The life of an average athlete is very strenuous, from handling practice to juggling school and trying to keep up with all things popular. Now imagine cranking that dial up three notches and having no time for yourself or even family and friends and being exhausted with every move you make. This is the life of a student-athlete, more specifically, sophomore-goalie Jade Wilkins.

Soccer has been a part of Wilkins’ life since the young age of eight. Soccer was not the only sport that captured this young woman’s heart. Prior to taking up soccer, Wilkins was a cheerleader for the Maryland Twisters alongside her big sister. “I was just [kinda] following my sister, and when she dropped out I did too,” Wilkins explained. Wilkins’ love for soccer comes from a familiar place as her dad was once a soccer player as well.

Growing up in Pasadena, MD there were a number of sports for Wilkins to be a part of once she reached high school. Not only was she a part of her school’s soccer team she also played on the basketball team. When asked about her position with basketball, Wilkins said, “They had me at guard, I don’t really know why because I can’t shoot.” As she laughed at her comment she proceeded to mention that she felt basketball was a great sport for conditioning.

Every person has their own hurdles and struggles when it comes to playing a sport. Wilkins is no different as she talked about how they would have week to week scheduling and transitioning to a new team that created a more intense environment with traveling being a part of it. Wilkins embraced this with extreme excitement, “I loved everything about it from traveling to meeting players. [I] loved every moment of it,” Wilkins exclaimed.

One other major hurdle was the choosing of her college. Wilkins explained that she knew that when she was picking her school she had to make sure this would be the right decision not for soccer but for her education. “I knew that my number one going into college had to be my career,” Wilkins stated. “I knew outside of college I wasn’t going to be a professional soccer player, I had to be realistic with myself,” she continued.

Wilkins’ sense of realism in how she goes about things can be accredited to her parents. Wilkins explained that her parents would sit her down and explain how she could try this or that but drove home that she had to be realistic and not get over-invested in something that is not long term. Wilkins stated that her parents “always had realistic conversations” with her and it always gave her the mindset of questioning the decision before going all in.

Off of the soccer field, Wilkins explained that she is a bit of a “school nerd” and that school things always excite her. “When you get me in a school environment or something that is really cool, I geek out,” Wilkins proclaimed. With a gleam of light in her eye and a huge grin that came across her face, Wilkins began to tell a story of her time working in a chemistry class in which she had a cool science experiment that she happily explained to her aunt.

Wilkins also likes to help out with school events when it fits her schedule and tries to help out as much as she can. Wilkins also has a special place in her heart for romantic movies that have a happy ending. She also has a tremendous love for Spongebob, as this was her favorite childhood television show growing up.

As an engineering major, Wilkins is not sure of exactly what she wants to do but feels that with talks from her professors she will figure out her career goals. With Wilkins’ determined work ethic and good nature, it will not be long before she finds her career and takes it to new heights no one has ever seen before.

The elation of the Retrievers’ double-overtime win over Villanova’s Wildcats has not worn off yet. Freshman-goalkeeper Quantrell Jones chose it as his favorite UMBC game to date. It is easy to see why: two of his teammates scored their first career goals, the Retrievers scored late in both second halves and the victory encapsulated the skill and camaraderie that the team has. Jones played his part in the game, making three saves, and he seems determined to play a bigger role in the outcome of UMBC’s season.

Jones, a Baltimore native, describes himself as an “open book with no secrets.” His favorite teams are FC Barcelona, the Baltimore Orioles and the Boston Celtics, after switching from the Cleveland Cavaliers. He spends his free time playing “God of War,” “Spiderman,” “FIFA,” “NBA 2K” and watching “Impractical Jokers.”

He calls soccer “my love, my happy place and a great stress reliever.” He was introduced to the sport by his best friend at age four. He is grateful to his mother for letting him play the game and supporting him all the way. His pre-game ritual includes listening to music and watching motivational videos on YouTube. He plans to play professionally after graduating.

Jones has played with Baltimore Celtic soccer club, D.C. United Academy and USA Youth National Team. He played for D.C. for one year and laments a missed opportunity to meet Manchester United and English legend Wayne Rooney, who joined D.C. the season after Jones’ last game. Jones also enjoyed some time with the national team, as it gave him an opportunity to play abroad as part of the Under-17 World Cup, where Jones and the U.S. made the semi-finals. The players lived at IMG Academy, a preparatory boarding school in Florida for two years training for the tournament. Jones recalls it as a “once in a lifetime opportunity that I was grateful to have”.

