Brick making is an inherently pay-it-forward process, says Marian April Glebes, M.F.A. ’09, a conceptual and mixed-media artist. In the past 10 years of her Mobile Community Brick Factory & Monument project, Glebes has made thousands of bricks and then invited community members to imprint their stories into the clay. Later, the bricks are used in mobile monuments around Baltimore City and beyond. Glebes, who won the 2025 Rubys Alumni Award through the Robert W. Deutsch Foundation for this work, asks: How can we support social and spatial change in order to build a new kind of community-driven monumental public space?

I come to historic preservation by way of my M.F.A. in imaging media and digital arts (IMDA) from UMBC—with an additional masters degree in city and regional planning and historic preservation from the University of Pennsylvania—my home in Baltimore City, and by making bricks as public art. As an artist, a preservation planner, a homeowner, an educator, a gardener, and a community and economic development practitioner, all of my research and methods investigate how we make a place and how a place makes us.

In 2015, I was the inaugural artist-in-residence at the Baltimore Museum of Art’s Patricia and Mark Joseph Education Center. The Robert E. Lee and Stonewall Jackson Confederate monument still stood across from the BMA’s Spring House in Wyman Park Dell in the Charles Village neighborhood of Baltimore. Aligning with and inspired by protest in support of social and civic justice movements, The Mobile Community Brick Factory & Monument operated within these complex intersections.

Almost a decade later, my camera was the only familiar thing at Baltimore City’s Department of Transportation facility on a frigid dawn in November 2023. I held it tightly as if it would prove to signify my role in providing archival documentation of a monumental move. The temperature had dropped to a mere 22 degrees, but the top-secret site was teeming with activity while the project was just beginning. 

“I like to do an easy one first,” the director of field operations says. But with the removal of any Confederate monuments, these or other “monuments to hate,” there is no easy one.

In the back corner of a DOT storage yard, I watched as the historical record was made and unmade, as preservation theory and practice was suspended and turned on their side, as conservation techniques and concepts were followed to the letter and simultaneously reinvented, starting with the Roger B. Taney statue. 

Baltimore’s contentious monuments shipped out to a storage facility near St. Louis on their way to Los Angeles for an exhibition at The Brick (formerly LAXart). In Baltimore, I stayed with the problem through a project I started a decade ago—creating a countermonument out of personalized, handmade bricks. 

Memory is mutable. Social contexts shift. This is the wicked problem in living heritage and what to do when it dies. I’ve had a unique position with singular access to process and understand this ongoing debate in Baltimore City while unofficial researcher-in-residence at the Commission for Historic and Architectural Preservation (CHAP). Each community is unique in its response on what to do with their Confederate monuments, and Baltimore’s perspective is vital to the discourse. Eric Holcomb, the former director of CHAP, invited me to the conversation, positing that perhaps it could or should be for the arts and artists to influence this unfolding preservation conundrum.

At UMBC, as M.F.A. candidates, our artwork was considered research—and therefore had to be contextualized and placed within the canon. To work responsibly, we were encouraged to know our audiences and our references and understand our place in time. Inspired by the people and places of Baltimore and by conceptual art’s blurring-of-art-andlife thinking of the 1960s, The Mobile Community Brick Factory & Monument maintains the ethos of rigorous research, material gravitas, and community connection engendered by my IMDA studies. Existing in the contexts of the Baltimore Uprising, the 2017 monument removals, social practice art, and civic engagement, I interrogate our circumscribed understandings of monumentality.

Monuments exist in social contexts that have often changed dramatically since the time they were created. Because of this, their meaning does not come only from the objects themselves—or only from how people view them—but from the shifting relationship between the two. The counter-monument was birthed by artists in Germany after the fall of the Berlin Wall and has not been widely accepted or brought into practice. In 2017, as monuments were being removed from our public spaces, artists again began erecting counter-monuments in protest of white supremacy.

The Mobile Community Brick Factory & Monument is centered in process, people, and making. To date, we have engaged over 15,000 people in Baltimore, made over 2,500 unique bricks, and collected over 1,000 personal stories from Baltimore residents. The Mobile Community Brick Factory & Monument is a new kind of monument, a monument not to the past, but a monument as an act of collective power that anticipates what will come to be.

