Did you know you may be eligible for unemployment benefits when you do not get teaching assignments or when your assignments are reduced from one academic term to another? Knowing how to access these benefits is more important than ever. However, adjuncts can face particular challenges to their unemployment claims due to their status as employees of educational institutions.

Please join me next Wednesday in an online workshop where we will cover how and why adjunct faculty are eligible for benefits, how to respond to any challenges to your claims, and what has changed due to the pandemic.

Please register in advance for one of the following workshops held by SEIU Local 500 on Zoom:

• Wednesday, May 6 at 10 AM

• Wednesday, May 6 at 6 PM

You will receive a confirmation email with instructions for accessing the workshop.

In the wake of COVID-19, the University of Maryland, Baltimore County canceled all events that could lead to large gathering of people, including the commencement ceremony scheduled to honor students graduating this spring semester.

In an email sent out on Apr. 20, the Commencement Committee announced to the Class of 2020 that there was an online celebration planned to recognize the students’ achievements and success in getting their degrees. The decision was made after a survey was sent to all students who were eligible for graduation this spring. Out of the 2000 students who were sent the survey, more than 600 replied, with two responses being “overwhelmingly” popular, according to Erin Johnson, the Associate Director of Special Events. The first one was the request to have some form of recognition in May when the original commencement ceremony would have been conducted. The second response was to have the ceremony postponed until it is safe to have large gatherings.

“We want to celebrate the graduates as they normally would have been celebrated. The decision on how was based on the feedback from the questionnaire,” Johnson said.

To recognize students as they graduate, the Commencement Committee came up with an online forum that graduates could easily share with their friends and family, although they are being careful to acknowledge that it is not a replacement for the traditional commencement ceremony.

“We are not using the word ceremony for the online celebration because [the ceremony is] what will happen as soon as it is safe to do so,” said Marie Lilly, the Director of Community Engagement within the Office of Institutional Advancement. “The ceremony is two-and-a-half hours long, people are not going to watch that on the internet … [The online celebration] will be [more] condensed and have more of an informal element to it. It is really a place for us to come together and celebrate.”

For the online event, graduating students are asked to submit a recording of the proper pronunciation of their name along with a photo of themselves. It was suggested that students take the photo in their cap and gown or in UMBC gear. The photos will be compiled in a slideshow, in which each student has their own slide dedicated to the honors they have achieved throughout their time at UMBC. The slides will be available for viewing along with several speeches on the morning of May 20 for undergraduate students and May 21 for graduate students.

During the planning period of the online event, it was decided that the speeches would be recorded prior to the event as opposed to being delivered through a live stream.

“Trying to get everyone together to do a live stream ends up being too difficult. We don’t want to disappoint anybody and have things freeze halfway through someone’s remarks,” Johnson said. “The best and safest way to make sure everyone got the full functionality was to make sure it was prerecorded.”

The speakers will include UMBC President Freeman Hrabowski, Maryland Governor Larry Hogan and representatives from campus faculty. For the undergraduate online event, the class of 2020’s valedictorians will speak. Similarly, the president of the Graduate Student Association will speak at the graduate school event.

“The issue is we normally have many more speakers and, even in addition to the speakers, we have the platform party which is … all the vice presidents, all the deans, [and] someone from the [university] system,” Lilly said. “We just can’t get them all in so that’s why it has been so hard.”

The option is also being kept open for graduates to return to campus for a future in-person commencement ceremony. Depending on the state of the coronavirus, students could potentially participate in the commencement held in December later this year. The goal is to give recent graduates the opportunity to partake in celebrations that cannot be replicated online, such as walking across the stage.

“People overwhelmingly wanted to make sure we would have an in-person ceremony so we are planning on doing that when everything is safe,” Johnson said. “We may have to end up having another ceremony or something like that, but we will make it work no matter what it is.” According to Johnson, the university will adjust the way they run ceremonies to accommodate the influx of graduates participating in the next commencement.

“One of my favorite things about commencement is watching everybody’s face on [commencement day] and seeing their joy,” Johnson said. “It really makes me sad that we can’t do that together this spring so I hope [the students] know that we are with them and that we are looking forward to celebrating in person with them too.”

A month ago to the day that I am writing this, I texted my friends reflecting on the idea that one day this experience, living through a global pandemic, will be part of history.