He currently plays for FC Baltimore, a club in the National Premier Soccer League. Baltimore head coach Brandon Quaranta, who was his former coach at Baltimore Celtic, got together with his DC United coach to give him the chance to play club football regularly while still training with D.C.’s first team. Jones believed that playing against semi-professional teams and college players helped him prepare for division 1 soccer with the Retrievers.

Jones credits his FC Baltimore teammates, who he already knew from his previous club, with helping him get the speed and consistency he needed to play at college level. He says the standards at the club are high, which pushes him to raise his standards and in turn, grow as a player. In addition, his Retriever teammates who also play for FC Baltimore assisted him in balancing the workload of both teams.

Jones describes Coach Caringi Jr.’s style as keeping the ball well and going forward quickly when the time is right. He adds that Coach always tells him that he and sophomore-goalie Ciaran O’Loughlin are two of the best goalkeepers in the league. Jones believes that both keepers “raise [the team’s] standards because [they] are both high quality.” He has been the Retrievers’ number one for the last few games as O’Loughlin was injured, he says it “feels good [to start] because I have been working hard.”

“This team can go far if we keep doing the correct things,” Jones said on the Retrievers’ chances of success this year. “We are on a winning streak, and if we play [the whole season] how we played against Villanova, we can go really far.”

“Just keep coming out to support,” was Jones’ message to the fans. “The fans are fantastic every game. It is my first time experiencing a crowd like this and I love every second of it. Thank you because you help us out.”

Being a student-athlete requires hours upon hours of commitment throughout the school year. From weightlifting, to practice, to game day, it takes a large amount of focus to balance the demands of athletics and academics. With any major, being a student-athlete requires time management skills and an impressive work ethic. But, with aspirations to become a surgeon and a major in biology, it is an especially tough journey.

This is the journey that UMBC volleyball’s sophomore-middle blocker Becca Elrod and freshman-outside hitter Gabrielle Curran have chosen to embark on. One day, after a hard-fought inter-squad game that capped off a Wednesday evening practice, Elrod and Curran sat down to reflect on their respective journeys.

The pair chose UMBC for different reasons, but their paths have coincidentally converged and are heading in a similar direction. Curran chose to attend UMBC because her mother was a graduate of the university. According to Curran, UMBC “wasn’t on [her] volleyball list,” but she chose the university because of the exemplary STEM programs. For Curran, volleyball was the driving force for her choice in attending UMBC, but she did note that the prestigious academics of the university aided in her decision.

Though the pair is in the early stages of their college careers, they have already started focusing on their next step. Elrod is looking to go to med school in the South, with hopes of going to either Vanderbilt, UT or Rice. But she noted that “any med school I could get into I would be thrilled, just [for] the opportunity to be in med school.” For Curran, her dream is to go to the University of Pennsylvania because of their rich background in orthopedic surgery, and she aspires to follow in the footsteps of Dr. James Guerra of her hometown in Naples, FL who has served as her role model in recent years.

Many people aspire to become doctors as kids, but very few actually pursue that dream. But, Elrod and Curran are committed to excellence and ready to thrive. “I’ve had injuries in sports and I’ve always been in the orthopedic surgeon’s office,” said Curran. “I would always put up x-rays and Dr. James Guerra would analyze them.” Curran is aware that there are not many women in the orthopedic surgery field, and she is determined to surpass those boundaries.

For Elrod, she recalled a time when she was a child and her mother brought her to a “take your daughter to work day.” Elrod’s mother was a nurse, and Elrod was immediately infatuated with the concept of surgery. In her sophomore year of high school, her mother was diagnosed with breast cancer and, after shadowing one of the surgeries, she was fueled to go on and pursue her dream of being a surgeon. But, she does note that oncology is difficult to deal with emotionally, and so she remains indecisive on what surgical specialty that she wants to pursue.

Life for Elrod and Curran can be difficult at times, as they are both pursuing biology majors and psychology minors. For Elrod, the beginning of her freshman year was particularly difficult. The workload was slightly overwhelming, and balancing athletics and academics proved to be more difficult than she could have imagined. But, through trials and tribulations, she noted that time management is a necessity for survival. Being proactive and studying during free time, instead of procrastinating, proved to make things much more manageable for her. But, there is no perfect formula and sometimes she still struggles in class due to lack of energy, so she plans ahead as much as possible to prevent herself from falling too far behind.

The pair noted that they were partially inspired in their journey through watching medical dramas over the year. Elrod excitedly referenced “Grey’s Anatomy” as one of her favorite shows, despite the tragic death of her favorite character Mark Sloan. For Curran, classics like General Hospital were particularly entertaining. “[They] just get you in the mood to be a doctor,” said Curran.