The Mobile Community Brick Factory produces handmade bricks using local hand-processed clay and historic water-struck methods. This means of brickmaking is an inherently pay-it-forward endeavor—the bricks made one day are destined for someone else’s future hands. Participants personalize and inscribe their stories onto these bricks—words and messages about place, power, home, and experience. These story bricks are woodfired and become The Mobile Community Brick Monument, an ongoing series of exhibitions that create shared spaces.

While the bricks become pathways, garden beds, benches—some are embedded in sidewalks in Baltimore—I collect oral histories from brick constituents through ethnographic methods. In Baltimore, over 150,000 people have visited The Mobile Community Brick Monuments, finding connections to stories that are like their own.

At The Mobile Community Brick Factory & Monument, we believe ordinary voices matter, especially those that aren’t usually heard, that public space should be built by the people who use it, that heritage is alive, memory is mutable, and history is ongoing—made by daily lives. Our bricks represent pasts, presents, and futures that would otherwise remain untold and unwitnessed, built, shared, and spoken by urban residents. All are welcome and included in the process—a different kind of monument—a living space that honors the past and is built collectively by the people who live in and use our cities.

—Marian April Glebes, M.F.A ’09

Welcome to a special Fall Break edition of the Provost’s Perspective. In this edition I want to highlight a few areas and efforts that I am particularly grateful for as we come to the home stretch of the semester – in particular, related to our commitment to shared governance and supporting our community.

Faculty compensation has been a consistent concern since I arrived at UMBC. I am excited to announce that a faculty-led compensation committee has been formed and met this week to start actively examining our faculty compensation and make recommendations. I am grateful for the efforts of Kelly Coleman, Christopher Correnti, Frank Ferraro, Amy Froide, Anupam Joshi, Jeannette Kartchner, Doug Lamdin, Daniel Lobo, Ana Oskoz, and Brad Peercy for their work in helping to ensure we have competitive and equitable compensation for all faculty.

I also want to express my gratitude for the long fall break that begins on Wednesday. The academic calendar change, made in coordination with the Faculty Senate and the university administration, is a great opportunity to recharge and reset as we head into the final month of the fall semester.

Packed Arts Weekend on Tap

Each week my goal is to both inform and highlight different aspects of the UMBC community. This week I would like to shine a spotlight on the outstanding work being undertaken in the Department of Music. Each semester, more than 200 students participate in 15 groups, ensembles, bands, and choirs that perform locally, regionally, nationally, and internationally. 

This week is a particularly packed period. I encourage you to find a performance and support our artists. A few highlights this weekend include:

UMBC Gamelan Ensemble

Friday, November 21, 5 p.m.

The Music Box

The Department of Music presents the UMBC Gamelan Ensemble under the direction of Michelle Purdy. The ensemble performs on a central Javanese gamelan (a gong-chime orchestra of Indonesia), and also on a Balinese gamelan angklung (one of many types of gong-chime orchestras from the island of Bali, Indonesia).

More Information

UMBC Jazz in Concert

Saturday, November 22, 3 p.m.

Linehan Concert Hall

The Department of Music presents UMBC Jazz in Concert, featuring the Jazz Guitar Ensemble, the Jazz Small Groups, and the Jazz Ensemble, under the direction of Tom Baldwin, Tom Lagana, and Matthew Belzer.

More Information

UMBC Percussion Ensemble

Sunday, November 23, 1 p.m.

Linehan Concert Hall

The Department of Music presents the UMBC Percussion Ensemble under the direction of Dustin Donahue in a concert of music by William Duckworth, Philip Glass, Fritz Hauser, JLIN, and Yousif Sheronick.

More Information

UMBC Camerata: Through Perspectives INjustice

Sunday, November 23, 7 p.m.

Linehan Concert Hall

The Department of Music presents the UMBC Camerata under the direction of Lulu Mwangi Mupfumbu. Its program Through Perspectives INjustice, featuring works by Joel Thompson and Jarrett Roseborough, will explore the critical social justice issue of police brutality and its far-reaching effects on society, with a particular emphasis on its impact on youth of color.

More Information

Coffee with the Provost: Thursday, Dec. 4

Come join me for a cup of coffee or tea Thursday, Dec. 4, from 10-11 a.m. in the Fireside Lounge in The Commons (third floor near the Skylight Lounge). This come-and-go hour is a great opportunity to connect in a casual, non-programmed setting. I look forward to seeing many of you there and our conversation together.  

