Frank Reeves ’86 invented the Rage Cage, a portable regulation lacrosse goal.

Inventing the Rage Cage

One might call Frank Reeves� invention � the Rage Cage� the �laptop� of the lacrosse world. That is, he has taken the heavy and cumbersome standard NCAA lacrosse goal and transformed it into a portable regulation version, which teams easily can set up, break down and transport. In three years, Reeves� Severn, Md.-based company, First Goal, has sold 500 Official Rage Cages and has pre-orders for 20 Rage Cage Practice goals, a less expensive spin-off of the official version, which is perfect for the backyard.

This former UMBC lacrosse player�a 1986 information systems management alumnus who worked at NASA-Goddard and several high-tech companies as a systems administrator before becoming an inventor�doesn�t plan to stop with lacrosse goals; he sees soccer, street hockey and water polo in his future. Reeves also hopes to apply his patented joint technology (the mechanism that makes the goals collapsible) to other arenas including road signs and M.A.S.H. tents.

Read more alumni profiles at www.umbc.edu/generations.

 
Taryn Bayles gets freshmen excited about science through competitive, hands-on projects.

Making Engineering Exciting

If you�re strolling across the UMBC campus and happen upon a catapult contraption flinging water balloons across a field or homemade hot air balloons floating high above the Engineering and Computer Science building atrium, be sure to look for Taryn Bayles.

Bayles is an energetic and inspiring lecturer in UMBC�s Department of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering who specializes in getting freshmen excited about science through competitive, hands-on projects.

Three years ago, Bayles came to UMBC and began teaching ENES 101 � Introduction to Engineering Science. In addition to class lectures, Bayles ends each semester with a competition that puts theoretical principles into some fun, real-life use.

Bayles prides herself with coming up with a new contest each year. To date the competitions have revolved around human-powered water pumps, water balloon catapults and model hot-air balloons. The idea being that formulas and physical laws are easier to understand when students are using them to do something fun —  launching projectiles at a target, or seeing whose mini hot-air balloon stays aloft the longest.

�I like to have my students build things,� Bayles says. �The freshmen are always very creative. They come up with innovative things that a senior may not have thought of.�

Bayles likes to be hands-on as well, even making herself the target for the final stage of the water balloon catapult contest this spring. She also makes sure the materials are inexpensive, use only simple tools and require very little technical background since all the competitors are just starting out in college.

Bayles� passion for making science education fun goes beyond her own classes. Since coming to UMBC, she has worked with Anne Spence, a lecturer in mechanical engineering and Claudia Morrell, director of planning and grants at the Center for Women and Information Technology, on four National Science Foundation grants for engineering education outreach.

One grant puts UMBC students in area high school science classrooms to give hands-on engineering demonstrations. Another project is developing a CD-ROM of engineering based algebra lessons to help high schools comply with a new Maryland law making algebra a required course. Other grants are funding a video project on women and technology and scholarships for computer science and engineering students.

�These grants work two ways,� Bayles says. �UMBC students get class management skills from teachers while the teachers get engineering knowledge from the students.� Bayles also teaches courses in Chemical Engineering Analysis, Transport Phenomena II and has taught a summer course for high school teachers and guidance counselors to help them better use engineering principles in their classrooms.

Bayles’ commitment to her students doesn�t end when they graduate. She often uses her extensive private sector background to help former students find summer jobs with industry leaders like DuPont. �I encourage all of my students to do research at another university or a summer internship so they can be sure they want to pursue a career in engineering,� Bayles says.

When she�s not working hard as an advocate for science education at UMBC, Bayles� top priority is her two children. But even at home, it�s tough to take the engineer out of the mom. Bayles is proud that, in addition to being very involved in the PTA, she also regularly teaches hands-on science classes at her children�s elementary school.

 
UMBC’s Ram Hosmane is the 2002 Maryland Chemist of the Year

Maryland Chemist of the Year

UMBC chemistry professor Ramachandra “Ram” Hosmane was named the Maryland Chemist of the Year by the Maryland division of the American Chemical Society in a ceremony on December 11 in Towson.

