Cash only. Pick up on campus.
Comes with lid, whip and electric base.
There is a severe lack of outlets on campus considering the amount of students who need them. Students frequently study and do homework using their laptops, which have a limited amount of battery life.
UMBC is working towards growing the campus through constructing new buildings. There should also be a focus on updating old ones, namely making certain that the buildings have sufficient working outlets. There are about 11,000 students enrolled at UMBC and many need an extra charge, not only during study time but also during classes.
There are many classes where the use of computers is necessary, but most classrooms do not have the capabilities to cater to every student. Even in classrooms with tabletop outlets there are not always enough outlets on the actual walls for the tables to be of any use.
Activities that require charger ports are integral to education today. Almost all students need to be able to charge their electronics and UMBC has not accounted for that as of yet.
A large amount of people enrolled at UMBC are majoring in something that involves computer science, which necessitates the use of a computer. Additionally, many other majors require at least a bit of time on an electronic device. Battery life is not infinite, and if there is a project due in a few hours but only enough battery life left for a few more minutes, that could be detrimental to a student’s grade.
Erika Echols, a senior sociology major, believes that, “more outlets could be added in classrooms and in lecture halls because some peoples’ battery life for laptops are not as long as others, and this could definitely impede one from learning and taking notes.” This is more noticeable during days where professors require the class to bring in their computers for the day and everyone clamors to get one of the limited outlets.
In some buildings, many of the outlets do not even work. As previously mentioned, the tables with tabletop outlets are limited. Echols comments on this, saying,”there is the library, but not every part of the library has outlets, especially the floors where it is supposed to be silent.”
Tamara Carr, a senior English major, shares a similar sentiment. “I spend the majority of my time in the performing arts building and there are not nearly enough outlets in the common spaces,” Carr says, adding, “I don’t think there are enough outlets in the classrooms, as I have often times not been able to charge my devices because other students were using the one outlet per wall of the classroom.”
Overall, UMBC needs to consider necessary updates to every building in order to accommodate every student. In the new technological age nearly everyone uses their laptop or phone in order to excel in school. Without the proper accommodations the use of technology is very difficult at UMBC.
]]>Being sick is rarely an enjoyable experience. While a brief break from the daily grind to lay in bed seems nice, being forced out of one’s daily routine by debilitating pain, fever or nausea is not as welcome. While studying abroad, sickness becomes an even greater inconvenience, as one must focus not only on getting better but also must contend with communicating across vastly different medical cultures.
Different countries have different measures needed to prevent sickness. For instance, in South Korea there are frequent clouds of pollution — called “microdust” — that can cause colds and headaches. To prevent illness, one must stay inside with windows closed or wear a special mask on days with poor air quality.
Many foreigners who do not know or do not care about this will often fall ill. Even if a foreigner does know the danger, they may fail to wear the correct type of mask. Aside from the special filtration masks available for microdust, medical masks and fashion masks are sold near these filter masks and are often mistaken for each other. However, they are not interchangeable, and wearing a mask not designed to filter the dust will not provide meaningful protection.
Aside from preventive medicine, medicine for treatment can be hard to obtain as well. In the United States, a bad cold is generally treated with medicine like NyQuil or cough drops. These things are not as common in foreign pharmacies.
In South Korea, cough drops are not the candy-coated menthol lozenges Americans tend to think of but are instead zinc-based rings which resemble lifesavers. Instead of bottles of cough syrup, special herbal health teas are more common.
These differences make it harder to identify the correct medicine on the shelf but can be avoided by a preemptive tour of a foreign pharmacy. Having a native friend act as a guide for navigating pharmacies can be a significant boon to this end, but even a solo exploration can be effective if done patiently and methodically.
Lastly, it is essential to be familiar with local medical infrastructure and emergency services. In many places there are specialized clinics to deal with foreign patients and regular clinics may refer foreigners to those. It is better then to identify these international clinics and go there first, to avoid wasting the time waiting, only to be turned away.
On top of that, translating certain medical conditions like allergies or chronic illness into the local language beforehand and putting those on a card can help in many circumstances both in and out of a doctor’s office.
Aside from where to go to be treated in non-emergencies, emergency numbers and a working knowledge of emergency procedures are some of the first things a traveler should acquire in a new country. Most countries have different numbers for emergency services, and many have separate medical, police and fire numbers. Some countries do not have reliable ambulances, so knowing where hospitals are and how to get to them may be necessary.