At the time I said, “It’s bizarre to live through but even more bizarre to think of it as a memory one day.” Even though we are still far from COVID-19 existing in the rearview, states are beginning to consider when and how to reopen. So as we think about what life will look like once stay at home orders are eased or lifted, I also want to consider what United States history books should record from this time.

1. Leadership (or lack thereof): From before outbreaks of COVID-19 began in the US, our country was ill-prepared for a health crisis. People have made a big deal out of looking back at things like Bill Gates’s Ted Talk about a global outbreak from 2015, or television shows that discussed the idea of a global pandemic. But people who discussed a new pandemic were not clairvoyant, they were speaking from the evidence of cycles in virology. Despite this, the president’s response to the pandemic has not reflected foresight or preparedness. His actions and inactions since the start of the outbreak have been appalling, such as his now infamous query about whether injecting people with disinfectants may help fight COVID-19.
2. The environment: There have been many memes centered on sarcastic jokes of pretend improvements in the environment followed by the statement: we are the virus. Despite the facetious memes, there are actually credible sources such as NASA indicating significant reductions in air pollution while people have been under stay at home orders. In addition, some animals are exploring urban areas while people spend more time inside. These changes show how powerful our impact on our environment truly is.
3. Education: The role of technology within the classroom has increased immensely over the last two decades, but any thoughts that sometime soon classes might run smoothly entirely online was quickly dispelled by the experience of online learning for today’s students. When people aren’t pulling Zoom pranks on their teachers, many are lamenting their lack of focus and drive to do… well, anything. More importantly, distance learning exposed issues of class and access to the internet that made learning more of a challenge for some than others.
4. Social Distancing: In addition to standard calls and texts, people have found new and creative ways to stay connected to their friends, family and work during this time. Social media and technology have often been seen as weakening our relationships, but now they are instrumental for so many people. Drive-by birthday parties and weddings are one of the more adaptive ways I have seen people keep their lives moving forward with loved ones despite social distancing. 
5. Media: Coronavirus has had a profound effect on the media or rather several profound effects. Media encompasses many businesses that have slowed down or shut down altogether because of coronavirus but the news media seems to have been invigorated in an unfathomable way. Journalists seem intent on reporting about every development related to COVID-19 from every angle at every opportunity. Keeping the public informed is important, but I question at what point the inundation of information is first counterproductive, especially in terms of conflicting or underdeveloped stories, and second exploitative of people’s fears and concerns, keeping them glued to news outlets even if it potentially causes psychological distress. It is a hard line to walk because lack of information can also create problems (And believe me, I get the irony of the medium in which I chose to express this.)
6. Racism: There have been disquieting instances of racism since the coronavirus became a global pandemic. In the United States, racism has been aimed at Asian people, with people blaming them for the virus. Some, following the president’s lead, began to call COVID-19 the “Chinese virus,” exacerbating the problem. In China, racism has been aimed at Black people because of associations between a second wave of the virus and foreigners visiting China. There has also been a surge in widely publicized instances of anti-black racism on the internet, with use of the TikTok app in particular as a platform for hate speech.

One thing is certain: Experiencing this global pandemic and the events that have happened because of it will leave some indelible marks on our society, even if they are just the knowledge of what we are capable of for better or worse.

While reading tweets from my friends about how it does not matter what you eat or drink during quarantine, I debate whether having lunch is a good idea. I stare at my fridge and my pantry before deciding that a granola bar or a bowl of fruit is enough to fuel me for the day. I drink an insane amount of water and tea to fool my stomach into thinking it is full.

I was a junior in high school when I was prematurely diagnosed with anorexia nervosa by a sports nutritionist. I say prematurely because I refused to see a doctor that could formally diagnose me.

At the time, the diagnosis seemed as unreal as the 10 pounds I lost during that year’s outdoor track season. Over those four months, I went from an already small 120 pounds (on a good day) to a mere 110 to 112 pounds depending on when I weighed myself. For a 5 foot, 6 inch tall girl that trained for at least an hour six days a week, those 10 pounds were the difference between being healthy and my body eating itself to survive.

My body started to break down. I developed many of the physical symptoms of anorexia, from always feeling cold to amenorrhea, or the lack of a period. I shivered at any temperature below a sunny 65 degrees. My heavy periods that once forced me to change my tampon at least once during a two-hour practice completely disappeared.

