It doesn’t matter where you are … you can make progress on that dissertation. You want to  … you NEED to finish that doctorate. You’ve been working hard, your family and friends are waiting, but more importantly, you have things to do … a world to influence, change to effect, mountains to move. Welcome to the Dissertation House On-line, Summer 2017 season!

Join us! Click the link below to enter the DH online.

DH Online Blog – Summer 2017 Season

This page serves as the announcement, but the page link above will lead you to the DH Online Blog where you can post your comments, encouragement, and goals. It  will be active from July 2017 – December 2017.  You can participate in the online Dissertation House from any part of the world.

This is your season … come on, you can do it.

Click the DH Online Blog Summer 2017 link and join in!

 While in-person Dissertation House participants will be most active on the DH online’s page from July 11 – 14, 2017, you don’t have to wait for them. This post is being written on July 1, 2017. Start today. Yes, we want you to have some career-life balance and enjoy the holiday, but don’t let that stop you from getting at least a little bit of work done too.

John Rennie Short, an expert on globalization, urban and environmental issues, and political geography, recently shared his research and perspective on current global trends in several U.S. and international publications. Most recently, the professor of public policy has commented on topics from shifting political parties to the rapid growth of cities and their roles in society.

In Christian Science Monitor, Short addressed recent seismic shifts in global politics. In this spring’s French election, neither one of the two traditionally-dominant parties’ presidential candidates advanced to the second round of voting, demonstrating “a rupture of the traditional political establishment,” Short said, and reflecting a larger trend in politics seen in Brexit and Donald Trump’s victory.

Short added that “we are in a new political era,” where leaders who hope to preserve Western values must address voters’ very real “economic pain, their cultural uncertainty, and their political anger at the system” and be “aware of the new sensibilities that have been brought to the surface.”

On Radio Sputnik, Short discussed another course change in politics. The Philippine president announced that the Filipino military would begin to occupy certain islands in the South China Sea, an area to which China lays claim. “This is very strange, because [President] Duterte had spent the last few months encouraging closer ties with China,” Short said, adding that the action was a “provocative move” that would label the Philippines an unpredictable ally for China.

In Smithsonian Magazine, Short addressed a historical issue in political geography, commenting on the construction of early maps of North America, where trade priorities could supersede political considerations. In these early maps, “the coastlines were accurate, but they weren’t as concerned about the interiors,” says Short. The attitude was, “as long as you keep bringing the beavers, we don’t care.”

Short has also produced several new publications related to contemporary urbanism, including A Research Agenda for Cities. This volume, which he edited, features case studies from around the world addressing topics such as gentrification, gender, creative economies, and sustainability.

In a piece for the Elgar blog, Short says it’s crucial to research cities because “we are living in an urban moment. The majority of people now lives in cities. Cities are at the very heart of transformations of political economy, civil society and governmentality. They are the setting for progressive politics and the context for new human–nature relations.”

Short also explores how cities can illuminate broader global shifts as “nodes in a global network of flows of people, ideas and practices.” Cities are highly fluid places, Short suggests, constantly “learning from each other and testing policies, with the more successful ones diffused, adopted, and adapted around the global network.”

In Global Citizen, Short adds, “Technology is transferable, knowledge is transferable, consultants move around, there’s a global circulation.” That’s part of the reason he believes cities have a major role to play in combating climate change, the focus of the Global Citizen piece. The other reason is much more practical: “Emotionally you can think of the polar bears and the warming Arctic, but when push comes to shove it still seems a bit distant,” he says. “But the air quality in your city is definitely a real issue,” and, he suggests, it can motivate cities to take action to curb pollution.

Short also addresses reasons that public transportation in U.S. cities lags far behind our European counterparts on The Academic Minute. He suggests the relevant factors include an American “love affair with the automobile,” suburban sprawl, and a large-scale dismantling of privately-owned mass transportation companies in the 1950s. However, he also sees younger Americans as more interested than previous generations in accessing public transit options, and less interested in owning cars, which he suggests could soon cause a sea change in U.S. transportation trends and investments. The interview followed up on a previous article Short wrote for The Conversation (“Why is the U.S. unwilling to pay for good public transportation?”), which was republished by Business Insider, Quartz, Slate, Newsweek, and others, and has been read nearly 300,000 times worldwide.

Reaching this kind of a broad public audience is a commitment Short considers central to his work as university researcher and educator. “Research and knowledge needs to be circulated widely and freely available to as many people as possible. If it is just for a small privileged elite it loses its moral center and social purpose,” he suggests. “Those of us lucky to teach in the academy have the responsibility and obligation where, when, and how we can to advance civic debates and enlightened discourse.”

The Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement Meeting (CLDE17) held in Baltimore this month offered an opportunity for students, faculty, and staff from colleges and universities across the nation to discuss forward-looking community-building and civic engagement strategies. UMBC participants played a major role in organizing and presenting numerous sessions, tours, and special events held during the meeting, which was cosponsored by the American Democracy Project (ADP), The Democracy Commitment, and the student affairs administrators group NASPA. Additionally, UMBC’s Craig Berger, coordinator of student life for campus and civic engagement, served as the chair of the ADP’s own annual meeting, held as part of the larger gathering.

During that annual meeting, the ADP honored Philip Rous, UMBC’s provost and senior vice president for academic affairs, with the William M. Plater Award for Leadership in Civic Engagement. This meaningful award recognizes the commitment of a provost to advancing civic engagement on their campus.

Michael Vaughan, provost at Weber State University, presented Rous with the award in recognition of his support for creating new courses at UMBC that foster civic engagement and help students rethink their power to envision and enact change in the world. Vaughan mentioned, for example, a mechanical engineering class that partnered with Baltimore City to identify failing water pipes and a class on race, poverty, and gender where UMBC students helped local refugee high school students prepare for the college admissions process.

Upon accepting the award, Rous shared with the crowd a story from his days as a student at Cambridge University, to explain his approach as UMBC provost. He noted that the entrance of Cambridge University is a very large wooden door, which itself contains a smaller wooden door, and said, “As you step through that door, it is as if you step into a completely different world.” On one side of the door he found the world was quiet, beautiful, and secluded, and on the other side it was the opposite, creating the immediate effect of excluding the broader city from the Cambridge experience and isolating the university from the dynamism of the city. As a university leader, Rous reflected, he wanted to challenge such barriers.

President Freeman Hrabowski delivered the opening remarks during the CLDE17 plenary session, discussing the importance of involving everyone on campus in shaping community. “Any institution that is truly about ethos, inquiry, and looking at agency and action will want the entire institution to be involved,” said Hrabowski. “To make a difference in communities, it is so important to have faculty, staff, students, and academic and student affairs all on the same page and understanding that we are in this together.”

David Hoffman, assistant director of student life for civic agency, facilitated the session “Our Stories Can Light the Way Forward,” focused on collecting and documenting stories from community engagement efforts to empower participants. Collin Sullivan ‘19, information systems; Manisha Vepa ‘19, fine arts; and Berger led the roundtable discussion “Ethos Matters: Creating Empowering Messages and Environments.”

Romy Hübler ‘09, modern languages and linguistics, M.A. ‘11, intercultural communication, and Ph.D. ‘15, language, literacy and culture, who now serves as UMBC’s coordinator of student life for student organizations and involvement, worked with Jason Loviglio, associate professor of media and communication studies, to lead Tell Me What Collective Action Looks Like. This discussion session focused on how educators can help students feel inspired to take action as engaged citizens.

Emily Melluso ‘17, biological sciences, shared her experiences during the session “Cultivating College Campus Leaders: A Story of Collaboration with U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and Citizen University.” Corinne Janet, coordinator of student life for leadership; Simon Stacey, interim vice provost and dean of undergraduate education; Berger; Hoffman; and Hübler facilitated the methods-focused session “Congruent Democratic Pedagogies: Teaching Democracy as a Way of Life.”

In addition to kicking off the meeting, UMBC community members also brought it to a productive conclusion, with Hoffman and Vepa presenting for the closing plenary session “The Theory of Our Work, Today and Tomorrow; What’s Next?”

UMBC is a leading member of the ADP, which was founded in 2003 through a collaboration between the American Association of State Colleges and Universities and The New York Times. Through innovative initiatives, ADP member institutions work to provide students with the skills and opportunities needed to put their ideas into action, on and off campus.

Banner image: Dr. Rous accepting the William M. Plater Award for Leadership in Civic Engagement at the 2017 Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement Meeting in Baltimore. All photos by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

The Civic Learning and Democratic Engagement Meeting (CLDE17) held in Baltimore this month offered an opportunity for students, faculty, and staff from colleges and universities across the nation to discuss forward-looking community-building and civic engagement strategies. UMBC participants played a major role in organizing and presenting numerous sessions, tours, and special events held during the meeting, which was cosponsored by the American Democracy Project (ADP), The Democracy Commitment, and the student affairs administrators group NASPA. Additionally, UMBC’s Craig Berger, coordinator of student life for campus and civic engagement, served as the chair of the ADP’s own annual meeting, held as part of the larger gathering.

