ARE YOU READY TO ROCK THE RAC????

3:00-4:00pm on the RAC Stage- URCAD headliner...

Fever Dream

UMBC rock band featuring:

Dr. Jeffrey Lieps (Professor, Biological Sciences)

Dr. Stephen Caruso (Teaching Professor, Biological Sciences)

Ryan Bacon (6th year PhD student in Biological Sciences)

Elana Frazier (1st year PhD student in Biological Sciences)

Ginevra Imberti (Biochemistry undergraduate student)

Claudia Gualtieri (Manager)

And join us at the URCAD afterparty on Thursday, April 23 at 7pm at

Fish Head Cantina

4802 Benson Ave

Halethorpe, MD

URCAD is this Wednesday, April 22 in the RAC:

URCAD.umbc.edu

URCAD Selfie Contest and Graffiti Wall

For URCAD 30 we are throwing back to 1997 where it all began!

Students are encouraged to “tag” the graffiti wall, take selfies, and post to social media. Lots of fun accessories! Bring your friends and family! Bring your mentor! Open to all attendees! The most creative entries win!

Location: RAC Track

Take a selfie at URCAD and upload it to URCAD social media or email it to aprilh@umbc.edu (by 4/24) to enter to win a gift card to the UMBC Bookstore!

Categories are:

Best Overall Selfie ($100)

Best Selfie with Your Mentor ($50)

Best Selfie with Your Presentation ($50)

Best Selfie with a Family Member ($50)

Best Selfie with Graffiti ($50)

URCAD is this Wednesday, April 22 in the RAC:

URCAD.umbc.edu

Join us for the Alumni Keynote Speaker and Luncheon at URCAD!

Karena Ingram ’16, Music Composition

Composer and Marketing Manager, Baltimore School for the Arts Foundation

Noon – 1 p.m., RAC Stage
Welcome by Provost Manfred van Dulmen
Introduction by Dr. Lisa Cella, Chair and Professor of Music

Karena Ingram is a composer based in Baltimore, Maryland. Beginning her career after graduating the University of Maryland, Baltimore County in 2016 with a degree in music composition, her chamber ensemble and symphonic works have been performed regularly throughout the United States, Europe, and in television and video games. Most recently, her work RAINN (2025) was premiered by the Memphis Symphony Orchestra, commissioned by the Virginia B. Toulmin Foundation Orchestral Commissions Program, an initiative of the League of American Orchestras in partnership with the American Composers Orchestra (ACO). She has been commissioned by the UMBC Ruckus ensemble (2023), Baltimore CenterStage’s production Life is a Dream (2023), and the ACO as a part of their Connecting ACO Community virtual series (2022). Described as “…stunning” and “… beautiful musical depictions of nature…” (Symphony Number One), Ingram’s music is reputable for its imaginative use of color and textural exploration. Ingram has worked for several non-profit arts organizations, at the Baltimore Choral Arts Society, has worked as a digital marketing associate at the Walters Art Museum, and is currently Marketing Manager at the Baltimore School for the Arts Foundation. While a student at UMBC, she worked with mentors Dr. Linda Dusman and Dr. Anna Rubin and presented her research at URCAD on the Baltimore-based composer, CK Barlow and her influence in the field of electronic music.

Ingram's RAINN musically represents the statistic that every 68 seconds an American is sexually assaulted. "Approximately every 68 seconds, the audience will be forced to feel that break and rebuild through music...I write to honor those who have been foced to break down, grieve, rebuild, and endure."

URCAD is Wednesday, April 22 in the RAC. For the full schedule of events, see:

URCAD.umbc.edu

Presenters: Amanda Negrete, Kristen Sauder , Rachel Fonder, Michael Moore, Ryan Whitfield, Adrian Jovel , Leila Cron

Title: “MouseHouse”- interactive video game

 Mentor: Eric Jordan, CSMC, Visual Arts

Location: RAC Arena Floor

Created in a Team-Based Game Development class, Mouse House is a game that explores both three-dimensional environments in collaboration with 2D character style developed in the Unity game engine. The game utilizes and explores Unity gravity mechanics and a first-mouse point of view as you maneuver around enemies that can affect the player’s health using mechanics like radial enemies and fright systems through Unity C# Scripts. Playing as a mouse, Mouse House reimagines everyday household objects at a massive scale, transforming ordinary spaces into immersive and dynamic environments. A 3D environment was constructed with Autodesk Maya to provide an intricate world full of ample hiding spaces, and player interface and 2D assets were created in Krita and edited in Adobe Animate to create a hand-drawn sense of whimsy to contrast the large and harsh environment the player must maneuver. Development of this game provided for a uniquely engaging collaborative experience that allowed for cross-discipline exploration of programming, visual design, and overcoming challenges in a team-based setting.