Even with these symptoms, I refused to believe anything was wrong with me. I did not have anorexia; I just did not have time to eat. After all, I was balancing Advanced Placements, being a photographer for my high school’s online newspaper, a social life, and running. I was using my lunch to do homework so I could go to bed before 1 a.m. It was a perfectly normal thing to do.

However, this attitude bled into every meal I ate. A quarter of the time I managed to finish two pieces of toast for breakfast. Most evenings, I barely finished half of my dinner. I went to bed with hunger pangs almost every night, telling myself that sleep was the cure for them instead of food.

Entering my senior year, I managed to weigh a consistent 115 pounds. The continuous lack of food and the high-calorie expenditure meant I got injured more often. I had shin splints, pain along the tibia or “shinbone,” and a stress reaction, swelling in the bone before a stress fracture, in my heel.

My thoughts about my body got worse. I started to relate being skinny to being fast. I chalked up not winning races to not being thin enough. I pulled at parts of my body, pinning them back or sucking them in to try and get a glimpse of what I wanted to see in the mirror.

I carried these thoughts into my freshman year running for the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. I ate more than I would have in high school after seeing my female teammates have their fill. However, it was still only enough to stop the hunger pangs. I wanted to eat just enough to look normal and to stop the pain, nothing more.

This, in combination with collegiate level training, led to even worse injuries. My shin splints turned into three stress reactions along my right tibia, cutting my outdoor season short. My coach had me count calories and found that I was eating less than 2,000 calories a day. A gynecologist visit later that summer revealed extremely low estrogen levels in my blood. According to my gynecologist, if I kept those levels over another few years, I would likely go through menopause in my late twenties or early thirties.

That finally got my attention. I worked on changing my attitude toward food. I went back to the sports nutritionist for help. I forced myself to drink smoothies and protein shakes to ensure I was fueling my body.

I was doing well until the pandemic canceled my spring track season. Without a strict training regiment, I feel like there is nothing to fuel for. I may still be running, but it is nowhere near the level I was at while at UMBC. I am no longer pushing myself through workouts that make me want to cry. I am no longer stacking on weights in the weightroom to keep up with my stronger teammates. I am no longer training and feeling like a Division I athlete, so why fuel like one?

When I run, I feel like I did in high school. My stomach growls when I wait for my GPS watch to start. I get lightheaded barely two miles into a run. I feel like I am forcing my body to take every step, no matter the pace I am running. 

Even sitting at my desk doing homework is exhausting. I struggle to concentrate in class. I often forget about how nauseous I am until I stand up to get more water to fill my empty stomach.

I stare at myself in the mirror more, poking at my stomach and seeing countless flaws with my body. I blame each of them on not training as much and for eating too much. My increased time on social media, staring at professional runners and lifestyle Instagrammers and YouTubers further deters me from eating. With these images in my mind of what I should look like, I am back to doing core unnecessarily. I am still struggling to find the line between looking the way I want to and tearing my stomach apart.

There is no rationalizing to me the need to eat during this quarantine. Even when I think about food as fuel, I manage to validate how little I eat. I do not need as much food because the pandemic makes my training less intense. Less intense training means I consume fewer calories while exercising. Consuming fewer calories while exercising means I should eat less, in general, to not gain weight.

The worst part is that I am now conscious that what I am doing is wrong. I know this way of thinking is destructive. I know it would upset the sports medicine staff and my coaches, especially since I never told them out of fear of being babied. 

I do have small successes here and there. I tell myself to eat lunch. I eat a full plate at dinner. For once, I am thankful for my sweet tooth as it encourages me to eat; even if what I am eating is toast with Nutella or Twizzlers.

As Maryland’s quarantine continues, so does my struggle with eating. I only hope that, as the fall’s cross country season approaches and my training ramps up, I can convince myself that consuming more calories is a good thing. While there is a chance that cross country will not happen, the season is a hope I cling to. Without it, I worry my relationship with food and my health will get even worse than it was in high school.

Even before my first week at The Retriever had ended, I quit.

It was freshman year. I had applied at the recommendation of my friend, one of the Arts and Culture (then called Arts and Entertainment) editors, and when I was not immediately placed in that section, I decided that maybe this journalism thing was just not for me. 

Fast forward four years, and I have written over 85 articles for The Retriever and have held the position of editor-in-chief for two full years. 

