UMBC provides the resources of a larger university with the access of a smaller one. Study abroad, internships, co-op experiences, service-learning, undergraduate research and accelerated bachelor’s/master’s programs are all within reach.
The Shriver Center
The Shriver Center, named in tribute to the vision and service of Eunice Kennedy Shriver and Sargent Shriver, links the resources of the campus to urgent social needs - particularly in the areas of education, juvenile and criminal justice, health, the environment and workforce development.
The Shriver Center places UMBC students in more than 1,000 service-learning experiences annually that bring the university’s resources to people in high needs settings and connects students to a range of community-based social-service projects.
By participating in the Center’s programs, students explore the connections between theory and practice and between their academic program and their life’s work. They acquire a better understanding of their own skills and interests and a clearer understanding of their role in the larger community.
All students placed in applied learning programs through the Shriver Center enroll in a zero-credit course (PRAC 094-097). This course provides formal recognition of students’ participation in the programs and assigns a pass/fail grade based on their performance. In addition, most Shriver Center placements can be taken for credit toward a degree.
Public Service Scholars Internship Programs
Through the Shriver Center’s Public Service Scholars internship programs, undergraduate and graduate students from across Maryland integrate classroom study with professional experience in public and nonprofit sectors.
These scholars programs offer competitive internships for students with a 3.00 GPA or above. Students compete locally or nationally for top-level placements that are paid. Scholars programs include the Governor’s Summer Internship Program, which places students with the heads of Maryland state agencies or in the Governor’s Office, the Maryland Department of Transportation Fellows Program, the Walter Sondheim Jr. Nonprofit Leadership Program, and the Walter Sondheim Jr. Public Service Law Fellows Program.
Service-Learning Programs
The Shriver Center leads nearly 1,000 service-learning placements annually for undergraduate and graduate students, which are designed to address social problems and foster civic responsibility. In coordinating placements, the Shriver Center links service experiences to students’ academic interests, allowing them to advance their personal and professional goals while earning credit. Students who participate in service-learning programs are involved in academic course work that includes critical reflection upon their service experiences.
Service-learning placements allow undergraduate students to provide direct service to non-profit organizations and local K-12 schools. Students can choose to serve in the center’s Choice Program or in one of a dozen settings. For example, students tutor Baltimore youth and adults in community-based programs or work in projects such as the College Gardens After-school Program, Best Buddies, Health Outreach Baltimore, the Baltimore Animal Rescue and Care Shelter (BARCS), and the Multiple Sclerosis YMCA Swim Program.
The Shriver Peaceworker Program, a graduate-level service-learning program, invites returned Peace Corps volunteers to participate in a rigorous, two-year program integrating three key components: community service, graduate study and ethical reflection. Peaceworkers focus their community service and graduate study in one of four areas of social concern: juvenile justice, education, health, and economic and community development. The program’s goal is to educate and train a new generation of citizens and leaders who can critically, creatively and responsibly address the complex economic, social and cultural problems confronting the United States, particularly its cities, today.
K-16 Outreach Initiatives
The Shriver Center is involved in a variety of sustained partnerships with K-12 public schools that address important unmet needs in the community. The Center connects faculty and students to elementary, middle and high schools throughout the region to support a wide range of initiatives. These programs have been supported by the National Science Foundation, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), local foundations, and corporate partners to provide stipends for students. UMBC undergraduate and graduate students have worked in classrooms supporting high school science teachers in Montgomery County, have trained teachers in elementary schools in Baltimore City on the use of Smart Board technology, and have tutored and mentored K-12 students through a number of other partnerships with schools throughout the state.
Service Delivery Programs
The Shriver Center’s service delivery programs involve the campus in the direct delivery of services to the citizens of Maryland. Through its field offices in the Baltimore Metropolitan Area, professional staff are committed to delivering high-quality, cost-effective services to youth and families in some of our region’s more challenging environments.
The Choice Program
The Choice Program is UMBC’s model community-based, family-centered case management approach to delinquency prevention and youth development. Choice staff members, known as Service-Learning Fellows, provide daily, intensive supervision, advocacy and other needed services to youth and their families. As a member of the AmeriCorps network, Choice Fellows receive an education award upon successful completion of their year of service. UMBC students get an opportunity to learn firsthand about social issues faced by youth and families in at-risk environments through direct involvement as tutors, mentors and project partners.