URCAD is Wednesday, April 22 in the RAC:

URCAD.umbc.edu 

Museo Garifuna Sawaina in Context: Honduran Neoliberalism, Anti-Colonial Ethnographies & Garifuna Celebrations of Life

Presenter: Bryan Castro-Velez, Bernardo Guerrero, Museo Garifuna Sawaina

Mentor: Sarah Fouts, American Studies

RAC 230 | 2:55 – 3:10 p.m.

A modest community museum on the northeastern coast of Honduras works beyond preservation and instead actively nurtures Afro-Indigenous cultures, realities, and celebrations of life. Contrasting western institutions, Museo Garifuna Sawaina exhibits transformational conceptions of cultural institutions and ethnographic practices led by Afro-Indigenous people in rejection of appropriation, extraction, and taxidermy. My research ultimately reflects upon mestizaje concealing neocolonial developments through the privatization and censorship of public institutions and education. This is a collaborative project that centers and contextualizes Museo Garifuna Sawaina’s community-centric model within its sociopolitical and economic environment, exploring Museo Sawaina as a transformative Honduran institution, with Director Bernardo Guerrero as a co-facilitator. Critical participatory action research, accompaniment and formation analysis will be the primary methodologies to prioritize intellectual ownership to the Garifuna pueblo of Limon, Honduras. I will directly assist in a community-developed project in this contextualization, including subsets, and co-produce a storytelling deliverable (ie. Story/Map, Storytelling Circle). This public-facing component ultimately connects Museo Garifuna Sawaina with the growing international presence of community museums and their efforts to ensure Afro-Indigenous communities remain the rightful stewards of their (hi)stories, traditions, and land.

This work was funded through the Orser Center for Public Humanities.

URCAD is Wednesday, April 22 in the RAC:

URCAD.umbc.edu

Voyages: Chapter Seven

Presenters: Michael Duffy, Christian Price-Burnett
Mentor: Nigel Semaj, Theatre

Special Exhibit, 2 – 2:30 p.m., RAC Upper Track, First Floor

The National Aquarium provides an annual residency wherein local Baltimore artists create a focused performance piece supporting the Aquarium’s mission of awareness and compassion for nature. In collaboration with Submersive Productions, we researched and developed choreography to portray the interaction between flowing water and marine life. We discussed our personal emotional connections to ocean life, participated in guided improvisation exercises, and explored emergent ensemble movement behavior from simple choreographed rules; with this, we developed a vocabulary of movement, both in terms of dance and character physicality. This vocabulary synergized with puppeteering, costumes, projections, and sound to create a cohesive and immersive audience experience. The research culminated in a one-night performance throughout the Aquarium, directly welcoming the audience as part of the experience. We gained exposure to collaborative devising practices, interdisciplinary methods of embodied storytelling, and the unique challenges of site-specific theatre.

This work was funded, in part, through an Undergraduate Research Award from the UMBC Division of Undergraduate Academic Affairs.

URCAD is Wednesday, April 22 in the RAC:

URCAD.umbc.edu

Did you see the academy award winning film Sinners?  Come hear Phoenix' critical take on this and more!

Conceptions of Blackness: A Fantastical Re-Imagining of Black Heroism and Villainy

Presenter: Phoenix Gordon
Mentor: Sharon Tran, English

Oral presentation: RAC 106 | 10 – 10:15 a.m.

This study examines constructions of Blackness in relation to pain. I explore how Black heroism is accompanied by pain and whether it is still revolutionary when removed from it. The notion that Black people do not feel pain has been used to justify their dehumanization/villainization. Black presence in White-dominated spaces has birthed many polarizing categorizations of Blackness: “the good” versus “the ghetto”; “not Black enough” versus “Black enough.” Such distinct labels render Blackness only acceptable when gentrified by the removal of pain, and uncouth when backed by the acknowledgement of it. I analyze how Black creatives intervene in these narratives by engaging in textual analysis of historical and contemporary depictions of Blackness, informed by critical race theory, through film, television, and literature. By focusing on Colson Whitehead’s The Nickel Boys, Misha Green’s Lovecraft Country (2020), and Ryan Coogler’s Sinners (2025), I consider realist iterations of Black pain and how they are reconstructed through fantastical elements. When coupled with wizardry and vampires, I argue that audiences gain a whole new perspective of understanding Blackness, power, and oppression. These works recreate the Black “hero” and “villain” into multidimensional beings who do not exist solely in hardship, or as victims.

URCAD is Wednesday, April 22 in the RAC:

URCAD.umbc.edu

Visualizing Enforcement: ICE Activity and Community Response in Maryland

Presenter: Andrea Quispe, Sondheim Scholar
Mentor: Tamara Bhalla, American Studies

Oral presentation: RAC 230 | 11:40 – 11:55 a.m.

