Information On Umbc, Please...

Colleges and Universities A-Z University of Maryland - Baltimore County
1

<p>My son received a brochure from UMBC today and we'd like more information.</p>

<p>What is the surrounding area like? What is in walking distance from campus?</p>

<p>Is housing guaranteed for all 4 years?</p>

<p>What percentage of students stay on campus on the weekends? reading older threads, I get the impression that it may be a commuter school.</p>

<p>The brochure states that UMBC is an Honor's College. Obviously not so, but has honor's programs. UMCP is more well-known (at least OOS) but is it more prestigious? </p>

<p>Any info on OOS merit $$$$?</p>

<p>How are the advisors? How often do they meet with students?</p>

<p>Average class size?</p>

<p>Any and all information is appreciated. Thanks in advance.</p>

2

<p>Well, I live in the surrounding area. Its a town called Catonsville and its a pretty nice place with restauraunt and shops, but it's not what you would call a college town. Alot of the college students go to Baltimore and there's plenty of stuff to do.</p>

<p>I'm not sure about guranteed housing, but I've never heard of anyone having any trouble getting housing.</p>

<p>UMBC is not as well known to the average person as UMCP, but recruiters from the area such as NSA, NIH, etc consider UMBC highly.</p>

<p>Here are the UMBC merit scholarships that I copied and pasted from the website. UMBC is known to be quite generous.
The following awards do not require a separate application:</p>

<p>UMBC Premier Award – $15,000 per year for in-state students and $22,000 per year for out-of-state students for four years.</p>

<p>UMBC Heritage Awards – $10,000 per year for in-state students and $15,000 per year for out-of-state students for four years.</p>

<p>President's Fellows – $5,000 per year for in-state students and $10,000 per year for out-of-state students for four years.</p>

<p>President's Scholars – $3,500 per academic year for in-state students and $7,000 per year for out-of-state students for four years.</p>

<p>Dean's Scholars – $2,500 per academic year for in-state students and $5,000 per year for out-of-state students for four years.</p>

<p>Students admitted to the Honors College are also eligible for consideration of the following awards:</p>

<p>Honors College Fellows – $15,000 per year for in-state students and $22,000 per year for out-of-state students for four years.</p>

<p>There are also some other scholarships such as Meyerhoff that require a separate application and I think you have to ask your guidance counselor to recommend you for it.</p>

3

<p>From what I've heard, there's about 30-40% who stay on campus, though according to the admissions spiel, that's been changing as of late and shifting towards a more residential based school. To answer another question, UMCP is more prestigious than UMBC, but, it must be said that UMBC is nevertheless a very, very good school. If you're looking for something smaller than College Park but not so small like an LAC, it's a pretty good bet.</p>

4

<p>As a recent UMBC graduate I think I can help. </p>

<p>UMBC is between two towns, Catonsville and Arbutus. Catonsville is nicer, with restaurants and music stores. Arbutus is a less desirable area. Unfortunately, it is nearly impossible to walk to Catonsville (no sidewalk, huge hill) and no real reason to go into Arbutus too often. Because UMBC was designed in the 1960's, the campus uprisings around the country had a large impact on campus design. "The Loop," a road that encircles campus, was designed as an easy way for police to lock campus down in the event of student protest and there are even secret tunnels beneath campus buildings so that police would be able to storm buildings in case of a student takeover (a la Berkeley). </p>

<p>With that said, around 70 percent of freshman live on campus. Many do leave on the weekends, up increasingly many are opting to stay. With conversations I have had with professors that have been at UMBC for a long time, many note that as early as 10 years ago school pride was non-existent. That is not the case now. </p>

<p>Some freshman classes can be rather large. But from what I understand that is the case at most schools. I found most of my professors to be very good (few bad ones). Professors and advisers are very accessible and willing to help. </p>