Hosmane, a faculty member at UMBC for 20 years, was honored for his career contributions to biomedical research, including the development of anti-cancer and anti-viral drugs as well as for creation of a powdered, artificial blood mix for use in emergency transfusions.

Hosmane is the third UMBC chemist to be named Chemist of the Year since the Society began giving the award in 1962. “This award is well-deserved recognition for the outstanding contributions that Ram Hosmane has made to synthetic and medicinal chemistry.” says Ralph Pollack, UMBC chemistry department chair and professor.

“I was surprised and shocked to win this honor,” says Hosmane. “I thought had little chance of winning it considering the fact that the nominations come from all over Maryland, including academia, industry and government.”

Hosmane’s recent breakthroughs include development of bulkier and leaner
forms of the natural building blocks of genetic material, nucleosides and nucleotides. The compounds have shown potential to fight against cancers including prostate, breast, lung, leukemia, colon, skin, kidney, brain and ovarian. The compounds also show promise against a dozen different viral infections, the major ones being hepatitis B and C, West Nile and herpes.

Hosmane’s artificial blood invention holds promise as a universal substitute for whole blood during emergency transfusions. The artificial blood requires no typing or cross-matching, is free of bacteria or viruses and is storable as a dry powder for indefinite periods of time. It can be carried to the scene of accident and administered as a buffered salt solution in water without having to transport the patient to the
nearest hospital.

Since joining the UMBC faculty in 1982, Hosmane has contributed well over a hundred original research articles in peer-reviewed, international scholarly journals and he is also the author of a half-dozen patents and disclosures on a variety of themes. He has been continuously funded since 1984 by both federal agencies and industrial partnerships. In addition to his research endeavors, Hosmane has trained
more than 75 scientists from all over the world, including undergraduate and graduate students, postdoctoral fellows, visiting scientists and visiting professors.

Two years ago, Hosmane won the “Outstanding Educator of the Year” award from the Maryland Association for Higher Education (MAHE). He was the UMBC Presidential Research Professor during 1998-2001, and has been the Provost’s Exceptional Sponsored Research Fellow ever since that program was initiated at UMBC.

 
Scott Bass, dean, and Janet Rutledge, associate dean, UMBC Graduate School

On a Mission to Support Women and Minority Graduate Students

On December 5, UMBC was honored by the Council of Graduate Schools (CGS) for its efforts to build a comprehensive, supportive environment for women and minority graduate students.

�There has been a 50 percent rate of attrition for doctoral students at U.S. graduate schools over the past 20 years�and among minority students, this figure is even higher,� said Scott Bass, dean of the UMBC Graduate School, as he accepted the CGS/Peterson�s Award for Innovation in Promoting an Inclusive Graduate Community at the Council�s annual meeting in Washington, DC.

�We must diversify and support our graduate student population for the nation to remain a world leader in science, engineering, and technology,� Bass said. �I�m receiving this award today on behalf of the entire UMBC community. This is at the core of our academic mission.�

UMBC, one of Newsweek’s hottest schools in America, has earned national acclaim for its comprehensive support for minority science and technology undergrads. The university is best known for its Meyerhoff Scholars Program. Founded in 1988, the program regularly sends large numbers of minorities on to advanced studies in science, technology and engineering at such institutions as Harvard, Stanford, and MIT. The scholars are among the best in the nation, many of whom turn down scholarship offers from Ivy League schools in favor of the personal attention they receive at UMBC.

Now Bass and Janet Rutledge, associate dean of UMBC�s Graduate School, are on a mission to expand that comprehensive approach to graduate students. �UMBC has done a tremendous job at the undergraduate level, so we�re primed to do the same at the graduate level,� Bass says.  

Rutledge, the first African American female to receive a Ph.D. from Georgia Tech�s electrical engineering program, knows firsthand the challenges minority Ph.D. students face. �There�s a feeling of invisibility,� says Rutledge, who concentrated on the scarcity of minority science Ph.D.�s as program director in the Division of Graduate Education at the National Science Foundation prior to coming to UMBC. 

