UMBC is a independent offshoot of University of Maryland in College Park. It's autonomous, but still part of the University System of Maryland. It's located near the intersection of I-95 (Exit 47B, towards Maryland Route 166) and the Baltimore Beltway (I-695, Exit 12C to Wilkens Avenue West).

It's your typical technology themed and research-centric University for the Mid-Atlantic area. To the typical student, it can seem that most of the teachers aren't professors, but just part-time instructors or graduate assistants. All the professors are busy doing research, or there just aren't enough of them on staff to teach even the upper-level classes.

The school has been courting a large number of New Jersey and New York high school and transfer students, as well as foriegn transfers. The course enrollment system every semester is credit based, but many of these transfers get to keep a large majority of their credits intact. To people like me who have been working towards their degrees for a few years, having a large influx of unexpected competition for seats in upper level tech courses was highly annoying, so a lot of my group just left to go to work instead.

UMBC has very little on-campus social life, although the drug culture is pretty well establshed in the dorm areas, with a lot of Baltimore scene ravers swapping club drugs like Ecstasy. On some nights you could stand out on the porches and have your choice of what type of weed you want to purchase that night. I've been told this has changed due to some recent anti-drug law enforcement, but was certainly the case in 1998.

On the other side, the academic atmosphere borders on Corporate Indoctrination. With such tried-and-true methods as "Corporate Days" (now recently renamed to Corporate Visibility days) and the massive construction throughout campus of various retail facilities and corporate offices, sometimes it seems that most UMBC undergraduates have accepted their roles as simple numbers within the greater system.

October 9, 1999 - ARTSYS is a web page which lists which classes will be accepted for credit at UMBC at other University System of Maryland schools.

The campus is served by the UMBC Police Department.

Karen Hechinger, is the new full-time academic advisor for the IFSM department. She is located in room 452 of the Academic IV B-wing. And can be reached at (410) 455-3931, or by e-mailing khechinger@umbc.edu.

UMBC has been named one of a dozen "Hot Schools" by the Kaplan/Newsweek 2003 "How to Get Into College" guide, which hit newsstands across the country on August 26.

One of the more annoying things I experienced as an out-of-state UMBC student (and there were many) was the process of going from out-of-state to in-state resident once I moved here. After a year of residency I went to fill out the paperwork, and found that it asked a million different questions like how much did I spend on groceries a year. Do you know how much you spend on groceries a year? I didn't. The form went on for three more pages. I can't remember if it were followed by an interview or not, but I would guess that it was.

Frustrated by this process, I took one more class and stopped going.

About a year later on September 21, 2001, I decided to reinstate.

I talked to one of my advisors, Valerie Scott, via e-mail and she gave me some excellent instructions for getting reinstated.

I needed to call the Registrar at x3158, and see if I needed to apply for to apply for reinstatement. When you are not a student, you become inactive and must "reinstate" - even when you left in good standing and of your own accord.

Once I was reinstated, then I could register for Winter with no permissions - first come, first served - as it is run by special sessions. Then for spring, I needed to talk with the registrar about (with your reinstatement) a registration date - as students "fall out" of the early registration unless this is especially re-established.

Once that was all done, I'd be a "normal" student again.

I finally got everything together by May 7, 2002 after I found the forms for reinstatement quickly and easily on the UMBC website and filled out the two pages of information, including my Baltimore City address and checked a quick box marked "In-State Resident." I mailed off the form and started thinking about what classes I wanted to take in the Summer session.

About that time, Karen Hechinger announced via e-mail that she was the new full-time advisor for the IFSM department. I sent her a note to ask about making an appointment to figure out where I wanted to go from that point. She replied within a few minutes said I could work with whoever in the department I had worked with in the past and was comfortable with, but also referred me over to my "alphabetical" advisor, Amy Everhart.

I sent Ms. Everhart a note and told me at first that I'd have to have a conference to go over my grades with Tate Redding and see if I'd be let back in. I was surprised at this and asked her why. She said that if you get kicked out for poor performance they have to re-evaluate you on entry. Once she realized I quit on my own accord, and was just being re-instated as an administrative measure she agreed to give me a quick advisement by e-mail to accomodate my work and home schedule.

On May 9, 2002 after a flurry of e-mails back and forth she cleared me for registration, and recommended STAT 351 for my summer course, and to follow up with one of my necessary upper-level major classes, including an attempt at IFSM 436 again in the Fall semester. I signed up for STAT 351 with Anna Osmoukhina and scored a seat for myself and Steve Killen in the hiking class with Tom Rider for my first 1.5 Physical Education credits.

Two weeks later I received my approval from the Registrar welcoming me back to UMBC as a part-time, in-state student.

June 27, 2003: UMBC President Freeman Hrabowski announces proposed tuition rate increases of:

• In-state full-time undergraduates: $363 per semester
• Out-of-state full-time undergraduates: $567 per semester
• In-state part-time undergraduates: $30 per credit hour
• Out-of-state part-time undergraduates: $47 per credit hour
• In-state graduate students: $28 per credit hour
• Out-of-state graduate students: $52 per credit hour

That winds up being about $90 extra per class, per semester for me.

Take a look! UMBC Webcams are online.

Follow link to UMBC
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