As #BlackLivesMatter continues to grow on social media, ABC 2 TV in Baltimore recently hosted Kimberly Moffitt for a discussion to explain how the movement has spread and how it is different from the Civil Rights Movement. Moffitt, an associate professor of American studies, noted that social media has changed the way in which messages and viewpoints are shared through expanded access.

“That’s the space that we’re in now with social media that anyone has access to the platform,” she said.

She explained that during the Civil Rights Movement, people would often gather at local churches, community centers, homes, and other spaces to strategize and coordinate messages. With social media, anyone can be behind a computer or mobile device and type the hashtag to spread their message.

“At this point, everyone becomes an expert. Everyone becomes that lead activist as long as they have the right platform to access a number of different individuals,” Moffitt explained. “The Civil Rights Movement, it was almost very strategic to make decisions about who should be those individuals to speak on behalf of the movement in order to carry out the particular strategy. Now, it’s anyone’s fair game.”

View the full discussion on ABC 2’s “In Focus” program.

In a new column in The Conversation, School of Public Policy Professor John Rennie Short revealed how immigrants can be treated differently based on wealth.

Short wrote about how Canada’s Immigrant Investor Program and the UK’s Tier 1 investor visa are among many programs that provide economic incentives for wealthy immigrants. Short also focused on how such policies play out in the United States: “Since 1990, the US has an employment-based program tailored for the wealthy entitled EB5. Under this program, 10,000 visas each year are reserved for investors to receive permanent residence status if they invest at least US$1 million (only $500,000 in high unemployment and rural areas) in a commercial enterprise that employs at least 10 full-time US workers.

Studies by trade groups estimate that the program contributed $3.39 billion to US GDP and resulted in 42,000 jobs in fiscal year 2012, while a more critical review of the EB5 program came to the conclusion that the visas are too cheap, the program is badly run and the bulk of the money goes to already overheated real estate markets.”

Professor Short wrote about how the programs referenced in his column often do not reflect their intended consequences: “Most official reviews now come to the conclusion that the programs, hastily conceived in the rush to attract the newly wealthy citizens of Russia, China and other countries, are too cheap with few benefits for the host countries.”

Read “The other immigrants: how the super-rich skirt quotas and closed borders.“

In his latest New York Times column, Mathematics Professor Manil Suri wrote about the underrepresentation of LGBT professionals in STEM. The column, titled “Why is Science so Straight?” explored the reasons for the invisibility of LGBT members in STEM fields, what Suri called an “unspoken convention.”

“Underrepresentation is just one factor that reduces visibility. Unlike women and minorities, whose status is usually obvious, sexual orientation is a hidden characteristic. The fact that a sizable proportion of the L.G.B.T. STEM work force is closeted (43 percent, according to a 2015 estimate) further deepens this effect,” he wrote.

Suri also noted that the STEM work culture could play a role in reduced LGBT visibility: “There is a another, more insidious factor at work. STEM culture is very problem-focused. Conversations, even over lunch, typically remain restricted to work matters (which is very different from what I’ve noticed in arts and humanities settings),” he explained.

In his column, Suri provided perspective on how STEM professions could move forward in regards to increasing diversity: “More critically, STEM culture must rein in the pressure to separate professional and personal identities. It should view its workers more holistically, welcoming their interests and differences as sources of enhanced resourcefulness.”

Suri is a contributing opinion writer for the New York Times. Read his previous columns on the New York Times website.

Douglas Lamdin, economics, was selected as the annual recipient of the Abramson Award for the outstanding article published in the past year in Business Economics, the journal of the National Association for Business Economics (NABE).

The article, “Gauging the Financial Capability of Americans,” was coauthored with Mark Johnson, a faculty member in the Sellinger School of Business at Loyola University, Maryland. The past two recipients of this award were Lawrence Summers at Harvard University, and John Taylor at Stanford University.

Erica Rebollar, Visiting Artist for Fall 2015, has been selected by a panel of esteemed judges to receive the prestigious Pola Nirenska Award for "Outstanding Contribution to Dance."  She will receive this award in a special ceremony on January 23rd at the Terrace Theater, Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts.  We salute her accomplishments and are very excited that our dancers have the opportunity to learn her choreography this semester.

Renaissance Fine Arts is seeking a success driven sales professional for our Baltimore gallery.

Sales Position:

To be successful in our fast paced art gallery, you must be dynamic & self motivated. Candidates must have an upbeat and professional demeanor, a desire to help our clientele "personalize" their homes and offices with art, and excellent closing skills.

Huebotics developers Jasmin Martin, Erika Shumacher, Tad Cordle and Michael Leung

Technical.ly Baltimore reports that the HueBots robot-building game made by a four UMBC students has been added to the PC game platform Steam.

“HueBots is a deceptively challenging top-down puzzle game. You control a team of colorful robots that will only interact with objects that match their color; they will also keep moving in one direction until they collide with something that matches their color.”

You can try a demo version of Huebots at http://huebots.com/ and also download the demo version for use on a Mac or PC.  The release trailer will give you an idea of what it’s like.

The UMBC Entrepreneurs group reports that the student team that developed the game includes lead Michael Leung ’16, computer science; Tad Cordle ’16, computer engineering; and Erika Schumacher ’17; and Jasmine Martin ’15, both visual arts students with interactive media concentrations. This summer Graham Dolle ’18, computer science, contributed special visual effects.

CSEE Professor Marc Olano notes that it is the first game to go for sale to the larger public from UMBC’s Game Developer’s Club.

“The Steam greenlight process requires the game to get strong community feedback before it is approved, which it could only have gotten with wider interest than just UMBC,” Olando said in an email to Technical.ly.

The group has already sold about 100 copies of the game and has a mobile version that is waiting for approval from iOS and Android in the coming weeks.