Hrabowski, Bass and Rutledge preach the mantra of better mentorship between faculty and graduate students as the key to getting more minorities and women to excel in science, math, engineering and technology graduate programs. �I�m a product of the national minority engineering education movement of the 1970�s,� says Rutledge. �There was a big emphasis on mentoring. If we�re to achieve the diversity we�re looking for with graduate students, we must mentor.�

Rutledge sees the two-year award from as a big step towards drawing national attention to the problem and hopefully spreading the comprehensive model to other U.S. campuses.

Earlier this year, Rutledge was instrumental in landing a $2.5 million grant from the National Science Foundation to establish the Maryland Alliance for Graduate Education and the Professoriate (MAGEP), a consortium of universities led by UMBC that includes the University of Maryland, College Park and the University of Maryland, Baltimore. MAGEP seeks to expand the principles of UMBC�s Meyerhoff Program throughout other disciplines to build graduate student recruitment, mentoring and professional development statewide.

Bass and Rutledge point out that the UMBC faculty is dedicated to the mission as much as they are. Michael Summers, the only Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator in Maryland and winner of the 2000 Presidential Award for Excellence in Science, Mathematics and Engineering Mentoring, recently volunteered to expand the Meyerhoff graduate biomedical program. Summers started with two minority students and has since grown the program to include 31 students across six departments.

�Our faculty sees this opportunity to be unique in the nation, and they have seized it,� Bass says. �At other campuses, often this type of mission is peripheral; you�ll see an office of minority affairs on the side somewhere. But here, as administrators, we�re just responding to faculty who really want to do this. They�re saying �Give us the tools and we�ll do it.� �

 
Heather Rhodes ’02 is completing her master’s in chemical and biochemical engineering.

Nurturing Engineering Talent

A few months into her new job as a chemical engineer, Heather Couvillon Rhodes, a May 2002 UMBC graduate, easily sums up her enthusiasm for her new profession: �Engineers have the opportunity to take knowledge and apply it to real-world problems.� Rhodes is employed by the Department of the Army, Aberdeen Proving Ground.

In fact, Rhodes began applying the knowledge she learned in favorite subjects such as math and science to real-world problems long before graduation. As a co-op student at the Indian Head Naval Surface War Center, she worked to design rockets, warheads and rocket launchers for the U.S. Navy.

�In high school I was good in math and science and it was a natural for me to major in engineering,� says Rhodes. She received full-ride scholarships from UMBC, Cornell and Virginia Tech. She chose UMBC for its proximity to co-op and career opportunities in Baltimore and Washington.

When Rhodes came to UMBC she found supportive mentors and female role models in the sciences. Jill Randles, the 2002 recipient of the UMBC President’s Commission for Women Achievement Award, was Rhodes� engineering advisor her first two years at UMBC. �She supported and challenged me during what was a very challenging first semester academically. She was the rock that held many of us together,� says Rhodes.

Rhodes founded WISE (Women in Science and Engineering) at UMBC to encourage and support other women in science and engineering fields. The organization helps students connect with professionals in the field through talks and networking. �Many women and girls don�t know about engineering,� explains Rhodes. �My advice is to follow your natural interests; connect with successful engineers through groups such as WISE. They can be a resource and source of inspiration for you.�

�Taryn Bayles [chemical and biochemical engineering lecturer] continues to be an inspiration for me,� says Rhodes, �I�m completing my master�s in chemical and biochemical engineering through UMBC�s combined bachelor�s/master�s program, and her door is always open to students.�

Rhodes credits undergraduate research experiences and faculty mentors for nurturing her talent for problem-solving. She conducted an independent research project on an imaging system for pressure-sensitive paints in Assistant Professor Lisa Kelly�s (chemistry and biochemistry) lab. Rhodes presented her findings, which will have applications in aerospace, aviation, automobiles and medicine, at UMBC�s Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement Day.

�Professors at UMBC really care about students�how they think and how they solve problems� says Rhodes. It�s this initiative and these problem-solving skills that impress Rhodes� supervisors in her new job and current undergraduate engineering students. She currently serves as an advisor to Alpha Sigma Alpha sorority members.

What are Rhodes� future plans? After she completes her master�s degree this December, she is considering applying her knowledge to an M.B.A. program or law school. �I�d like to develop my management skills while staying technical,� adds Rhodes.