My capstone research and public humanities project in American Studies examines the chronological escalation of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) activity in Maryland through the creation of a digital timeline. The digital timeline visualizes how enforcement has heightened over the past two years using two forms of public recording: social media and mainstream news media. This presentation examines how social media functions as an information network for the Maryland Latinx community compared to mainstream media news coverage to understand how different platforms decide what counts as urgent and shareable. While mainstream media prioritize large-scale enforcement stories, social media circulates localized warnings and “know your rights” resources. Using content analysis of ten Maryland-based Facebook group posts and three mainstream news coverage sites, this project will uncover the differing criteria and purposes that go into publishing community encounters with ICE. This digital visualization not only brings attention to the ongoing realities of enforcement, but also demonstrates how Maryland communities have responded by creating rapid communication networks to protect one another.

URCAD is Wednesday, April 22 in the RAC:

URCAD.umbc.edu

Aircrafts by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics chapter at UMBC, Design, Build, Fly (DBF) and Student Unmanned Aerial Systems (SUAS) teams

Presenters: Shrikant Bhatnagar, Kalel Kai, Ben Bazarsuren, Daniel Shin, Jonah Malcom, Austin Wagener, Nebiyu Mammo, Murali Indukuri, William Vandenberg

Mentor: Joseph Washington, Mechanical Engineering

Students will display the prototypes of their aircafts on the RAC track throughout the day.

The American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics chapter at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County was created to address the absence of a formal aerospace engineering program on campus. Without dedicated coursework in aeronautics, many students had limited ways to explore a field that plays a central role in transportation and national security, and engage in fascinating research. In response, the chapter built an experiential pathway into aerospace through student-led competition teams. At the core of this effort were the Design, Build, Fly (DBF) and Student Unmanned Aerial Systems (SUAS) teams, where students took ownership of the full engineering lifecycle. From early design concepts to manufacturing, systems integration, and flight testing, members engaged in the development of unmanned aerial vehicles for international competitions. Students experienced aerospace theory through processes that mirror those used in professional aerospace development. Members strengthened not only their technical abilities, but also their capacity for teamwork, documentation, and leadership under real constraints. Over time, this approach positioned UMBC’s teams as the leading undergraduate-led aerospace competition groups in Maryland, demonstrating how experiential learning can meaningfully expand access to aerospace education.

This work was funded by UMBC SGA, UMBC Mechanical Engineering Department, UMBC COEIT, Northrup Grumman Corporation.

URCAD is Wednesday, April 22 in the RAC:

URCAD.umbc.edu

Free copies of the 2026 edition of the UMBC Review will be available at the table on the RAC track, 1st floor during URCAD: April 22 in the RAC!

The UMBC Review is a peer-reviewed publication, completely directed by UMBC undergraduate students. All of the articles published in the UMBC Review go through a rigorous peer review process. The Review is indebted to the anonymous off-campus faculty reviewers who volunteer their time to assure the high quality of our publication. We are proud to produce the publication in print format. The Review offers a rewarding opportunity to get your undergraduate research published in a peer-reviewed academic journal. Submit your paper by August 17, 2026: umbcreview@umbc.edu

2026 Editors:
Parvata Kirthivasan
Senior CAHSS Editor

Phoenix Bryant
Senior STEM editor

Diane Esteban
Junior CAHSS editor

Yonu Akanji
Junior STEM Editor

Sonia Pivovarov
Student Designer

Ian Anson
Faculty Advisor

Laura Schraven
Staff Advisor

Table of Contents

01 Veronica Goonan
In Democracy We Trust? How Strong Leadership, Partisan Distrust, and Confidence in Elections Influence Political Satisfaction Among Rural Americans

02 Corey Bryce
Maryland State Bill 83, Public Health – Overdose and Infectious Disease Prevention Services Program: Critical Analysis and Advocacy Efforts

03 Lilli Malone
The Salem Witch Trials: How the Hunt for Witches Led to Disaster

04 Siskind Oshry
Edogawa, Nakahara, and Dazai:  The Influence of Western Literature on Japanese Authors in the Early 20th Century 

05 Rishika Bandi
Breathable Shake Flasks for Improved Cancer Cell Culture

06 Beryl Fuamazeh
Evaluating the Relationship Between Frequency of Family Visits and Happiness Levels Among Older Adult Residents in Retirement Homes

07 Amal S. Aulakh
Human-Centered Design for Science Education: UX Insights from Synthetic Biology Wiki Interfaces

08 Ramsha Chaudhary
Assessing the Effect of Language Barriers on the Perception of Care Received by Spanish-speaking Patients in Baltimore, MD

09 Maia Turman Cooke
Resilient Hearts: Theoretical Portrayals of Lauryn Hill’s Self Love & Resistance Against Intimate Consequences

Apply to be a student editor for the next edition by emailing: umbcreview@umbc.edu

URCAD is Wednesday, April 22 in the RAC
URCAD.umbc.edu