2002-2003: A Hot Year
for UMBC
Dear UMBC Graduate:
This issue of our alumni newsletter, Generations, celebrates the achievements of UMBC students, alumni, faculty and staff this past year. I am always particularly excited to learn about the accomplishments of our alumni. There are now more than 40,000 UMBC alumni in Maryland, across the nation and around the world. Your success is our success and an inspiration to our current students. We are very proud of you.
As the academic year begins, the campus is energized by the arrival of returning students and 3,000 new freshmen, transfer
and graduate students. This year's freshman class of more than 1,500 is our largest ever, and 75 percent are living on campus in our
growing community of residence halls. Enrollment in our graduate programs also is growing and includes students who earned their undergraduate degrees at such institutions as MIT, the University
of Wisconsin and the University of Virginia.
It is certain to be another year of creativity, intellectual growth and achievement for the UMBC community. We will work to keep you connected to UMBC and to each other, through the Internet and with programs and events on campus. On behalf of my colleagues, and especially the students here today, thank you for your continuing commitment to UMBC.
Sincerely,
Freeman A. Hrabowski, III
President
 UMBC Named Newsweek "Hot School"
The 2002-2003 academic year got off to a sizzling start in August when the Kaplan/Newsweek "How to Get Into College" guide — one of the most influential college admissions publications — named UMBC one of the nation's 12 "Hot Schools."
"Our list for 2002-2003 is dominated by some of the country's top public universities," wrote the guide's editors, who also included the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and the University of California at Santa Barbara among the 12. "With a tough economy, the hottest schools may well be the best bargains-those offering excellent academics at more affordable prices" — advantages that UMBC alumni know well.
From L.A. to the Head of SGA
 As a high school student in Los Angeles, Scott Nicholson might never have found UMBC but for chance. Today, he is one of the University's most visible and enthusiastic students, serving as president of the Student Government Association (SGA) and preparing to graduate with honors — a year ahead of schedule.
It was on a campus visit to College Park that Nicholson first learned about UMBC when, feeling overwhelmed by the flagship school's size, he inquired about smaller universities in the area. Meeting the chairs of the history and political science departments was what sold him, in addition to the "small community feel" of the campus.
"I got a real sense of commitment from both of them," he says.
"I sensed the faculty would be really involved in my success and
have found that to be true in my time here."
A double major in history and political science, Nicholson is a member of the Golden Key National Honor Society, Phi Kappa Phi and the National Society of Collegiate Scholars. He has also held internships with Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi and the Greater Baltimore Committee. His post-graduation plans include law school and a career in law or politics.
Improving School Performance
Earns
Accolades for UMBC
In recognition of its success in improving student achievement in some of Maryland's lowest-performing schools, UMBC's Urban Teacher Education (UTE) Program received the Christa McAuliffe Award from the American Association of State Colleges and Universities in November 2002. Only three universities received this award, named in memory of the teacher killed in the takeoff of the space shuttle Challenger in 1986.
The UTE program has placed more than 200 teachers in 75 of Maryland's highest-need schools, and it continues to recruit highly qualified candidates through incentives that include 100 percent tuition and other financial support in return for a commitment to teach for three to four years in a UTE partnership school. The program assigns teams of UTE teachers to the same school, helping them to become one another's support system; they also are assigned master teachers as mentors and supervisors.
The strategies have paid off — in troubled schools where most
new teachers leave in the first two years, more than 95 percent
of UTE teachers stay on. Their strong preparation in subject
content and teaching methodologies has helped push students'
reading and math scores above their peers in comparable schools.
The program's success is "stunning," noted one observer, adding, "UTE arms teachers with a solid understanding of their discipline, strong skills in classroom management and pedagogy and the caring attitude needed to support our urban teachers."
NASA Honors UMBC Scientist
Robert A. Schiffer, chief scientist at UMBC's Goddard Earth Sciences and Technology (GEST) Center, was awarded the NASA Distinguished Service Medal, the agency's highest honor, for his contributions to environmental research and service to NASA. Schiffer ended a 27-year career with NASA and joined the GEST Center staff last fall.
"I am happy to come to UMBC and work with so many talented individuals," says Schiffer, an atmospheric scientist. "I hope to expand UMBC's national and international involvement on climate and global climate change research."
The GEST Center, established in 2000 through a $70-million cooperative agreement between UMBC and the NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, currently employs more than 100 research scientists and also sponsors visiting research fellows and summer internship programs for graduate students, helping to make UMBC a focal point for earth and environmental research.