 
Brian Maguire is a visiting assistant professor and director of distance learning in the Department of Emergency Health Services.

On the Front Lines of Emergency Response

When faced with a medical emergency, the last thing most of us think about is the potential dangers for the medical personnel who respond to our call for help. An innovative new study, led by UMBC�s Brian Maguire, shows that emergency medical services providers face a number of unexpected risks every day.

Maguire, a visiting assistant professor in the Department of Emergency Health Services, took on the project after finding that there were no existing statistics on occupational safety among EMS personnel. �There was no database to document job-related incidents of death, injury or illness for EMS workers,� says Maguire. �We had to collect all the data from various state and local agencies and create our own database to analyze the long-term trends within the collection of isolated incidents.�

While Maguire�s study is ongoing, Maguire and his colleagues have released the first findings of their study, which report the occupational fatality rate among EMS providers, in the December issue of the Annals of Emergency Medicine. Based on the data in their study, Maguire estimates that the occupational fatality rate for EMS professionals is comparable to that of police officers and firefighters. Transportation incidents account for the largest portion of these work-related deaths; assaults are also a common cause of occupational fatalities among emergency medical responders.

As surprisingly high as these fatality rates may seem, Maguire says that these estimates are conservative. �We are often working with only small amounts of information,� explains Maguire, �We can usually only document cases that connect illness or injury to a specific event, which means that, at the very least, we�re certain to have missed any number of long-term health problems that might not be apparent immediately.� Ultimately, Maguire and his colleagues hope that their efforts to collect data on the number of work-related illnesses and injuries for EMS providers will result in a comprehensive evaluation of occupational safety within the profession.

In the meantime, Maguire�s work is certain to have significant impact on the next generation of emergency responders. Maguire also serves as EHS�s director of distance learning and oversees the department�s innovative online Management Studies master�s degree. Now in its fifth year, it was UMBC�s first distance education program. Approximately 70 students are enrolled; many are already active in various fields of emergency medical services management across the United States and abroad.

 
Building an engaged community is what drives Patty Perillo, director of student life at UMBC.

Strengthening the Campus Community

Growing up in a family of eight siblings and 80 first cousins has made a profound influence on Patty Perillo. �One of the fundamental lessons learned growing up as a child was the value of community,� she says. And with most of the family still living within five miles of one another, there is no excuse for missing a Sunday family dinner � or Tuesday game night.

Building an engaged community is what drives Perillo, the director of student life at UMBC. When she is not busy organizing Homecoming activities, advising one of 170 student organizations or running a leadership retreat, you will find her out talking one-on-one with UMBC students � who greet her affectionately as Patty.

�Students need a place to connect both formally and informally,� says Perillo. �UMBC students are bright, active, promising, thoughtful, challenging and they have fun in very different ways. We�ve been deliberate in creating experiences for students that they can connect with on their own level. It�s a model that hasn�t been built before.�

Perillo is the chair of the Student Involvement Council Programming Committee, a group developed to address the issues of student life on campus and the university�s need for campus-wide community events. �I�ve seen a real institutional change since I�ve started working here,� says Perillo. �Administration, faculty and staff are personally invested in the co-curricular lives of the students; and students are creating a place they will be proud to come back to as alumni. It�s a collective, synergistic relationship,� says Perillo. �As a campus, we are all in the midst of building lasting traditions at UMBC. It is a very exciting time.�

Along with her tightly knit staff in the Office of Student Life, Perillo continues to make life-long influences on UMBC students and the community. Programs such as the September 11 Project, LeaderShape, Into the Streets and Welcome Week are designed to foster student success from the developmental level. �What I want to do is support and enhance the learning experience of our students � to take what they learn in class and help them to apply it to every day situations,� says Perillo. �We�re all helping to shape the leaders of tomorrow.�

Perillo holds a bachelor�s and master�s degree in college student personnel from the University of Delaware and earned a Ph.D. in Public and Community Health from the University of Maryland, College Park. Her doctoral dissertation focused on the study of college student drinking behaviors.

 
Jim Bembry is an associate professor of social work.

Teaching from Experience

As if nearly 20 years of teaching and scholarship weren�t enough, Jim Bembry brings a lifetime of experience to future social workers in his classroom.