With Elrod being one year ahead of Curran, she has served as a mentor through Curran’s first few months at UMBC. “She has really been there for me,” said Curran. “She’s really been helping me in chemistry with notes and stuff.” Every Wednesday, Elrod assists Curran in going over notes before her chemistry quizzes. Curran beamed at Elrod and noted, “I am so thankful for her,” and with a laugh, Elrod responded, “aw, that was so cute.”

Picturing Italian Art and Culture in Context

Rome, Italy, July 3 – 31, 2019

This program includes two Visual Arts courses, ART329 Topics in Art History: Roman Visual Culture and ART369/392 Topics in Photography, Art, Media: Mobile Imaging in Italy, for a total of 6 undergraduate credits. Both courses engage the rich history and architecture of Rome, analyzing and exploring it through new technologies and social media.

Both courses can be used to fulfill the following requirements:

• For the BA/BFA in Visual Arts, ART329 will fulfill requirements for the Art History portion of all VA concentrations

• For the BA/BFA in Visual Arts, ART369/392 will fulfill requirements for the Photography concentration or it can be used to count as an art elective in any of the other VA concentrations
• For Global Studies majors, the program fulfills the Study Abroad requirement
• Both courses can be used to fulfill requirements for general electives

Shirin is a Biological Sciences major with minors in Spanish and Psychology, who will graduate in 2020. She is a member of the Honors College, and recently received a UMBC Travel Award to present her research at the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students (ABRCMS), in Indiana this November.

Title of your research project: The Effect of Sleep Hormones on Cancer Cell Growth and Response to Chemotherapeutics

Describe your project: Our objectives are to determine if the diurnal addition of sleep hormones has an effect on cancer cell growth and response to chemotherapeutic drugs. We mocked the circadian rhythm of a cancer patient by putting specific physiological dosages of melatonin and cortisol in lung cancer cell lines and then tracking any change in cell growth that had occurred.

Who is your mentor for your project? Why did you choose them? My mentor is Dr. Daniel Gioeli in the UVA Department of Microbiology, Immunology, and Cancer Biology. I participated in the UVA Summer Research Internship Program (SRIP) this past summer, and I ranked Cancer Biology as my top choice for my lab in the application, which is how I was assigned to Dr. Gioeli’s lab! When I met Dr. Gioeli for the first time, I was so grateful that I was assigned to him as my mentor because he was very kind, hardworking, and understanding, and I could tell he was going to push me to reach my full potential within only ten weeks.

How did you become interested in this project? I became interested in this project because I learned a lot about cancer in the Cellular Biology course that I took last Spring semester, and it was shocking to learn everything that affects cancer progression. I had never thought that sleep could be a large factor that contributes to one’s cancer therapeutic treatment, but after reading a lot of literature about the background of this project, I was so invested in continuing to learn more about the effect that sleep has on cancer cell growth.

What has been the hardest part about your research/what was the most unexpected thing about being a researcher?  The hardest part has been failing at an experiment and realizing that the amount of times you fail is generally higher than the amount of times that you succeed. However, I also learned that the amount of times you fail will also lead to the amount of times you succeed based on if you learn from the mistakes you made, which is the most important part of the whole process.

What has been the most rewarding part? The most rewarding part was learning more about scientific topics from my mentor and peers in lab and expanding my network with people that I now have long-term connections with. I was able to push myself past my own limits, and I could not have done it without the encouragement of all of the people in my lab and program.

How will you disseminate your research? I will be presenting my research at the Annual Biomedical Research Conference for Minority Students (ABRCMS) in Indiana this November, and I also plan on presenting my research at Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement Day (URCAD) here at UMBC.

What is your advice to other students about getting involved in research? Try to find a research lab that aligns with your interests but do not be afraid to try something new, so keep an open mind. And never give up – no matter how many tries it may take to get your experiment running or to see results!

What are your career goals? I plan to obtain an AM/PhD while continuing to do medical research. 

[Originally posted on the Office of Undergraduate Research's group page]

As vital part of the Guest Services Department and Port Discovery team, Museum Experience Associates are responsible for providing guests with an excellent, memorable experience, stellar customer service, and supporting the Museum’s educational philosophy. As a member of our team, you’ll support playful learning and discovery through meaningful interaction with children and adults, ignite imaginations, and teach children through hands-on experiences.

This is a seasonal opportunity through January 1, 2019.