UMBC Recognized for Promoting
Diversity in Graduate Education
UMBC's efforts addressing a national trend — the shortage of women and minority Ph.D.s in the sciences — earned the Council of Graduate Schools/Peterson's Award for Innovation in Promoting an Inclusive Graduate Community. In 2002, almost 55 percent of UMBC's 2,162 graduate students were women, and more than 300 students were African American, Native American or Hispanic.
Through the Meyerhoff Scholars Program, UMBC has been extremely successful in supporting minority undergraduates going on to earn advanced degrees in science, mathematics and engineering. "Now," says Graduate School Dean Scott Bass, "we're primed to do the same at the graduate level."
UMBC's Meyerhoff Graduate Fellows Program in the Biomedical Sciences, created in 1996, now has more than 30 students across six departments. Two new programs were also created last year. The Graduate Horizons Program will recruit women and under-represented minorities to UMBC's Ph.D. and master's degree programs. The Maryland Alliance for Graduate Education and the Professoriate, created with a $2.5-million grant from the National Science Foundation, will promote and coordinate graduate student recruitment, mentoring and professional development statewide.
New Support for Undergraduate
Research in the Sciences
More and more UMBC students are participating in research projects as an integral part of their undergraduate educational experience. Now, a new scholarship in chemistry and the biological sciences will increase those opportunities further.
UMBC is one of 13 institutions nationwide to receive the prestigious Beckman Scholars Award, given by the Mabel Beckman Foundation to support undergraduate research in the sciences. The other award recipients include Carnegie Mellon, New York University and William and Mary.
The award provides undergraduates with research stipends and opportunities for sustained, in-depth, faculty-mentored undergraduate laboratory research experiences in chemistry and biological sciences. Up to five UMBC students will be named Beckman Scholars over the next three years. As a capstone to their experiences, they will present their research at the Beckman Scholars Annual Research Symposium in Irvine, Calif.
UMBC HHMI Lab researchers (l to r) Chun Tang,
Isaac Kindle and Erin Loeliger
UMBC Researchers Identify Potential
Treatment for HIV
Of the scientists working to unravel the mysteries of AIDS, surely one of the youngest is 16-year-old Erin Loeliger, a UMBC sophomore and part of a research team headed by Michael Summers, professor of chemistry and biochemistry and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator. Summers' group has discovered a new target on the HIV molecule that could lead to a new class of drugs to fight the virus that causes AIDS. Their work was featured on the cover of the Journal of Molecular Biology this past spring. Three patents were filed based on the team's findings, and Achillion Pharmaceuticals, a Connecticut company specializing in new drug treatments for infectious diseases, has become a partner in the research.
The greatest challenge in treating HIV is drug resistance brought on when the virus mutates, rendering existing drugs ineffective. "Our research has led to the identification of a new class of compounds that disrupts the assembly of the HIV-1 capsid protein," Summers says, "which is a vital step in changing
immature, non-infectious HIV into its mature form."
In addition to Loeliger, the research team that co-authored the Journal of Molecular Biology study included Meyerhoff Scholar Isaac Kindle, biochemistry graduate student Chun Tang and Samson Kyere, biochemistry '01, who is now in the M.D./Ph.D. program at the University of Maryland, Baltimore. While additional laboratory testing needs to be undertaken before the new approach can be tested in humans, this team's work holds a great deal of promise.
Junior Wins UMBC's First Truman Fellowship
 Baltimore City native Alicia Wilson, who aspires to be a Supreme Court justice someday, has the first step toward her career goal already locked up. In May, she became one of only 75 college juniors nationwide to receive a Harry S Truman Fellowship, and UMBC's first student to win this prestigious award. The $30,000 merit-based grant is given to students committed to careers in public service and underwrites their graduate or professional school education.
A Sondheim Public Affairs Scholar majoring in political science
at UMBC, Wilson hopes to attend New York University or the University of Chicago to purse joint degrees in law and public administration. She has demonstrated her commitment to public service during her college career with internships at the Public Justice Center and the Circuit Court of Baltimore City and involvement with Oxfam America and BUILD (Baltimoreans United in Leadership Development), among other organizations. "I want
to give a voice to people in the community who are under-represented," she says. "UMBC has opened a new world to me."
Read more in Alicia Wilson's own words at www.umbc.edu/undergrad/s_pubaff_words.html.