Ultimately, illness abroad will always be more stressful than illness at home, but steps can be taken to make that less so. With foresight and preparation medical care can be made quicker and easier, allowing a speedy return to the adventures of studying abroad.
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Four years ago, I graduated from high school. I remember experiencing conflicting emotions, both the pride of academic achievement and the questions about where to go to college and what to study. Family and friends often asked me, what do you want to be? Because whatever I wanted to be must transfer into what I study in college, right?
All I knew was that I wanted to go to UMBC, but not because of its stellar academics, social life, or diverse student population — which, of course, I became well acquainted with during my time here. I chose UMBC because it was a 15-minute drive from my house and I wanted to stay near my family and my friends.
Celebrating with my two loving and supportive parents following the commencement ceremony.
Attending UMBC has become somewhat of a family tradition. Elisabeth Cruz ’13, English, was the first of my five siblings to graduate from UMBC. She was soon followed by my brother James Cruz ’16, mechanical engineering. I am the third in my family to graduate from UMBC with my younger sister, Karyn Cruz ’20, graphic design, close behind. Of course none of this would be possible without the support from our parents. I guess you could say black and gold pride runs in my family.
Now that I have graduated from UMBC with a Bachelor’s degree in English, I am facing similar questions to those I did at the end of high school: What will you do now? What kind of job do you want with an English degree? Unlike my commencement from high school four years ago, I have no answers as of yet.
But no matter what my future outside UMBC holds, my final year here was truly a memorable one for the whole black and gold community. UMBC produced its first Rhodes scholar, enjoyed a history-making NCAA run by the men’s basketball team, saw the return of our Commencement ceremonies to campus with the completion of the Event Center, and was recently listed in the top 3.5% of universities worldwide by a global ranking.
This is truly an exciting time to be a Retriever, which makes my graduation that much more bittersweet. Commencement felt almost surreal as my four years here went by so fast. I so much enjoyed my experiences here pursuing a degree in English, relishing new challenges and new triumphs each semester. One example is public speaking.
When I started at UMBC, I hated public speaking. But throughout my time here, I delivered so many class presentations I lost count. Each one felt like a triumph; no matter how long (I remember one of my presentations had to be a full hour) or how short, it always took the same amount of courage to address a class. There was also a time when I struggled with writing, particularly creative writing. However, my studying English forced me to practice all kinds of writing and communication skills, and in facing these particular challenges at UMBC, I learned the valuable lesson that challenges pay off in the long run.
The weeks leading up to Commencement were crazy but wonderful. It was crazy to think everything I was working on here was wrapping up. My last semester of classes neared its end much like previous semesters; the workload felt overwhelming. But, of course, the difference was the fact that it was my last time facing the stress of final projects and examinations. Also, my internship with UMBC Magazine, which had lasted during my whole senior year, was soon to end. But there is something wonderful about knowing that no matter what happens after UMBC, I continue to enjoy the support of this community in the form of friendships with my UMBC peers, former professors, and magazine staff. I know that my experiences here, while difficult to leave, have prepared me well for my future.
Graduation dinner with my family and boyfriend, Alex.
Commencement is the honored celebration of ending one chapter with the beginning of the next. While I do not yet have concrete plans regarding a career with my degree, I am fully confident in the skills I have developed, the connections I have made, and the resulting confidence in my education during my time at UMBC. I currently enjoy incredible support from my dear family and friends moving forward, and I am encouraged by President Freeman Hrabowski’s words to the UMBC community after the Retrievers’ Cinderella run in the NCAA Tournament: “They said could not be done because it has never been done – and then we did it.” As I am now a proud UMBC alumna, I know going forward that I could not have received better preparation and education than that here at UMBC.
At the top: The moment I was most excited for…shaking hands with President Freeman Hrabowski!
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Allison Cruz ’18, English, served as UMBC Magazine’s editorial intern during her senior year. We wish her the best of luck in all she does, and hope she comes back to visit often!
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Written by Sarah Hansen M.S. ’15
Illustrated by Ruth Chan
Jumping into business can be a risk, but at UMBC, budding faculty entrepreneurs have a support system that includes the Technology Development Corporation (TEDCO) at the state level, which offers Maryland Innovation Initiative (MII) grants to support budding entrepreneurs. UMBC has a remarkable 50 percent acceptance rate for MII proposals. On campus, the Office of Technology Development and bwtech@UMBC research park provide great resources, including “Entrepreneurs in residence” who seek out research that could be a good fit for commercial development and support faculty from start to finish.
