Kamili Jackson ’97, and M.S. ’99, mechanical engineering, has witnessed one NASA space launch in person during her nine years at the agency: the Hubble Servicing Mission 4 in 2009.

Jackson was a contracted materials engineer at NASA for that mission, helping the team make decisions on what metals, plastics and ceramics should be used for the craft. And as she watched her hard work blast off and enter orbit, she was filled with satisfaction.

That same year, Jackson co-founded a project that helps high school students take off into careers in engineering – the Future Innovative Rising Engineers (FIRE), National Society of Black Engineers (NSBE), Junior Chapter in Greenbelt.

“We wanted to have a consistent impact on a set of kids,” says Jackson. The FIRE students come from all over Maryland and even Virginia, and they often stay on the team until they graduate from high school and find a college or university. (In 2013, the program began accepting middle school students as well.)

The competition and mentoring in the program is intense. Professional engineers and parents coach participating students through four national competitions in robotics, model rocketry and math. They also teach them coding, software and building techniques, and also facilitate discussions throughout the process. The goal is for the students to design and build their own robots and rockets.

“We get them to learn by doing,” says Jackson. “We want them to take ownership of what they’re learning.”

Her passion for community service blossomed during her undergraduate years at UMBC, where she was a member of the fourth class of the Meyerhoff Scholars Program. (She has also served on that program’s alumni advisory board.) Among her long list of extracurricular activities at that time were day-long service projects in Baltimore City and mentoring elementary school kids. She also participated in campus governance in the Student Government Association.

“Vice president of student government was a big one as far as starting to figure out my leadership style,” recalls Jackson, who was elected to the position in her senior year. “Student leadership was one of the best things I did in college because you can be a leader, mess up, experiment, and at the same time make things happen.”

She completed a Ph.D. at The Johns Hopkins University and a postdoctoral research fellowship at the University of Cape Town. Jackson began working for NASA in 2005. After five years of consulting on space missions, she was hired as a civil servant to work in Safety and Mission Assurance.

Last year, Jackson was promoted to chief safety and mission assurance officer, and she has leads a team that includes experts in reliability, safety, materials, electronic parts, radiation, and contamination. “This is the first time I have a team at work, which is cool because I am able to use all the skills I have been building up outside of work as a leader,” she says.

Leadership is one of the values she is imparting to her FIRE students. One former program participant who enrolled at UMBC, junior Markus-Allen Proctor, mechanical engineering, won third place in the NSBE Science Fair in 2012 as a senior in high school. Now he serves as the vice president of the UMBC NSBE chapter. As a sophomore, his Proctor’s team took third place in the 2014 Cangialosi Business Innovation Competition for creating EduPal – an online time management tool designed for student success.

Jackson wants her students to “catch the bug of winning” so they can push each other to soar even higher each year.

And winning is what they are doing. At the 2014 FIRST LEGO League Robotics competition, Jackson’s FIRE students built a robot designed to rescue people during a natural disaster. At the Awards Luncheon, her students were presented with the First Place Robot Design Award, and before they’d even finished taking photos for that, they heard their team’s name announced again for achieving the Overall Individual Highest Performance in the competition’s Try-Math-A-Lon “Points Race.”

As future engineers and competitors, they had achieved lift off.

— Salma Sparklin ’11

Anne Spence, mechanical engineering, will participate in a roundtable discussion hosted by Congressman Elijah Cummings.

The panel is part of a Congressional initiative to learn about issues women educators encounter in building and sustaining economic security. The discussion will also focus on strategies to increase the number of women pursuing STEM fields. Spence has conducted extensive research on engineering education and seeks to identify best practices for educating teachers and engaging students.

The discussion will take place on August 13 from 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. at the University of Maryland Biotech Park Conference Center. Click here to learn more about Spence’s research.

The Princeton Review profiles UMBC in The Best 379 Colleges: 2015 Edition, published today. The book’s reviews are based on a survey of 130,000 students, measuring eight categories, such as academics, admissions selectivity, quality of life and financial aid. The colleges and universities in the book are not ranked overall, but are included based on outstanding academic programs.

The book highlights UMBC’s strengths in academics. One student quoted in the profile says, “UMBC is a place where it is cool to be smart, and everything about the campus, including the students, exudes ’nerd-chic.’” Undergraduates also expressed enthusiasm for the “academic opportunities and scholarship programs available,” and said, “UMBC wants to see every student succeed—they provide you with the tools, people, and resources to make sure you get where you want to go in life.”

Click here for more information on The Best 379 Colleges and here to read an article about the ranking.

Between You and Me is a solo show in three parts by multidisciplinary artist Christine Ferrera. Counter-posing live and recorded performance, this piece contemplates art, humor and feminism. 

 An artist befriends a global coffee conglomerate, confronts her anxieties by attempting a stand-up comedy routine and battles a belligerent version of herself in a series of strange phone calls. Counter-posing live and recorded performance, Between You and Me is a solo show that contemplates art, humor and feminism.

Cano will be sworn in as MHEC student commissioner on August 15, 2014.

Want a way to set yourself apart from the pack of grad school applicants?

Want an answer to all those questions people keep asking you about your future?  

Step 1 of 2: Apply for the 2014 APSA Annual Meeting Travel Award!

Step 2 of 2: Attend the 2014 annual meeting of the American Political Science Association, the leading professional organization for the study of political science!! 

At this conference, you will: 

Network with other students and with non-UMBC faculty conducting cutting-edge research in political science

Discover more about the various fields and subfields of study in political science

Spark an interest in a graduate degree in political science or in law

The award covers for your conference registration fee and one Round-trip MARC ticket from BWI to Union Station.

The award does not pay for hotel accommodations. The expectation is that recipients will attend one full day of the conference. All panels, business meetings, receptions, special events, and exhibits will be held at the Marriott Wardman Park, Omni Shoreham, and the Washington Hilton. Registration and exhibits will be located in the Marriott Wardman Park.

Eligibility: Juniors and seniors majoring in Political Science with GPAs of 3.0 and higher are eligible to apply.

Requirements: Recipients will be required to attend eight panel presentations and to submit a written report of their experiences.

How to Apply: Applicants must submit a 500-word narrative outlining what they hope to gain from attending the annual meeting and how they will share their experience with other UMBC students.

Contact Dr. Tyson King-Meadows (tkingmea@umbc.edu) to apply or to get additional information.