Britain's BBC Showcases the IRC
The Imaging Research Center's (IRC) virtual tour of the Baltimore apartments of legendary art collectors Etta and Claribel Cone — part of the IRC's landmark collaboration with the Baltimore Museum of Art — has gone international. The IRC's work is featured in a BBC documentary hosted by Michael Palin (best known as one of the original members of Monty Python and an avid art collector). The Cone tour includes five interactive modules and photo realistic lighting, and it has been a hit with both museumgoers and the arts community.
The success of the Cone virtual tour has spawned another IRC collaboration, this time with the National Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C. In November, the IRC finished a project that involved recreating The Public Gardens-a series of large panels considered the grandest and most complex project of French Impressionist Edouard Vuillard — as it originally hung
in a private salon.
Astronaut Sally Ride Launches UMBC's First Computer Mania Day
 America's first woman in space greeted hundreds of enthusiastic girls and their parents and teachers at UMBC's first Computer Mania Day on May 3. Sally Ride delivered the keynote address at this program sponsored by UMBC's Center for Women and Information Technology (CWIT). More than 300 sixth- and seventh-grade girls (and a few boys) from Baltimore and Howard County public schools came to learn how technology can be an exciting part of their lives now and in the future.
Research shows that the IT gender gap opens as early as the middle school years, when girls are most image-conscious and don't want to be labeled as "geeks" or "nerds." Girls make up only about 14 percent of students who take advanced placement courses in computer science, a key to success in IT-related fields at the college level.
"If we want to increase the number of women in IT careers, we need to reach them when they're young — ideally, in middle school — and get them excited about technology," says Joan Korenman, CWIT's founding director. "The good news is that we know Computer Mania Day can do this, and next year we hope to invite many more girls and their teachers."
New Student Regent From UMBC
 Governor Robert Ehrlich picked UMBC senior Phil Shockley, formerly president of the Student Government Association, to serve as student regent on the University System of Maryland Board of Regents, the governing body overseeing Maryland's 13 public campuses. While it is only a one-year appointment, the student regent votes on all matters that come before the board and holds all the same powers as the board's other 16 members.
"It's not a position that is well known to most students," Shockley says. "Part of my effort is going to be to get the word out, because it's an excellent way for students to have a voice in their education."
President Freeman Hrabowski spoke proudly of Shockley's nomination, saying, "The Governor's appointment of Phil is a major statement of support for UMBC and a major statement of confidence in Phil Shockley. Phil represents the best of UMBC. He has a stellar reputation in Maryland, and we should all be proud of his leadership."
Shockley is a native of Snow Hill, Md., and a double major in information systems and political science. A T. Rowe Price Scholar at UMBC, he also worked as an intern in the office of Lt. Governor Kathleen Kennedy Townsend during the 2002 legislative session and was selected for the Governor's Summer Internship Program last year.
Retrievers Move to NCAA America East
 After five years dominating the competition in the Northeast Conference, UMBC's Retrievers are taking on new challengers, joining the NCAA America East Conference.
The University's new intercollegiate athletic rivals are mid-sized research institutions in New York and New England: Boston University; Northeastern University; the University of Hartford; the University of Maine; the University of New Hampshire; the University of Vermont; and the Albany, Binghamton and
Stony Brook campuses of the State University of New York system. The move to the America East Conference advances UMBC's athletics program and brings greater visibility in key recruiting areas.
"We were looking for a 10th member, and our presidents were very clear that it had to be someone special," says league commissioner Chris Monasch. "UMBC is a natural fit for the conference, with an academic and athletics mission similar to our current members."
"The America East is the next logical step for UMBC," says Athletics Director Charles Brown. "The Northeast Conference was very good for us, but it's time to move on to greater challenges, which are the greatest motivation for athletic success. We have a great deal of hard work ahead of us."
UMBC Competing for $5-Million Entrepreneurship Grant
As a university that takes pride in its creative, entrepreneurial spirit, UMBC has a strong chance to receive major funding to help infuse that kind of entrepreneurial thinking throughout the curriculum and give students opportunities usually found only in traditional business schools. The Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation chose UMBC and a small number of other schools to compete for $5-million grants from the new Kauffman Campuses Initiative, which will be given to universities that can make entrepreneurship a common and accessible experience for all students.
If funded, UMBC's proposal would support faculty research about entrepreneurship in a wide range of disciplines and introduce students in wide-ranging majors to concepts of entrepreneurship in innovative, compelling ways. It would also build on initiatives already in place, including an internship program currently funded by the Kauffman Foundation as well as programs developed through UMBC's Alex. Brown Center for Science and Technology Entrepreneurship and the University's business incubator, techcenter@UMBC. Syracuse University, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Wake Forest University and Washington University are also competing for Kauffman funding but as always, UMBC is up for the challenge no matter how formidable the competition may seem.