<p>The reason I chose UMBC over UMCP was the size (didn't want to feel lost in a huge sea) and emphasis on getting students into grad programs. I personally know many students who ended up in grad and professional programs at top schools such as Stanford, Umich, Cornell, Duke, NYU, Hopkins and Harvard. UMBC's emphasis is mostly on the sciences, but as a social sciences student I never felt like a second class student. </p>

<p>The “Honors University in Maryland” title is just a marketing ploy. In fact, it was always a joke between my friends and I at UMBC. As for which is more prestigious, neither is prestigious to be frank (I personally think that there are very few schools that can be called “prestigious”). They are both decent public universities, but UMCP is a much more famous name. But with that said, I think UMBC has a good reputation among college admission committees and many employers (especially locally). </p>

<p>I do not regret my decision to choose UMBC over UMCP. With that said, UMBC is not for everyone. Some people do really end up hating it. While if you are looking to party you can definitely find that, UMBC is never going to be a huge party school. </p>

<p>I hope I have been some help and good luck in your search for the right university.</p>

5

<p>Thank you for your great replies.</p>

<p>While searching for schools, there are so many unknown campuses that are discovered, and can be hidden treasures and a perfect fit for the right person. For my son, UMD is too large and I worry about the crime as reported on that CC thread. There certainly are pros and cons to every school to be taken into account. We are trying to come up with a good list of schools for my son to visit and then he can determine the fit and chose to apply or not.</p>

<p>Not having a town to walk to and the idea of so many students going home on the weekends is not a good idea for my OOS son.</p>

<p>In the meantime, our search continues. </p>

<p>Thanks again!</p>

6

<p>Thought I would post an article that is informative about UMBC for other people that might come across this thread:</p>

<p>Far From a Case Of Dogging It</p>

<p>By Thomas Boswell
Saturday, March 22, 2008; Page E01</p>

<p>RALEIGH, N.C. </p>

<p>With Georgetown leading by 18 points in the second half and a first-round victory in the NCAA tournament a virtual certainty on Friday, the fans of UMBC threw their Retrievers a bone.</p>

<p>Sorry, I couldn't help myself. How many teams have a Chesapeake Bay Retriever as a mascot? You've got to love it when the pooch holds out his huge, floppy ears and begs the crowd to knock him backward with a big cheer.</p>

<p>Actually, the yellow-and-black-clad fans of UMBC gave their spunky team a standing ovation for standing up to the second-seeded Hoyas, who had a half-a-foot-a-man advantage, and gave them fits during much of a dignified 66-47 defeat in a Midwest Region first-round game. </p>

<p>"Regardless of the result, I am a proud Retrievers believer," said UMBC President Freeman ("Mega Nerd") Hrabowski III, 57, who is best known for helping minority students succeed in science, technology, engineering and math. "To reach the NCAA tournament for the first time ever is wonderful for school spirit on our campus. Our students are so serious we need something to balance the academic climate. This is exactly how it should be."</p>

<p>Just how serious is UMBC? "How many college presidents have to tell their students to 'Go have some fun on the weekends. Stop studying so hard. Take part of Friday and Saturday off,' " said Hrabowski, who's run the school for 16 years.</p>

<p>For UMBC, days like this don't come around very often. Okay, never. Not in 41 years of existence, including 22 seasons in Division I. The only 7-footers on the 500-acre UMBC campus, located about five minutes from Baltimore-Washington Airport, are huge Kings and Rooks, which the pointy-headed-and-proud- of-it school displays on its quad-sized outdoor chess board during its celebration of Chess Week.</p>

<p>Oh, sure, chess week. Sometimes, the UMBC basketball team only dresses seven scholarship players -- "We have limited athletic resources," said Hrabowski -- but the school's chess team, one of the two best in the country, gets scholarships. Beat Harvard? Like a drum. On the same days that the basketball Final Four will hold the nation's attention in San Antonio, UMBC will host the collegiate Final Four of chess. I've got UMBC's No. 2 board, Katerina Rohanyan, the Kiev Killer, in my bracket.</p>