Choice Jobs provides job skills development to youth. The program operates a concession at Oriole Park and at the Inner Harbor that serves as a real-life laboratory for skills development.
The Choice Program welcomes students of all majors to join the Choice team of Fellows following their graduation from UMBC. Additionally, Choice has engaged with graduate students from a variety of majors in research, training development, internships and other special projects. This program is supported by Maryland’s Department of Juvenile Services, local management boards, local and federal government agencies, private foundations, and the private sector.
For further information on Shriver Center programs, call 410-455-2493 or 410-455-2494, or visit the Shriver Center. Hours are Monday through Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 5 p.m., Public Policy Building, www.shrivercenter.umbc.edu
Short-Term Community Service Programs
The Office of Student Life (OSL) helps students connect with community service opportunities on and off campus. Service programs supported by OSL include Alternative School Break trips, campus blood drives, National Volunteer Week, and various one-day volunteer placements. OSL also will help students develop new service opportunities. For more information, call 410-455-3457 or visit www.umbc.edu/studentlife.
Career Center
410.455.2216 careers.umbc.edu
Office Hours: 8:30am-5:00pm M-F, Walk-in appointments: 2:00-4:00pm M-F (212 Math/Psychology Building)
UMBC’s Career Center supports students in preparing to make a smooth transition to the world of work or graduate school. The Career Center provides both in-person and online services to help students explore career options, engage in applied learning, develop effective job-search strategies, plan for graduate or professional school, and meet potential employers.
The Career Center offers individual career counseling and hosts a wide variety of professional skill-building workshops. The Center also organizes regular career fairs and employer events for students seeking internships and full-time or part-time employment. Students should use UMBCworks (UMBC’s online job database - http://careers.umbc.edu/umbcworks/) to look for full-time jobs, part-time jobs, internships/co-ops and research opportunities.
Undergraduate and graduate students at ALL levels are encouraged to take advantage of the Career Center’s programs and begin building their professional skills and networks.
Please visit http://careers.umbc.edu/ to view our extensive online resources and find out how we can help you prepare for the future!
Phi Beta Kappa
Phi Beta Kappa was founded in 1776 at the College of William & Mary by a group of students dedicated to the culture of the intellect for its own sake. Students elected by Eta of Maryland, which is sheltered on the UMBC campus, and its 282 colleague chapters are considered to have given evidence that they share that dedication and show promise of pursuing that intellectual culture for the remainder of their lives. In reviewing potential candidates for election, the chapter seeks to identify those who, because they enjoy the rigor of intellectual challenge and are assuaging an unbounded curiosity, have pursued a broad curriculum of liberal studies well beyond minimal institutional requirements.
Eta of Maryland of Phi Beta Kappa currently uses the following criteria in selecting candidates for election to Membership in Course. It is emphasized that these are only the minimum criteria for consideration for election and that meeting all of these criteria does not guarantee election.
- 90 credits in liberal studies subjects at a college or university
- 36 credits at UMBC
- 3.5 grade point average in liberal studies subjects
- Completion of General Education Program requirements in language
- Competence in mathematics through the precalculus level. Students may demonstrate competence in mathematics by completing high school or college courses or by proficiency examination.
- Completion of at least six courses (18 credits) in a coherently structured program of liberal studies outside a student’s major discipline
For more information, please contact Michele Wolff, 410-455-2493 or wolff@umbc.edu.
Study Abroad
Spending a semester, summer, January term or academic year overseas offers a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to become a more global citizen and gain cross-cultural job skills that can be beneficial through a participant’s academic and professional career. UMBC strongly encourages students to include an international experience as an integral part of their university education. Students of all academic majors have a wide range of educational options throughout the world through the Office of International Education Services’ Study Abroad Office.
The Study Abroad Office serves the university’s undergraduate students to find academically appropriate, affordable study abroad programs. Tuition exchanges allow students to pay their regular UMBC tuition and fees, yet attend an international institution, providing the most economical ways to study overseas. UMBC students may take advantage of tuition exchanges at peer universities in France, Japan, Spain, Italy, Ireland, Sweden and the United Kingdom. Through our partners at Towson University and Frostburg State University, UMBC students can expand their exchange options to dozens of additional universities throughout the world. UMBC’s Study Abroad Office also works directly with international universities and U.S. partners to expand the variety of academic opportunities available to its students.