“You set the tone,” says Tom Sadowski ’89, political science, and current vice chancellor for economic development for the University System of Maryland, of UMBC’s efforts to support its faculty entrepreneurs. “You set up the model that other institutions are now following.”
From start-up funding sources to access to experienced entrepreneurs and more, the available support lowers the entry barrier to entrepreneurship and creates opportunities for faculty to impact the world in positive ways. “We focus here on innovation that matters,” says Karl Steiner, UMBC vice president for research, “whether it be in the classroom, working with our communities, or creating new solutions to some of today’s most pressing societal challenges.”
Read on to see how professors and their collaborators are using research and new-found entrepreneurial know-how to bring their inventions to life.
Jeffrey Gardner, associate professor of biological sciences and one of two Up-and-Coming UMBC Inventor awardees, had a problem. Gardner’s research focuses on “how bacteria eat dead plants,” which has applications from renewable fuels to removing plastics from the ocean to improved composting methods. But the technique for measuring how efficiently different bacteria could digest plant materials was lengthy and labor-intensive.
So, Gardner created a tiny solution — a plastic widget similar to a tea-strainer — that makes his research on bacteria-driven decomposition faster and lower-cost while increasing the accuracy of the results. Gardner collaborated with Tagide deCarvalho, manager of UMBC’s Keith Porter Imaging Facility, to solve the problem “with a little bit of engineering and 3D printing.”
Gardner received a Maryland Innovation Initiative (MII) grant through TEDCO to complete prototype development on the widget and do a market assessment. Now his newly-created company, Gardner Industries, LLC, exists on paper, and a patent is pending on the product. He’s waiting to find out if he’ll receive phase-three funding from MII, which would enable the company to pursue increased production of the widgets and send them to labs around the country for feedback.
Gardner suggests that academics who may be curious about entering the entrepreneurial space simply “find someone who’s done it successfully and talk to them about it. If you try to do it in a vacuum or try to guess, you could end up with a lot of misconceptions or think it’s going to be too hard or too easy.”
For Gardner, that person was Chuck Bieberich, professor of biological sciences and the Herbert Bearman Foundation Chair in Entrepreneurship. Gardner encourages adventurous faculty to take the leap because the available support lowers the barriers to entry.
Kevin Sowers, professor of marine biotechnology, has been studying anaerobic bacteria (bacteria that don’t require oxygen) for more than 20 years. In that time, he’s discovered a bacterium that can break down polycyclic biphenyls (PCBs) very efficiently. PCBs were considered a “miracle chemical” when they came out in the 1930s, but since then, researchers have identified some potentially hazardous forms as neurotoxins, carcinogens, endocrine disruptors, and more.
Although banned today, because of their ubiquity in their first several decades of existence, PCBs are now common in wetland sediments around the world. Sedimentary invertebrates ingest them, and they make their way up the food chain from there. Now people are searching for ways to get rid of them safely. Current techniques include dredging and “capping” (piling a thick layer of sand on top of the sediment), but, both techniques are devastating to wetland ecosystems.
Sowers and Upal Gosh, professor of chemical, biochemical, and environmental engineering at UMBC, joined forces to come up with an alternative. Funding from an MII phase-one grant allowed them to develop a carbon pellet as a delivery mechanism for the PCB-degrading bacteria. After bonding the bacteria to the pellets, the researchers spray the pellets out over a wetland or under a pier. The pellets are one to two centimeters in diameter, and they spray 25 kg per cubic meter. The pellets sink, and the bacteria do their work in the sediment. Carbon and this bacterium are both found naturally in sediments, but the low bacterial concentration present would take many, many years to remove the unnaturally high level of PCBs.
A new UMBC Catalyst Fund grant supports the duo’s efforts to develop a method to measure the effectiveness of the treatment by comparing the predicted amount of time it would take for the PCBs to degrade naturally versus with treatment.
Sowers and Gosh have patented the product, and in 2017 they formed a company, Rembac. While it’s still somewhat of an experimental procedure, “we’re hoping that we’ll build up a reputation and we’ll be able to show that this is working well in different environments, and it will become more of a mainstream application,” says Sowers.
Gymama Slaughter’s invention is an outgrowth of her work to develop glucose-based power sources for use in implantable devices, such as pacemakers. By using the body’s own supply of sugars to power the devices, these “bio-batteries” would remove the need for repeat surgeries to replace failing traditional batteries.
“This project is important to me because of all the issues that human beings face. I give a lot of thought to that, and how we as researchers can really touch people in the community,” says Slaughter, professor of chemical engineering and a UMBC Up-and- Coming Inventor.