During that annual meeting, the ADP honored Philip Rous, UMBC’s provost and senior vice president for academic affairs, with the William M. Plater Award for Leadership in Civic Engagement. This meaningful award recognizes the commitment of a provost to advancing civic engagement on their campus.

Michael Vaughan, provost at Weber State University, presented Rous with the award in recognition of his support for creating new courses at UMBC that foster civic engagement and help students rethink their power to envision and enact change in the world. Vaughan mentioned, for example, a mechanical engineering class that partnered with Baltimore City to identify failing water pipes and a class on race, poverty, and gender where UMBC students helped local refugee high school students prepare for the college admissions process.

Upon accepting the award, Rous shared with the crowd a story from his days as a student at Cambridge University, to explain his approach as UMBC provost. He noted that the entrance of Cambridge University is a very large wooden door, which itself contains a smaller wooden door, and said, “As you step through that door, it is as if you step into a completely different world.” On one side of the door he found the world was quiet, beautiful, and secluded, and on the other side it was the opposite, creating the immediate effect of excluding the broader city from the Cambridge experience and isolating the university from the dynamism of the city. As a university leader, Rous reflected, he wanted to challenge such barriers.

President Freeman Hrabowski delivered the opening remarks during the CLDE17 plenary session, discussing the importance of involving everyone on campus in shaping community. “Any institution that is truly about ethos, inquiry, and looking at agency and action will want the entire institution to be involved,” said Hrabowski. “To make a difference in communities, it is so important to have faculty, staff, students, and academic and student affairs all on the same page and understanding that we are in this together.”

David Hoffman, assistant director of student life for civic agency, facilitated the session “Our Stories Can Light the Way Forward,” focused on collecting and documenting stories from community engagement efforts to empower participants. Collin Sullivan ‘19, information systems; Manisha Vepa ‘19, fine arts; and Berger led the roundtable discussion “Ethos Matters: Creating Empowering Messages and Environments.”

Romy Hübler ‘09, modern languages and linguistics, M.A. ‘11, intercultural communication, and Ph.D. ‘15, language, literacy and culture, who now serves as UMBC’s coordinator of student life for student organizations and involvement, worked with Jason Loviglio, associate professor of media and communication studies, to lead Tell Me What Collective Action Looks Like. This discussion session focused on how educators can help students feel inspired to take action as engaged citizens.

Emily Melluso ‘17, biological sciences, shared her experiences during the session “Cultivating College Campus Leaders: A Story of Collaboration with U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum and Citizen University.” Corinne Janet, coordinator of student life for leadership; Simon Stacey, interim vice provost and dean of undergraduate education; Berger; Hoffman; and Hübler facilitated the methods-focused session “Congruent Democratic Pedagogies: Teaching Democracy as a Way of Life.”

In addition to kicking off the meeting, UMBC community members also brought it to a productive conclusion, with Hoffman and Vepa presenting for the closing plenary session “The Theory of Our Work, Today and Tomorrow; What’s Next?”

UMBC is a leading member of the ADP, which was founded in 2003 through a collaboration between the American Association of State Colleges and Universities and The New York Times. Through innovative initiatives, ADP member institutions work to provide students with the skills and opportunities needed to put their ideas into action, on and off campus.

The Higher Education & Research Google Cloud Platform team would like to invite you to a 45-minute webinar next month to learn about how Google’s public cloud can complement and extend your campus HPC to best serve the campus research community.  You have made significant investments in high performance computing, however meeting ever expanding computing needs and supporting the latest technologies available can be difficult and expensive. Join us to learn how GCP can further enable your campus community to think bigger and reach insights faster.

The webinar will take place on Thursday July 13th at 1pm EST/10am PST. Click here to register.

During this webinar we will cover the following:

·  Why Google’s Cloud?

·  High Performance Computing & GCP

oExtending your environment for batch processing

oInnovative Technologies: GPUs, TPUs

oPrice to Performance Advantage: Preemptible Machines, Custom Machines, Discounts

·  Spotlight: MIT Principal Research Scientist, Andrew Sutherland,  shares his GCP experience

·  Answers to your questions

Want to learn more about how Kate Drabinski’s summer course is exploring food justice in Baltimore? UMBC Magazine’s Jenny O’Grady tagged along for a recent walking tour, exploring local historic food markets and a community garden.

Learn more about UMBC’s Summer Session here.