Studying abroad offers an incomparable way to learn a new language. UMBC’s language majors and minors study their concentration overseas through partnerships in Central and South America, France, Belgium and French-speaking Africa, Russia, China and Taiwan, South Korea, Germany and Austria, Japan, as well as Jordan and Morocco. For students studying languages considered strategic by the US federal government, there are several nationally prestigious scholaraships that UMBC students have won to study these languages.
Proficiency in a foreign language is not a requirement for studying abroad. UMBC students in any major can study at universities in the English-speaking world, studying their major in Australia, Ireland, the United Kingdom, South Africa, New Zealand or India. Many study abroad programs offer courses in English, even when the main language of the country is not English. From environmental systems in Sweden, mechanical engineering in Chile, Asian Studies in Korea to gender studies in Mali, UMBC students have expanded their majors while exploring the globe.
Federal and state financial aid, as well as UMBC merit scholarships, can be used for most study abroad programs. Special scholarships are also available for students participating in these programs.
Interested students should contact the Office of International Education Services’ Study Abroad Office, located in 222 Administration Building, by phone at 410-455-2624. Additional information is also available at studyabroad.umbc.edu.
Undergraduate Research
UMBC offers many opportunities for undergraduates in every major to gain significant experience with independent creative work, scholarship, and research.
Students frequently collaborate with faculty members in creative endeavors in the dance, music, theatre, and visual and performing arts departments. Students in the humanities and social sciences carry out independent scholarship with the help of faculty mentors. Science and Engineering faculty members offer students positions in their research laboratories, including UMBC’s Howard Hughes Medical Institute research laboratory. Taking advantage of UMBC’s prime location, UMBC students conduct research at the NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center, Johns Hopkins University, and the National Institute ofStandards and Technology. UMBC students are accepted for summer research fellowships in scientific laboratories worldwide.
The Office of Undergraduate Education Undergraduate Research Award (URA) provides up to $1,500 for student recipients to work with a faculty mentor on an original project. Recipients are chosen on a competitive basis. Recent projects have included a study of the Shanghai Jewish Ghetto during the Holocaust, a reconstruction of the ancient Greek lyre and a study of ancient Greek musical notation, and as study of a newly-recognized species of song bird- the Puerto Rican Oriole.
Each year, the Office of Undergraduate Education sponsors Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement Day (URCAD), a campus-wide conference featuring independent work completed by UMBC students in all disciplines. Recent oral and poster presentations included “Exploring Poorly Understood Psychosocial Factors for HIV Prevention and Treatment Among Urban African American Women”,Geographically Skewed News: A Trayvon Martin Case Study”, and “Dialect Attitudes and Prestige Values Among Korean Dialects”. Films, artistic exhibits, and performances have included the original film “Future Children” and the new choreography “Ebb and Flow”.
Students also submit their research papers for publication in the undergraduate research journal, UMBC Review. Accepted articles have included “Darwinism and Moral Realism”, “Evaluating the Ability of Low-Tech Processes to Remove Bacterial Contaminants from Drinking Water in Kenya”, and “Evaluating the Success of Question 6: A Case Study of Abortion Politics in Maryland, 1990-1992”.
Faculty members, professional advisors, graduate students, staff, workshops, and online resources are available to help all students identify appropriate independent creative projects, scholarship, and research experiences. This professional-level experience helps students explore career interests, improve learning, and establish mentors. For more information, go to www.umbc.edu/undergrad_ed/research/index.html
Evening and Special-Sessions Classes
UMBC offers academic courses in the evening and on the weekend, as well as during the day. Often, full-time undergraduates schedule evening classes because they find this to be an excellent way to combine class work and part-time jobs. Additionally, UMBC offers many three- and four-credit courses during summer and winter sessions. These are excellent opportunities for students to get ahead in their degree programs and progress toward graduation.
Reserve Officers Training Corps Program (ROTC)
UMBC students may participate in Army and Air Force ROTC programs through other area universities. The Army Reserve Officers Training Corps is an elective course of study that allows full-time college students the opportunity to earn a commission as a second lieutenant in the United States Army, Army Reserve or National Guard while pursuing a regular college degree.
Army ROTC is available through The Johns Hopkins University Department of Military Science. Scholarships are available. For further information, contact the JHU Department of Military Science at 410-516-7474.
Air Force Reserve officer training is available at the University of Maryland, College Park. When participating in the four-year program, students attend classes at College Park once a week. Juniors and seniors may complete the two-year program by attending a four-hour weekly session at College Park. For more information, call the Office of Air Force Aerospace Studies at UMCP at 301-314-3242.