<p>Usually, UMBC wins competitions such as the Ethics Bowl (debate) or the Technical Bowl (National Society of Black Engineers) or receives praise for a diverse student body. But, once in a while, a handful of special athletes can pull a university that doesn't even have a football team into national sports prominence. That's what happened at UMBC, where a superb little point guard, 5-foot-8 Jay Greene, ignited a long-shooting, high-powered offense by dishing to a trio of 6-2 to 6-4 dead-eye gunners, Brian Hodges, Darryl Proctor and Ray Barbosa. No, they don't have a real center. And, of course, they can't beat Georgetown with 7-2 Roy Hibbert and assorted McDonald's High School All-Americans.</p>

<p>But, on days like this, when a No. 15 seed such as UMBC puts up a good fight, we're reminded why the first round of the NCAA tournament is both a hoot and a public service. Actual academic institutions receive a few days of the sunlight that are usually hogged in March by sports factories that think racquetball is a tough major. So, we learn that UMBC is big -- 12,041 students and a 500-acre campus -- and draws a quarter of its students from Montgomery County. After $400 million of construction in 10 years, UMBC now has three-quarters of its freshmen living on campus. And UMBC is smart, heavy in science and math, with a quarter of students scoring over 1,350 on the SATs.</p>

<p>"Our idea of theater is Samuel Beckett," Hrabowski said. Just to lighten things up after replaying a Karpov-Kasparov match? </p>

<p>Let's be clear: UMBC does not have an identity crisis. They know who they are. But, after 20 years of building the school's reputation in academic circles, they can be a little touchy that others have so little clue about who or what they are.</p>

<p>As the school's NCAA tournament media guide says, in a black box, "We are UMBC. The full name of our institution is University of Maryland, Baltimore County. We prefer to simply be called UMBC. Our full name has a comma between Maryland and Baltimore; please do NOT use a hyphen. Please do NOT call us Maryland-BC, UM-Baltimore County, Maryland-Baltimore, Maryland-Balt. Co. or Maryland (Baltimore County)."</p>

<p>So, someday it'll just be UCLA, USC and UMBC?</p>

<p>UMBC's edgy insistence on escaping hyphenation, abbreviation, excessive capitalization and all other forms of mistaken identity would be funny except that UMBC is typical of dozens of first-rate colleges and universities that never get a fraction of the recognition of the country's basketball powers. Get the Fisk Guide to colleges and see how many of the 65 teams that made the draw can match UMBC in academics. It's considerably less than half. But you know their names.</p>

<p>"They're a real scrappy team -- undersized, but they throw a lot of things at you," said Hibbert, who had 13 points and seven rebounds. "They play with a lot of heart, really contest everything all over the court," said Jonathan Wallace, who also scored 13.</p>

<p>Next season, four of five UMBC starters will return. But leave that to the future. This visit had its own authenticity. "We're the first to go to the Big Dance," said Barbosa, proud in defeat. "This put us on the map," said Proctor, who scored 16.</p>

<p>"I couldn't be more proud," Coach Randy Moore said of his America East champs. "Nothing can dampen this."</p>

<p>Just in case the Retrievers don't get back to the Big Dance for a while, remember the name. Comma, no hyphen. NOT Maryland-BC or UM-Baltimore County or Maryland-Baltimore or Maryland-Balt. Co. or Maryland (Baltimore County).</p>

<p>Just UMBC. If you see a 5-8 basketball star next to a 7-foot tall chess piece, you'll know you're there. </p>

<p>Thomas</a> Boswell - Far From a Case Of Dogging It - washingtonpost.com</p>

7

<p>Arbutus is about 6 blocks from campus. It has the Hollywood movie theater. Sorrento's best sub/pizza shop in town if I do say so myself. Umbc is close to the metro. So you can take day trips to D.C. I confess I'm biased. It's my hometown. Your close to the beltway which gives you access to all of Baltimore.</p>