Fireside Lounge, The Commons

New Faculty Spotlights

Each week we feature the newest faculty members of our community.

Yiwen Hu, Assistant Professor, CSEE

Areas of Research/Interest: My research areas include wireless communication (5G and beyond), network security, and mobile systems, with a recent focus on innovating next-generation emergency (9-1-1) services.

Fun Fact About Yiwen: I’m a pet lover. I have a French bulldog named Chocolate. The name might seem risky, but it’s to remind her not to eat chocolate and to inspire her to live a healthier life!

Myoung Eun Pang, Assistant Teaching Professor, MLLI

Areas of Research/Interest: Language and identity 

Fun Fact About Myoung: Maryland is the fifth state I’ve lived in since moving to the U.S.

Are you a new faculty member? Please take two minutes to fill out the form and submit your bio if you have not already done so.

New Staff Spotlights (Coming Soon)

Are you a staff member who joined UMBC in the last year? Email Aaron Burnett, director of provost communications, to be featured in an upcoming edition of the Provost's Perspective.

Help Make this Newsletter Better

The goal each week of this message is to deepen our connection to UMBC, whether that is learning about an upcoming event, a divisional accomplishment, an innovative program, or an  update from the Office of the Provost. If you know of a program or event that should be highlighted, please share it here.

Until next week, 

Manfred van Dulmen

Prof. Houbing Song, UMBC

11:15-12:45 EST, Tue Nov 25, 2025, UMBC ITE 325b and online

From the Center for Social Justice Dialogue Directors

For some, the holidays are a season of joy, connection, and shared traditions. For others, they can be emotionally demanding, a careful dance around long-standing tensions, lingering conflicts, polarizing political disagreements, or generational wounds. A friend once told me, "I love my family, but three hours is all I can manage." Many of us prepare strategies, invite "buffers," or brace ourselves just to get through the meal.

Holiday tables have always held complexity. This year, though, many of us are feeling the weight of that complexity more intensely than ever.

As directors of UMBC's Center for Social Justice Dialogue, we want to offer our Retriever community tools to navigate this season with grounding, compassion, and intentionality. Whether you're entering difficult conversations about identity, politics, justice, or family history, the competencies of dialogic community building—critical self-reflection, cultural storytelling, generous listening, and loving accountability—can help guide your steps.

Here are some tips, tools, and practices to consider. 

Care + Critical Self-Reflection

Before we enter dialogue, we begin with ourselves. Critical self-reflection calls us to look inward at our identities, experiences, triggers, the stories we carry, and the assumptions we bring to the table.

Ask yourself:

• What am I feeling in my body as I anticipate this gathering?

• What topics or comments tend to activate strong reactions in me?

• What boundaries do I need to hold to maintain my well-being?

• How can I show up in ways that contribute to community care?

Radical self-care reminds us: you can opt in to dialogue, and you can opt out as an act of protection and love. If a conversation becomes unsafe, dehumanizing, or overwhelming, it is valid to pause or walk away. Your well-being matters.

Community care reminds us: how we show up impacts others. Our presence, tone, boundaries, and choices can contribute to a safer, more compassionate environment, even when disagreements arise. Community care invites us to hold ourselves with compassion and to consider the collective well-being of those around us.

Cultural Storytelling: Sharing Truths and Lived Experience

Dialogue deepens when we share the stories that shape us, not to prove a point, but to build understanding.

Cultural storytelling invites you to:

• speak from your own experiences rather than speak about others,

• connect present tensions to personal and community histories,

• illuminate the values, traditions, and identities that shape your worldview.

This practice helps shift conversations away from abstraction and toward authenticity.
It also supports relational connection—"Here is where I come from, and here is how it shapes what I believe."

Generous Listening & Practicing Generous Questioning

Generous listening is the heart of dialogic community building. It requires vulnerability, patience, wonder, and the willingness to pause your assumptions to consider someone else's perspective truly.

This kind of listening sounds like:

• "Help me understand how you came to that belief."

• "What experiences shaped that view for you?"

• "I hear your intention. Can we talk about the impact?"

Generous questioning invites deeper reflection rather than defensiveness. It widens the possibility of connection, especially across difference.

Loving Accountability: Offering Truth With Care

Dialogue doesn't mean avoiding conflict; it means engaging conflict with compassion and clarity.