Each editor-in-chief imbues The Retriever with their own personality. While it’s probably fair to say that my term has been defined by a more-than-healthy level of skepticism about university processes, I know that I’m also leaving behind a commitment to truth, transparency and a great sense of personal style. 

I’ve given so much of my time in college to this newspaper — 28 issues’ worth — and I can’t imagine what my time here would have been like without it. I’d wake up in the morning thinking about our next issue, our next story, our next meeting, and I’d go to sleep at night knowing that I’d get to do it all again tomorrow.

But running a newsroom does not come without challenges, and suffice to say I feel as if I’ve seen them all. The hardest of them seems to be not being able to have a traditional final production in our newsroom, which is tucked away on the second floor of the University Center (Yes, we do have a physical office, and we’re located in UC 214, immediately above the Chick-fil-A. Please come visit once we’re back on campus).

A typical production begins at 8 a.m., with a ham and cheese croissant and a venti iced vanilla latte with an extra shot of espresso from Starbucks, an order I share with my roommate and fearless News Editor, Johanna Alonso. I meet Madeline, my sharp-witted sister and Production Manager, in the newsroom as we place ads and talk about what’s going on the front page so she can get to designing. 

By 9 a.m., the other editors arrive, and it’s a flurry of ‘But what about this?’ and ‘How long is the Starbucks line?’ and ‘Do we have a staff ed?’ until 8 p.m. when it’s just me and my incredibly perceptive managing editors, Maxi Wardcantori and Natalie Murray, closing out the issue, and we’re tired and we’ve been through the five stages of grief. 

But when that newspaper arrives on Wednesday morning, god is it worth it. 

Student journalism is worth it. 

Over the past two years, we’ve broken stories about campus vandalism and the removal of the physical education requirement. We’ve answered your questions about the Event Center, campus posting policies and funding for student organizations. We’ve covered a lawsuit, student government, countless protests and more recently, the coronavirus pandemic. Most importantly, we’ve done it while handling full course loads, internships, jobs and leadership positions in other student organizations.

I’m proud of what our newsroom has been able to accomplish, and I can’t wait to see what the next editor-in-chief, Anjali DasSarma, does with her time here. As our current Opinions editor and sometimes news reporter, she has already demonstrated an indefatigable dedication to our coverage and to the community we serve. 

To my newsroom, which has changed dramatically with the seasons, thank you for believing in me enough to even elect me in the first place. I know I didn’t strike a formidable presence as a soft-spoken sophomore Arts and Culture editor, but I appreciate you seeing in me what I now see in myself. 

To my faculty advisors, both Professor Corbett and Professor Rudacille, thank you for answering my almost-constant emails and for always being on call if I needed some advice. We would not have the paper we do without your overwhelming support and guidance. 

To the students of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County: you are the reason why we even put out a newspaper in the first place. Keep demanding more, from your administrators, from your student government, from your student newspaper, from each other. 

Over the past two years, I’ve seen students who didn’t register journalism as a career option begin writing for The Retriever and completely change their career path. That alone speaks to how powerful our work can be and how special this newspaper is. 

I myself am leaving to pursue my own career as a reporter. I’ve accepted an internship at The Capitol Forum this summer and will head to the University of Maryland, College Park in the fall for my Master’s of journalism. 

It’s been an honor to grow and learn with The Retriever over the past four years.  

Thanks for reading.

Julia Arbutus, Editor-in-Chief, Volumes 53-54

As the United States unemployment rate is heading quickly for 30 million people, seniors who might otherwise be delighting in graduation and entering the workforce now find themselves on the brink of entering the worst economy since the Great Depression.

For some, like Zach Tucker, a historical studies graduate student, job offers that once existed have vanished into thin air. “One federal organization has gone silent [and] doesn’t reply to any communication, and the other private company has informed me that they will not be able to bring anyone on until June at the earliest. I was working two jobs and an assistantship before the COVID-19 shutdown. The shutdown immediately closed the two jobs I had,” said Tucker.

Tucker graduated high school after the 2007 housing market crash, which impacted his family and his ability to enter college. He joined the military after high school and completed a six-year cycle before coming to the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. Now he’s set to graduate into an almost identical economic disaster. “It feels almost cyclical in the worst way imaginable. It took years for the housing market crash to reverberate around the globe and the full effects to be felt. We won’t know the full extent of [COVID-19] for potentially years to come. It feels depressingly familiar and unknown at the same time,” he said.

