Hosea 11:1-4 - “When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called my son. But the more they were called, the more they went away from me. They sacrificed to the images of Baal and they burned incense to idols. It was I who taught Israel to walk,taking them by the arms; but they did not realize it was I who healed them. I led them with cords of human kindness, with ties of love. To them I was like one who liftsa little child to the cheek,and I bent down to feed them.”

Hosea shows us that God feels, that his heart can be broken and is broken, that he feels pain, the pain of a deserted parent. The story of God and his people is this story. This part of that story recounts God loving a child whom he has adopted. God rescues and delivers his son out of slavery. But this son rejects him and runs away from him. And the more God calls to him, the farther he runs.

In the time of Hosea, God’s people were not living as God’s people. The sacrifices were outwardly getting done, but they weren’t genuinely worshiping him. Idolatry was rampant, treating God like another Baal. They didn’t want to have and be in a real relationship with God, but rather chose (tragically) to worship “things” that are “easier” to deal with.

The story continues, recounting how God affectionately raised this son, teaching him to walk, taking him by his arms. We see the tenderness of God, his fatherly heart. The one who is like a parent who lifts their toddler up to their face, who stoops down to be closer to them, to heal to them, to feed them.

Today, let’s come to the one who relates to us and loves us like this. Let’s be excited and in awe of his (words can’t fully describe) heart for us. Let’s pray for ourselves and our churches, that our Father’s tender, sure love would keep breaking through in our lives and others’ lives we share with; that his fierce, pursuing love would even more bring his healing and rescue in our lives and others’ lives we share with, beyond what we can ask or imagine.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rRKrxxHpFYQ

-AP

In recent months, as the U.S. presidential election has approached, concerns over email hacks and the security of voting systems have frequently appeared in the news. Rick Forno, assistant director of the UMBC Center for Cybersecurity and director of the Cybersecurity Graduate Program at UMBC, recently described to WYPR’s Sheilah Kast that voting machines are just one part of a system that has concerning vulnerabilities.

“I think we have to separate the issue between voting machines and the overall voting process, because the two are related but have very different threat and vulnerability characteristics,” said Forno, who is particularly interested in the voting process and technologies used to collect data, as well as how that data is collected, counted, and reported.

A voting machine might report votes to a laptop across the room at a polling location, and that computer might then share data from the single polling place with a computer in a regional or state hub to be aggregated. In this scenario, Forno wonders how the laptop—as one small but crucial piece in the full chain of data transfer—is protected.

Data can be corrupted at moments when it is moving, and also when it is stationary, he says. “You’re looking at a range of security concerns that start with the individual voting machine in the voting booth, all the way up through the systems that officially record and report out the outcomes of an election.”

Voting machines include computers and other hardware that need to be maintained on a regular basis, much like computers that people use at work or at home. Forno warns that not regularly updating the technologies used in voting systems, can give hackers and researchers the opportunity to identify weaknesses and potential vulnerabilities in those systems.

Listen to the full segment “Cybersecurity and the Ballot Box” on the WYPR website.

In a half-century, UMBC has graduated more than 70,000 people, and the university’s alumni have gone on to rewarding and impactful careers in the arts, humanities, social sciences, and STEM. “That has been the story of UMBC,” said President Freeman A. Hrabowski in an interview on Maryland Public Television, just ahead of UMBC’s 50th anniversary. During the network’s Education Spotlight week, Hrabowski discussed with Jeff Salkin UMBC’s success since it opened its doors in 1966, as well as important national education issues, including diversity and paying for college.

“People marvel at the quality of education here,” Hrabowski told Salkin. “We are one of the top institutions in innovation, and we have redesigned courses,” he said. “We give students chances to work in labs, but also in companies and school systems, and people get great jobs.”

Many students at UMBC today are the children of people who attended institutions in the University System of Maryland and found successful careers, he noted, sharing, “What American families see when they come to college is that people who complete those experiences are able to get better jobs and are able to take care of their families.”

President Hrabowski also offered advice for students on how to make the most of their college experience, particularly visiting the “Career Center and attending career fairs beginning in the first semester of freshman year.” Emphasizing the importance of internship opportunities, he said, “There are wonderful experiences and opportunities in the Baltimore-Washington corridor, we just have to expose the students to them and they will do well. The challenge is to make sure they take advantage of the opportunities.”

The lessons students learn at UMBC prepare them to contribute to society in meaningful and significant ways, Hrabowski continued, describing that it is important for students to go outside of their comfort zones and learn how to work with people different from themselves, to become “people who can serve as a bridge in explaining the problems.”