“Our primary activities are transforming diagnostic tools, reinventing the manufacturing of these tools — and creating the next generation of scientists and engineers. We now get approached by students all over the world who are interested in what we’re doing.”
“This is not just about chemistry, it’s about vision and bringing the right people together to solve a problem,” Slaughter says. The goal is to “benefit the maximum number of people in the world, not just people in our community.”
Linda Dusman, professor of music and the UMBC Entrepreneur of the Year, is helping more people make positive connections with classical music via a mobile app called EnCue. The app provides customized information in real time during a performance, which could include facts about the composer, quotes from the performers or conductor, or historical context for the piece. World-class orchestras like the London Symphony are already using EnCue.
Dusman has MII phase-three funding to pursue further business development and fine-tuning of the product, such as allowing orchestras to design their own presentations rather than drawing from a library generated by Dusman and her business partner, Eric Smallwood ’08, interdisciplinary studies, former assistant professor of visual arts at UMBC.
You don’t need a certain kind of education to appreciate classical music, Dusman says. “What kills me is when I see newcomers in the audience and they’re embarrassed about not knowing when to clap, or they leave feeling stupid — that is a tragedy, a tragedy. And EnCue helps make me feel like I’m doing my best so that doesn’t happen. People leave concerts using EnCue excited about what they learned.”
Asked if she would recommend taking the plunge into the business world, she says, “If you believe in what you’re doing, then yes. In a way, I had to do it, if I really believed in this idea of real-time education.” But the process has not been without its challenges and frustrations.
“Anything worth doing, if you had known what it was going to take to get it to work before you did it, you’d probably never do it,” she says. “But if you believe in something, you do what it takes to make it happen. The value is worth the effort.”
Ever wake up feeling groggy and wonder why, because you’re sure you slept through the night? Nilanjan Banerjee, associate professor, and Ryan Robucci ’02, computer engineering, assistant professor of computer science and electrical engineering, have invented a device that may help you answer that question. In collaboration with researchers at Johns Hopkins University, Banerjee and Robucci have developed an anklet users wear at night to monitor “sleep texture” by measuring leg movements in a way that wrist monitors currently can’t.
The device is currently in the FDA approval process as a diagnostic tool for sleep-related disorders such as restless leg syndrome, attention deficit disorder, or iron deficiency. “People usually do this in a sleep lab, with EEG electrodes, and it’s very expensive,” says Banerjee. “We’ve been trying to see if we can move it to the home.”
The research team has received MII phases one through three funding, and is currently seeking larger grants from NIH — but none of this might have happened without the support of entrepreneurs in residence (also known as “site miners”) at bwtech@UMBC. Banerjee and Robucci originally sought to use their motion-sensing technology in assistive devices for people with limited mobility, but Dave Fink, one of UMBC’s site miners, knew a counterpart from Hopkins who had a researcher in need of motion-sensing for sleep monitoring. “They took the steps to help us form the company by understanding what our technology was and pairing it with exactly what the medical need was,” says Robucci.
In conversations with entrepreneurs at UMBC, one name keeps popping up: Dave Fink. He’s an entrepreneur in residence (also known as a “site miner”) at UMBC’s bwtech@UMBC Research and Technology Park. His task? Identify UMBC faculty research projects that have commercialization potential, and then steward the researchers through the entrepreneurship process, from brainstorming initial ideas to applying for start-up funding to seeking patents. Fink and other entrepreneurs in residence are critical to the success of fledgling ideas, but their work goes largely unseen.
For example, it’s not always easy for academic faculty to tell if an invention would be relevant to a wide range of potential customers or if it solves a problem unique to their research. Only in the former case is commercialization worth pursuing. “The site miners are really good at sussing out whether something will work or not,” says Jeffrey Gardner (see “3D-printing solutions”).
Like Gardner, Gymama Slaughter (“Bio-batteries”) has benefited from the support system in place for inventors at UMBC and in Maryland. “I was able to establish a wonderful relationship with David Fink at UMBC and Ken Malone at BioHealth Innovation,” she says. “They did such an amazing job with the logistics of the product and just helping out any way they could.”
Fink also guided Kevin Sowers and Upal Gosh (“Saving the Bay — with bacteria?”) in their entrepreneurship journey. “Dave was very supportive with our MII and with the Catalyst Fund grant. He advised on what to write and what the evaluators would be looking for,” Sowers says. “He’s been very supportive all along the way.”
]]>SUMMER 2018 INTERNSHIP
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