UMBC public policy professor David Salkever delves into the University System of Maryland merger debate in a new Washington Post letter to the editor and Baltimore Sun commentary, published last week.

In the Sun, Salkever argues that merging the University of Maryland, College Park and University of Maryland, Baltimore in an effort to “raise their national rankings based on total research funding” represents flawed logic, given that rankings groups are aware of and have mechanisms to mitigate the effects of such tactics, such as collecting data at the campus rather than institutional level. He writes, “to increase the College Park rankings, in the authoritative ‘Top American Research Universities’ report, we would need to make some (very expensive and disruptive) geographic moves of programs to the College Park campus.”

Responding to the argument that a merger would increase research collaboration across the campuses, Salkever’s Post letter notes: “Before proceeding with an expensive, complicated process to solve [the suggested] collaboration ‘problem,’ officials should first get evidence that a problem exists.” He adds that if the problem does exist, officials should take a careful, evidence-based approach to addressing it.

Thomas Schaller’s new Baltimore Sun commentary responds to Rick Perry’s recent debate gaffe, where he failed to recall the third cabinet agency he’d like to close, after naming the Depts. of Education and Commerce. Beyond the “oops” moment, UMBC political science professor Schaller asks why Perry wants to eliminate those three departments in particular, rather than cutting spending across all departments or eliminating newer agencies.

Schaller has also written a new guest post for Sabato’s Crystal Ball, exploring the limited political impact of President Obama’s foreign policy successes in Iraq, Libya and with the killing of Osama bin Laden. Schaller writes: “His performance thus far has been pretty solid, but he stands to reap little to no electoral benefit from it.”

Are you looking to learn more about AASHE’s Sustainability Tracking, Assessment & Rating System (STARS)? Do you find yourself seeking resources and educational opportunities related to the program? Look no further! Subscribe to the STARS Update for the most current information about STARS.

AASHE created the STARS Update to keep the higher education community up-to-date on the latest and greatest information about STARS. Not only is the STARS Update a great resource, but it is also a way to stay connected to the higher education community. Learn not only how AASHE is enhancing the STARS Program, but also how institutions are working through each step of the STARS process from registration to submission. Stay engaged with the decisions by the Technical Advisors to ensure the STARS credits stay current and reflect the feedback AASHE receives from the higher education community. The STARS Update isn’t just for STARS Participants, although it is an imperative source of information for STARS Liaisons. Any individual interested in learning more about the details of the STARS Program is welcome to subscribe.

The STARS Update is a free, monthly e-newsletter. Your subscription will keep you up to speed on the latest STARS news, resources, participant highlights, events, and more. Article topics often include:

• Announcements about new versions of the STARS Technical Manual
• Updates to the STARS website and Reporting Tool
• STARS webinars, blog entries, and forum posts
• News from the Steering Committee
• Tips and reminders about STARS
• Events related to STARS
• Calls for STARS Steering Committee Members and Technical Advisors
• Limited-time offers and discounts from AASHE

Don’t miss this opportunity to stay connected to the STARS Program. Subscribe to the STARS Update today! Questions? Contact stars@aashe.org

Masters Thesis Defense

Approximation of Nonintegral Frequency Moments

Brian Pilz

10:00am 30 November 2011, ITE325b

Let a data stream have length m over an alphabet of n letters, with letter i occurring m_i times for i = 1,…,n. For any k, define the frequency moments F_k as F_k = \sum_{i=1}^n m_i^k. Alon, Matias, and Szegedy showed how to estimate F_k for integers k>0 with a one-pass algorithm using O(n^{1-1/k}log n) space for given length m, accuracy, and confidence. Here we extend those results to non-integral k obtaining bounds on the variance giving accuracy and confidence estimates, and giving quantitative results on the algorithm’s space requirements with particular interest to when k is near 1. We also give some performance statistics of the algorithm for these cases and consider an application to entropy estimation. This algorithm is known as a sketching algorithm. Sketching algorithms are probabilistic algorithms generally requiring sublinear space vs. a "classical" O(n) (linear) space requirement, and may have applications for anomaly detection of systems or networks.

Committee:

• Drs. Samuel Lomonaco
• Brooke Stephens
• Kostas Kalpakis (chair)
• Larry Wagoner

Three students were awarded the Second Generation Scholarship on November 9 during the W.E.B. DuBois Lecture featuring speaker Carla L. Peterson of the University of Maryland College Park. The annual lecture is sponsored by the department of Africana Studies.

A group of African-American alumni started the Second Generation Scholarship in 1986 as a means to give back to the campus and become more involved in UMBC. The scholarship provides funding to continuing students whose money for college often decreases the longer they stay in college and graduate. Among the requirements, scholarship candidates must be currently enrolled or have taken a course in Africana studies and demonstrate a commitment to improving the lives of minorities through community service, extracurricular activities or other community involvement.

Learn more about the scholarship here.
The 2011-12 scholarship winners: Oseogie Okojie ’14, Nia Hampton ’13, founder James Wiggins Esq. ’75, and Mahelet Gennene ’13.