“What we need in America is the opportunity to talk to people different from ourselves, to remember to listen, to open our ears and our minds and our hearts, and to solve the problems,” Hrabowski said.  

UMBC’s 50th anniversary was featured in several news outlets, including:

Why College Rankings Are a Joke (The New York Times)
UMBC’s Puppy Parade (The Baltimore Sun)
UMBC 50 Anniversary Celebration (The Baltimore Sun)
Over 50 years, UMBC has cultivated a research mission from former pastures (The Baltimore Sun)
UMBC celebrates 50th anniversary (The Baltimore Sun)
A Catonsville university turns golden (The Baltimore Sun)
At age 50, UMBC just getting started (The Daily Record)

Image: Dr. Hrabowski, September 2016. Photo by Jim Burger.

After a series of stops and starts in her pursuit of higher education — up to and including marriage and children — Carrie Cleveland graduated from UMBC this past May with a degree in social work. During her time here, Cleveland was the recipient of multiple scholarships made possible by the Charlotte W. Newcombe Foundation, including the Susan Bernstein-Charlotte W. Newcombe Memorial Scholarship for returning students in the social work field. The Newcombe Foundation provides support to students over the age of 25, and has helped over 5,000 UMBC students achieve their goals since 1981.  In her own words…

“What I appreciated about these awards is that these scholarships were meant to help a student who had additional challenges. Trying to manage three young kids while in school is challenging. I have the expenses of a working person, like daycare, but not the income that is needed to help pay for those expenses. These scholarships helped me to be able to afford my tuition and the cost of care for my children while I took classes or was in my social work field placement. If it was not for these funds, I would have had to take out more loans to cover the cost of care for my children. I am so appreciated of scholarships that look at not just the student, but their unique circumstances as well…
“[After graduation,] I will be attending University of Maryland, Baltimore as an advanced standing student at the School of Social Work. My clinical field instruction will take place at a school for middle schoolers who are federally classified as emotionally disabled.”

Read more about Carrie Cleveland at UMBC News.

After a series of stops and starts in her pursuit of higher education — up to and including marriage and children — Carrie Cleveland graduated from UMBC this past May with a degree in social work. During her time here, Cleveland was the recipient of multiple scholarships made possible by the Charlotte W. Newcombe Foundation, including the Susan Bernstein-Charlotte W. Newcombe Memorial Scholarship for returning students in the social work field. The Newcombe Foundation provides support to students over the age of 25, and has helped over 5,000 UMBC students achieve their goals since 1981.  In her own words…

“What I appreciated about these awards is that these scholarships were meant to help a student who had additional challenges. Trying to manage three young kids while in school is challenging. I have the expenses of a working person, like daycare, but not the income that is needed to help pay for those expenses. These scholarships helped me to be able to afford my tuition and the cost of care for my children while I took classes or was in my social work field placement. If it was not for these funds, I would have had to take out more loans to cover the cost of care for my children. I am so appreciated of scholarships that look at not just the student, but their unique circumstances as well…

“[After graduation,] I will be attending University of Maryland, Baltimore as an advanced standing student at the School of Social Work. My clinical field instruction will take place at a school for middle schoolers who are federally classified as emotionally disabled.”

Read more about Carrie Cleveland at UMBC News.

• President: Chidera Agwu
  
• Vice President: Courtney Campbell
• Secretary: Elena Schwengel
• Treasurer: Allie Meadows
• Public Relations: Alicia Khan
• Event Coordinator: Jacob Mohammadi

Folks, this frog isn't done yet.

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http://www.breitbart.com/tech/2016/09/27/adl-adds-pepe-the-frog-meme-to-hate-symbol-database/

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The Pepe the Frog character did not originally have racist or anti-Semitic connotations.  Internet users appropriated the character and turned him into a meme, placing the frog in a variety of circumstances and saying many different things.  Many variations of the meme became rather esoteric, resulting in the phenomenon of so-called "rare Pepes." 

The majority of uses of Pepe the Frog have been, and continue to be, non-bigoted.  However, it was inevitable that, as the meme proliferated in on-line venues such as 4chan, 8chan, and Reddit, which have many users who delight in creating racist memes and imagery, a subset of Pepe memes would come into existence that centered on racist, anti-Semitic or other bigoted themes.

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http://www.adl.org/combating-hate/hate-on-display/c/pepe-the-frog.html