Bembry, an associate professor of social work, now realizes that his interest in the field began during his own childhood growing up in a tough Philadelphia neighborhood. �At one point, I got into enough trouble to be sent away for over a year,� he says, �During that time, I met a teacher who gave me a lot of wise advice and helped me learn that I couldn�t fight my way through everything.�

Bembry took that advice to heart and soon put his life back together. A few years later, while a junior majoring in sociology at the College of the Holy Cross in Worcester, Massachusetts, he was offered an opportunity that confirmed his interest in helping other young people overcome the same difficulties he faced in his own childhood. He volunteered to work with troubled students in Worcester�s public schools, where he served as a part-time counselor for three to four schools, meeting with several students at each school. �I couldn�t have been very effective,� says Bembry, reflecting on the experience, �but the kids came to school on the days that I met with them and that was a definite improvement.�

After graduation, Bembry worked for two years as a residential counselor at a facility in Virginia before returning to school for a master�s degree in social work from Temple University. His field placements at Temple included time spent teaching undergraduates, but he was a practicing social worker for seven more years before he began teaching full-time.

Bembry began teaching at UMBC 16 years ago while finishing his doctorate at the University of Maryland, Baltimore. He currently teaches the methods courses in both practice and research for social work majors–a combination that even he admits is unusual in his field.

Melding theory with experience and practice, however, has been a hallmark of Jim Bembry�s career. His research continues to examine how to address the needs of underserved and at-risk young people. Currently, he is leading an evaluation of a state program that promotes discussion between state agencies that provide services for children and youth. The program�s directors hope that Bembry�s evaluation will allow them to obtain long-term federal funding that will allow them to offer more coordinated state responses to issues such as school safety and adolescent pregnancy.

CSEE Professor Penny Rheingans and her colleagues in the Graphics, Animation and Visualization Lab (GAVL) combine art and computer science.

 
UMBC Presidential Teaching Professor Robert Deluty is a clinical psychologist and published poet.

The Poetry of Experience

As a clinical psychologist, Presidential Teaching Professor Robert Deluty has devoted his adult life to exploring the workings of the human psyche. Recent years, however, have seen his work take a more creative turn. In addition to being a researcher, psychotherapist, and award-winning mentor, Deluty is also a poet whose work has appeared in publications such as The Baltimore Evening Sun and The Wall Street Journal.

Psychology is Deluty�s first passion and his research interests have ranged widely throughout the course of his career. In his graduate work and early years at UMBC, he explored the development and treatment of aggressive and submissive behavior in children. He now focuses on how clinical psychologists treat their patients, from  ways of assisting clients in making moral and ethical decisions to the influence of religious beliefs on approaches to therapy.

Deluty began his creative writing career almost  11 years ago when his wife encouraged him to write about a deeply personal event from his own life � the moments leading up to the arrival of his second adopted child. �We were waiting for our son to arrive from Korea,� he recalls, �and it led me to think about my relationship with my own father, who had passed away several years before.� This experience led to an essay that, much to Deluty�s surprise, was published in The Baltimore Evening Sun.

He turned to writing poetry after a failed attempt at an essay evolved into a publishable poem. He has since published over 500 poems in a variety of publications, including his book, Within and Between, released in 2000. Deluty�s poetry takes many forms, although he most frequently writes in a Japanese poetic form called senryu. Senryu share the same structure as haiku, but, unlike haiku, usually describe human subjective situations and are often satiric, pathetic, or ironic. Like his first essay, much of his poetry comes directly from his own experiences with his family and work.

Deluty�s creative endeavors have not stopped his work in psychology. In fact, his latest research finds common ground within the two fields. In a recent article published in the Journal of Poetry Therapy, Deluty explores the common processes and goals of a psychotherapist and a writer of haiku or senryu poetry. �The psychotherapist and the senryu writer share characteristics such as the desire to bring about new awareness or insight in their audience and the need to be absolutely genuine in the feelings and attitudes they express,� says Deluty. �My writing has made me a better psychotherapist and my work as a psychotherapist has made me a better poet because these common goals and processes reinforce each other in all aspects of my work.�

Click here to read Robert Deluty�s poetry.