Imaging Research Center (IRC)
Students have the opportunity to enhance their education by taking part in the visual arts department Visiting Artist Program. Throughout the year, a mix of prominent and emerging artists visit the department to present their work, attend classes, etc. Presentations are open to the public. Past artists include Vito Acconi, Carolee Schneeman, Fred Wilson and Janine Antoni. The Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture exhibits contemporary art by nationally known artists. Students have the opportunity to exhibit their works in an annual exhibition. The Imaging Research Center (IRC) is a state-of-the-art facility combining research, education and professional training in animation and computer visualization. The IRC’s student internship program provides advanced students with opportunities to work on actual 3-D animation projects and develop a portfolio of work. In coordination with the Shriver Center’s cooperative education and internship program, advanced-level visual arts majors may obtain internships at area firms and companies in design and production disciplines related to the student’s field of study. Student Organizations. Filmmakers Anonymous is a student-run group providing an open forum for cinematic arts students, as well as others interested in the field of cinema. Filmmakers Anonymous offers the opportunity to share ideas and experiences and to show work in a critical, yet supportive, environment. American Institute of Graphic Arts (AIGA) Baltimore Student Chapter is a student-run organization which fosters a community for graphic design students in the visual arts department. It organizes programs relevant to design and visual communications issues. The Visual Arts Council of Majors (ARTCOM) meets on a regular basis to discuss issues and develop programs relevant to visual arts majors.
Accelerated Bachelor’s/Master’s Programs
Students interested in pursuing an accelerated bachelor’s master’s degree program should make their intentions known to the appropriate graduate program director. This is usually done early in the junior year, although some programs allow earlier admission. Completion of the Accelerated Bachelor’s/Master’s Program application form is required at that time; the form is available on the Graduate School Web site, www.umbc.edu/gradschool. Follow the link for current students under the topic forms. The Accelerated Bachelor’s/Master’s application is the first form on the list.
An undergraduate may apply to participate in an accelerated program even if the desired graduate program is in a department other than the one in which the student is majoring.
A major advantage of this program is that it enables the student to double count up to nine credits toward both the bachelor’s and master’s degrees. If admitted, the student follows a prescribed course of study in which a maximum of nine credits of graduate-level courses may be taken as an undergraduate and counted later toward the master’s degree. They may be enrolled on either a part-time or full-time basis.
Students must apply and be admitted to the Graduate School at least one semester prior to the completion of bachelor’s degree requirements. There will be no retroactive admissions to the program once the student has received the bachelor’s degree. The Graduate School application fee of $50 is waived for students applying to this program.
The bachelor’s degree may be awarded after successful completion of bachelor’s degree requirements (usually at least 120 credits); master’s degree requirements depend upon the individual program, but a minimum of 141 total credits are required for both degrees.
This program is selective. Students must have at least a 3.0 GPA to be considered, and some programs have more stringent requirements. The Graduate Record Examination usually is waived for applicants in this program; some graduate programs waive other application requirements, as well (e.g., letters of recommendation). If admitted, students must develop with the graduate program director a plan of study for the remainder of their undergraduate career. Students in these accelerated tracks must continue to be in good academic standing throughout the course of their studies.
A student admitted to the program may be allowed to take a break between the bachelor’s and master’s careers, but the graduate courses taken as an undergraduate must be “used” toward the master’s degree within five years.
Once students are admitted to Graduate School and are enrolled, they must complete a Transfer of Credit form to transfer up to nine graduate credits taken as an undergraduate into the master’s program. Note that only the credits are transferred, not the grade received.
No more than one master’s degree may be earned through a combined bachelor’s/master’s degree program.
Collegiate Summer Institute, Summer Bridge Program (CSI)
CSI@UMBC is a summer bridge program designed for students interested in getting a head start on their college experience. During this six-week program, participants have an opportunity to earn four to seven credits, learn what it takes to be a successful student, and discover the UMBC campus and the surrounding area. Students also participate in the University’s “Introduction to an Honors University” (IHU) seminar which is designed to address transition issues as well as support students in developing the skills needed to reach their academic goals. During the IHU portion of the class, students become familiar with the many resources and opportunities that UMBC offers. Although the summer bridge program has an academic focus, CSI students participate in interesting on- and off-campus activities in which they get to know each other - creating a peer support system that last well beyond the summer experience.
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