UNC Chapel Hill), published by Johns Hopkins University Press.

Additionally, he is embarking on a new four-year, $1.7 million study � with UMBC sociology professors Robert Rubinstein and Leslie Morgan and UNC Chapel Hill�s Cheryl Zimmerman � titled �Transitions from Assisted Living: Sociocultural Aspects� and funded by the National Institute on Aging. Combined funding for the sociology department�s new Center for Aging Studies now exceeds $3 million.

In 1999, Eckert�s numerous collaborative projects led the University System of Maryland Board of Regents to honor him with a Regents Faculty Award for Excellence in Collaboration. Through his partnerships with the University of Maryland School of Medicine, Eckert has illuminated the medical and functional outcomes of long-term care for the elderly in assisted-living facilities.

In addition to the new doctoral program in gerontology, he also was instrumental in developing the interdisciplinary Ph.D. program in language, literacy and culture, which involves five departments at UMBC and faculty from four other University System of Maryland (USM) campuses. His contribution included the course �Cyberspace, Culture and Society,� developed out of his interest in the effects of electronic technologies on culture and society.

 
Jay Freyman has inspired a tradition of mentoring at UMBC.

“An Advocate for the Liberal Arts”
  

Ancient studies professor Jay Freyman, a member of the faculty since 1968 and director of the Honors College, is a tireless advocate for the liberal arts and a role model, personal counselor, career advisor, and mentor to hundreds�if not thousands�of UMBC students. His actions have inspired a tradition of mentoring at UMBC, and he was instrumental in UMBC�s successful application for Phi Beta Kappa, serving as the chapter�s first president. In 1999, he received one of the University System of Maryland Board of Regents� highest honors, a Regents Faculty Award for Excellence in Mentoring.

As director of the Honors College, Freyman visits Maryland high schools to recruit students for the Honors College and the ancient studies program. His mentoring and service also extends to the community, including working with The Associated Jewish Community Federation of Baltimore assisting Russian immigrants with the development of conversational English skills.

 
Economist Virginia McConnell’s teaching and research reflect her interest in the intersection of urban and environmental problems.

“An Eye on Air Quality”
  

As a environmental economist focusing on transportation issues, Virginia McConnell knows a lot about cars and trucks – more specifically, the impact of policies to reduce air pollution through vehicle emissions regulations, inspection and maintenance programs, fuel regulations, emission taxes and land use changes. She became interested in the intersection of urban and environmental problems as a graduate student, and has taught and pursued research in these areas ever since. Her recent work is on differential fuel taxes for introducing cleaner fuels, and land use policy changes and their impact on air quality. She enjoys working on these projects with students in the Economics department�s new M.A. in Economic Policy Analysis. 

An economics department faculty member at UMBC since 1982, McConnell also serves as a senior fellow in the Quality of the Environment Division of Resources for the Future, where she works with other environmental economists on air pollution policies. She recently served on a National Academy of Sciences panel examining vehicle emissions policies, and is currently a member of several Environmental Protection Agency advisory committees.

 
Clinical Associate Professor of Education John Lee works with teachers enrolled in Project SUPPORT, UMBC’s urban teacher-training program.

“Teaching That Makes a Difference”
  

UMBC is a leader in assisting Maryland�s most troubled public schools through Project SUPPORT (School-University Partnership to Prepare Outstanding Responsive Teachers), a remarkably successful federally funded program that will ultimately place 1,100 teachers in Baltimore City and hundreds more in Anne Arundel and Baltimore Counties.

�Our school-university partnerships will break a tradition of neglect by recruiting, preparing, mentoring and retaining the high-quality teachers necessary to improve student learning and achievement,� says UMBC Clinical Associate Professor of Education John Lee, who heads the project.

The program is a win-win for public school students, their schools and UMBC�s urban teachers-in-training. UMBC�s teacher trainees receive tuition support for their master�s level studies and undertake apprenticeships with veteran teachers in the school system. By year-end, UMBC will have 150 urban teacher graduates.

In turn, the program�s public school partners are promised that UMBC teacher candidates will sign on for five years. As a result, teacher attrition in many of these schools is down. Moreover, in schools where UMBC has provided academic services, student achievement has soared.

 
Sari Bennett, director of geographic education, works with educators to strengthen the teaching of geography.

“The Power of Geography”
  

For more than a decade, Sari Bennett has worked with educators in Maryland to strengthen the teaching of geography in grades K-12.  “All too often students think of geography only as maps or the memorization of place names. We�re working to show teachers and students the power of geography in understanding the world around us.”

As head of the Maryland Geographic Alliance, an initiative funded by the National Geographic Society (NGS) and the State of Maryland, Bennett has provided professional development programs for more than 8,000 teachers, including summer geography institutes at UMBC. Currently, she has a Grosvenor Grant from NGS to produce CD-ROMs with interactive activities for students to learn and apply important geographic concepts. These CD-ROMs and related activities will be disseminated to elementary teachers throughout Maryland.

A geography department faculty member since 1974, Bennett is the director of the Center for Geographic Education. She also served two years as “Geographer-in-Residence” at the National Geographic Society.

 
Michael Summers, professor of chemistry/biochemistry, works closely with undergraduates in his Howard Hughes Medical Institute laboratory.

“U.S. Presidential Award for UMBC”
  

The usually casually dressed Michael Summers put on a suit and tie for the occasion–he was, after all, going to the White House to receive an award from the president of the United States.

Summers, UMBC professor of chemistry/biochemistry and Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator, accepted the 2000 Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics, and Engineering Mentoring from President Clinton. He was one of 10 national recipients of the award. Administered and funded by the National Science Foundation, the award honors leadership in encouraging minorities, women, and people with disabilities to pursue careers in scientific, engineering, and technical fields.

Summers brings UMBC undergraduates into his research lab to work on unraveling the protein structure of the HIV virus, affording them real scientific research, and even publication experience. His guidance and encouragement of UMBC’s minority students interested in pursuing the sciences have proven pivotal in launching their careers: Summer’s recent UMBC grads have gone on to medical school and M.D./Ph.D. programs at Harvard, Yale, and the University of Pennsylvania.

This marks the second time in four years that the award has been brought home to UMBC–the university was honored for its institutional mentoring efforts in 1997. Summers brought back from the White House a commemorative presidential certificate, and a $10,000 grant. Well worth wearing a tie.

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“Probing Our Impact on the Environment”
  

A member of the physics faculty since 1984 and a 1974 UMBC graduate, Larrabee Strow is one of the chief scientists behind NASA’s $30 billion international Earth Observing System project. He developed a new satellite instrument, the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS), and complex algorithms that will be used to measure climate change. The data collected by AIRS will be used by scientists around the world to better understand weather and climate change and by the National Weather Service and others to improve the accuracy of weather and climate models.

Strow’s work on the NASA project over the past 10 years is one of the most significant examples of UMBC’s emergence as a major research center for environmental studies.

In 2000, the University entered into a $75 million cooperative agreement with NASA/Goddard — the largest research partnership in UMBC’s history — establishing UMBC as the headquarters for the Goddard Earth Science and Technology Center, which studies the Earth’s surface, atmosphere, and oceans. The University also received $2 million in funding from the Environmental Protection Agency to create the Center for Urban Environmental Research, Education, and Training.