Crew Team Races Toward Success
While most of the campus is sleeping, every morning at 5 a.m., the UMBC Crew Team can be found on the water near the Hanover Street Bridge, beginning its daily practice.
Since its founding in 1992, the team — a club sport — has grown to 40 members and nine racing shells, and it is consistently ranked in the top third of 30 programs in the Mid-Atlantic region. The team competes against such nationally known schools as West Point, Michigan State, Drexel, the University of North Carolina, Virginia Tech and Penn State and such local powers as Washington College, Johns Hopkins and Loyola College.
One of the team's biggest regattas is Boston's world-famous Head of the Charles, held annually each fall. Last year, UMBC's women's varsity four finished 15th out of 52 in the international competition, less than one minute off the winning time after three miles. This year, the team will have two boats entered in the regatta, which is slated for Saturday, Oct. 18.
The crew team is known not only for its performance on the water, but also in the classroom, with an average GPA of 3.4 and student-athletes hailing from the Humanities and Meyerhoff scholarship programs. Former club president and Humanities Scholar Ilse Schweitzer, English and history '03, graduated in the spring with a 3.94 GPA and is pursuing a master's degree in medieval literature at the University of York in England.
Class 2003 on the Move
If a university's graduates are the true measure of its success, then the Class of 2003 is sure to be one that goes down in history. Following are just a few of the newest graduates and their post-graduation plans
 Valedictorian Erika Danna, a biological sciences major with a 4.0 GPA, is beginning her doctoral studies in immunology at Stanford University this fall. While at UMBC, she worked in Suzanne Rosenberg's lab as one of the first students in the Department of Defense-funded Breast Cancer Undergraduate Research Experience (BCURE) program. She presented her research findings at two major national scientific meetings, as well as four UMBC-sponsored research symposia, and she also was part of the BCURE program's Race for the Cure team to raise money and awareness for breast cancer research.
Jasmine McDonald, who earned her B.S. degree in chemistry, is attending Harvard University on a Prize Fellowship to pursue her Ph.D. in immunology and infectious diseases. The Meyerhoff Scholar has done a lot to be proud of during her UMBC years, including publishing in the Journal of Molecular Biology and working in the lab of Nobel Prize-winner Thomas Cech. She also served as president of UMBC's Golden Key International Honor Society.
 At 16, Tomasz Macura completed two B.S. degrees in mathematics and computer science. Now he's in England, continuing his studies toward a Ph.D. in computer science at the University of Cambridge's Trinity College — considered the most prestigious of the 37 Cambridge colleges. He is the school's youngest Ph.D. student since World War I. Age aside, Macura stands out as one of the nation's most promising scholars in the areas of math and science. He was one of 16 winners of the Department of Energy Computational Science Graduate Fellowship, which pays tuition, fees and a $29,000 stipend per year for four years.
 Doug Yetter, who has written, directed and/or conducted more than 200
musicals and was one of seven finalists for valedictorian, is now enrolled in the world's only graduate program in musical theatre writing at New York University's Tisch School of the Arts, where he has received a full scholarship and housing allowance. Not only will Yetter and the other students in this M.F.A. program have opportunities for assistantships at New York theatres,
in their final year each composes an entire Broadway show.
 Sipi Gupta's post-graduation plans began at the Office of Homeless Services in Baltimore and then will take her to a community health organization in West India. At the Office of Homeless Services, Gupta — who earned her master's degree in sociology in 2003 and her bachelor's degree in 2002 — will help evaluate the 2002-03 Code Blue Policy, which includes a first-time program to find shelter for the homeless when temperatures fall. In India, Gupta will survey community health needs, including access to water for the elderly and information on vision care.
 Elise Vestal, Ph.D. clinical/human services psychology, decided to focus her research on forensic psychology after a practicum experience
at Clifton T. Perkins Hospital, Maryland's maximum-security forensic psychiatric hospital. Vestal's dissertation examined clinical predictors of violence among patients at that facility. Vestal was a Meyerhoff Graduate Fellow and says the Meyerhoff Graduate Program played an important role in her success. "The monthly networking meetings were a great opportunity for me to meet other minority graduate students pursuing degrees in the sciences," she says. "The social support this offered was a crucial element in my continuing
academic success."
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