Undergraduate students, like global studies major Sofia Barrios, share the same fears and feelings of uncertainty as many graduate students. 

Barrios was originally planning to apply for immigration nonprofit jobs in Baltimore or D.C. and to move out of her parents’ home, but like Tucker, she is now uncertain about what opportunities remain on the table. “I am unsure if I will be able to secure any position within the organizations I’ve applied for,” she said. “I don’t know if organizations that I applied for are still hiring, or how the positions or hiring process has been affected by COVID-19.”

For others, hopes for the traditional graduation ceremony were dashed first, with the announcement of commencement cancellation earlier this year. That includes Lauren Hall, who is receiving her Master’s in Secondary English Education and will receive her teaching certification from Maryland.

After her father passed away during her first year at UMBC, soon after, her divorce was finalized, and she hoped for a moment to celebrate all that she had accomplished in the face of difficulty.  

“Walking the stage in front of my children, partner and mom. Hearing them cheer my name. Swelling with pride at how much I’ve overcome to get here. That’s gone now. Every month I struggled to pay the bills, get good grades and be a present mother. Now, all that work and sacrifice isn’t going to be honored the way I had envisioned,” she said.

Her plans for celebratory trips and vacations are now nothing more than painful dreams. “We were to take a family vacation up to Maine in July to see my Great Uncle and Aunt. They have a cabin in the woods and it’s a beautiful (and free) place to stay and we usually drive over to Acadia for a few days. It will probably be too risky to go now,” she said. “There were talks of a trip with my mother to New Mexico. We wanted to sleep in the desert, like one of our favorite artists, Georgia O’Keeffe.”

Any plans that involve leaving the house are off the table, and for Hall, who planned to look for teaching jobs and also jobs with more creative elements, it’s about taking it day by day: “I still plan on writing [a] book because as Joan Didion says, ‘We tell ourselves stories in order to live.’”

Hall said she received assistance from her professors, especially Dr. Cheryl North and Dr. Kim Feldman, in the education department, whom she described as being “amazing and understanding through this whole process.” North and Feldman check in on Hall’s progress and have been working closely with her to ensure she is set to graduate and get a job in the fall.

The Career Center has upped its services to continue to provide resources to all students, especially those who are entering the workforce this May, according to Kacie Lawrence, associate director of Internships & Employment. The Career Center has included help for students to handle the switch to virtual workplaces, through guidance about virtual interviewing skills and networking through LinkedIn.

 “We’ve had a steady flow of career appointments and strong attendance at many of our workshops and career panels. We’re ready and willing to help the class of 2020 enter the professional world,” said Lawrence. “The Career Center is happy to advise students on putting their best foot forward online. We strongly recommend that students practice their virtual interviewing skills. The Career Center offers an online tool called Big Interview where students can record and receive feedback on their responses to a variety of interview questions.”

For students like Hall, there’s nothing left to do now but wait. “Take it day by day, try not to break down, try not to miss the beauty in my present by fretting over the losses,” she said. “Elaborate visions of beauty have always come naturally to me. It’s what’s kept me going these last five years working towards these degrees. I only have visions for today, no comments on the future.”

Nepotism Question Added to Application

Earlier this year, Human Resources added a new nepotism question to application forms in the PageUp system.  Applicants are asked if they have any family members working at UMBC and, if so, to give the name and relationship information.  A reference to the USM policy on Employment of Members of the Same Family (Nepotism) and a list of definitions of “family member” is listed on the application for reference. 

This question should be reviewed by hiring managers during the screening stage, to verify that a supervisor/subordinate relationship will not be created.  Relationships that may cause an ethical concern regarding grants/sponsored awards should also be considered.  The USM nepotism policy applies to all UMBC faculty and staff.  Please contact Human Resources if you have any questions.

Reminder to Upload your Ad Copy if Placing Outside Recruitment Advertisements

If you intend to place outside ads for a search, please create the ad copy and upload it on the documents tab of the requisition.  Human Resources will review the ad, make any necessary changes and provide unique source identification links for you to include in your ad.  These links allow the departments to track the effectiveness of the source of these outside ads.  An ad copy is only needed for advertisements in sources other than the UMBC Jobs website, Higheredjobs and HERC.  A sample ad copy, along with directions, is now available on the requisition under the Documents and Advertising sections.