Loving accountability includes:

• naming harmful language or behavior with respect and honesty,

• recognizing when someone's disagreement denies your humanity,

• setting boundaries without shaming,

• aligning your tone and words with your values.

You can say:

• "I want to stay in this conversation, but I need us to slow down."

• "That comment felt hurtful to me. Can we talk about why?"

• "Your intention matters, and so does the impact."

As James Baldwin reminds us, we can disagree and still love each other—unless that disagreement denies our right to exist.

Loving accountability holds us all to a higher standard, not to win, but to grow.

When You Are Triggered: Return to Your Body

If you feel overwhelmed, flooded, or frozen:

1. Breathe deeply to reconnect.

2. Body scan: Where is tension showing up?

3. Name your reaction if you want:

• "I'm noticing I'm having a strong reaction right now."

4. Pause the dialogue if needed.

5. Re-enter or step back based on what your well-being requires.

This is part of loving accountability, to both yourself and the relationship.

After the Dialogue: Ground, Reflect, and Replenish

When the conversation ends, ask yourself:

• What emotions linger in my body?

• What did I learn about myself?

• What support or community care do I need now?

• What joy practices can help me reset?

Choose rest. Hydrate. Journal. Move your body. Connect with people who affirm your dignity and wholeness.

In Community, With Courage

As you move through this holiday season, remember that dialogue is not about perfection. It is about showing up with intention, curiosity, and heart. Whether you are leaning into connection or protecting your peace, you remain part of a community dedicated to justice, equity, and humanity.

May you find moments of grounding, clarity, and care wherever you gather.

In community,

Ciara and Jasmine
The Center for Social Justice Dialogue Directors
UMBC | Division of Institutional Equity
#UMBCtogether #SocialJusticeDialogue

Dear Colleagues,

We would like to share an upcoming IRS rule under the SECURE 2.0 Act that may impact how you make retirement contributions.

What is changing?
Beginning January 1, 2026, employees who are age 50 or older and who make catch-up contributions to the USM Supplemental Retirement Plans will be required to make those contributions on a Roth (after-tax) basis if they earned $150,000 or more in wages from USM during the prior calendar year. Roth contributions grow tax-free, and qualified withdrawals in retirement are tax-free.

Who is impacted?
You will be affected by this change if all the following are true:

• You will be age 50 or older in 2026, and
• You elect to make catch-up contributions, and
• Your 2025 wages from USM are $150,000 or more.

Employees who earned less than $150,000 in the prior year may continue to make catch-up contributions on either a pre-tax or Roth basis, depending on plan options. This change applies only to catch-up contributions. Your regular retirement contributions are not affected and may continue to be made on either a pre-tax or Roth basis, depending on plan options.

Eligibility for the 2026 Roth catch-up requirement is based on wages earned in the 2025 calendar year.

2026 IRS Contribution Limits:

Contribution Type and 2026 Limit

• Standard Employee Contribution (Under 50)-$24,500
• Catch-up Contribution (Age 50+)-$8,000
• Enhanced Super Catch-Up (Age 60-63)-$11,250

What are catch-up contributions?

Catch-up contributions allow employees age 50 or older to save additional money for retirement above the regular annual IRS limits.

What do impacted employees need to do?

If you are affected, beginning in 2026, your catch-up contributions will automatically be treated as Roth (after-tax) contributions.

• No action is required at this time. Your Roth catch-up contributions will be identified separately within your retirement account.
• Because Roth contributions are made after taxes, impacted employees may see a difference in take-home pay.

If you wish to make a change to your deferral because of this update, you can review or change your contribution elections at any time through the Retirement@Work portal.  Your elections can be updated at any time during the year and will apply to future pay periods.

Contribution changes apply only to future pay periods and cannot be applied retroactively.

Participants in the Maryland State Employees Supplemental Retirement Plan (MSRP)
If you also participate in an MSRP plan, you will receive additional information directly from Empower, the plan's recordkeeper, explaining how SECURE 2.0 will apply to your MSRP contributions.

Why is this happening?
This change is required by federal law (SECURE 2.0 Act, Section 603) and applies to all employers that offer 401(k), 403(b), 457(b), and similar retirement plans.

We will keep you informed
Please look for additional information about this change from TIAA, Fidelity or Empower. If you have questions about catch-up contributions or your retirement plan elections, please contact HRBenefits@umbc.edu