“Jurassic World Rebirth,” the latest installment in the blockbuster movie franchise, is out Wednesday, going back to its roots with a high-stakes adventure to a remote tropical island. And streaming on PBS now is the newest iteration of "Walking With Dinosaurs,” a BBC series that brings viewers into the lives of six species, mixing footage of scientists on digs around the world with animated sequences imagining how they lived. 

Each Spring, the Office of Undergraduate Studies hosts a year-end celebration and reception to honor the accomplishments of its faculty and staff.One of the highlights of the ceremony is the presentation of the Donna B. Hamilton Teaching Awards. The Donna B. Hamilton General Education Teaching Award recognizes extraordinary teaching in a General Education course across the whole university based on undergraduate student nominations. The Office of Undergraduate Studies recognizes two faculty members for excellence in teaching each year: one faculty member teaching in an Undergraduate Studies Program, and one faculty member teaching in a General Education Program.

Liam Driver ’27 shouted in excitement as he picked up a shard of rock out of orange clay and ironstone on an exposed gray hillside.As his classmates gathered around him, he held out his hand, revealing a sliver of bone in the center of his palm. “That blueish part is what gave it away” as a fossil, he said.It might have been part of a now-extinct species of lungfish 115 million years ago that, per its name, could also breathe outside of the water. It’s one of many animals and plants that once thrived in a lush early Cretaceous waterway that’s now an unassuming excavation site, tucked away at the end of a long drive of warehouses and office buildings in Laurel, Md.

Civic Engagement Across the Curriculum at UMD (CEAC at UMD), a pilot professional development program, supported 12 instructors, including several College Park Scholars program directors and staff, from seven schools and colleges as they integrated community-focused strategies and experiences into more than 20 courses serving over 1,000 students, in disciplines as varied as art, kinesiology and sociology, during the fall and spring semesters. College Park Scholars in the CEAC at UMD 2024-25 Cohort:

Another of the Scholars founders has passed on. Beth Pattison, who was key to developing the College Park Scholars administrative infrastructure, died December 23, 2024. Beth served as an associate director in Scholars from 1994 until her retirement in 2003.

The tiny, two-toed fossil footprints made by an unidentified dinosaur species some 100 million years ago and preserved in a slab of rock in South Korea are thought to have been made by a raptor no bigger than a modern sparrow. What stumped paleontologists was the animal’s enormous stride; the unknown raptor’s footprints had larger gaps between them than expected for such a diminutive dinosaur.“This guy is dinky—one of the smallest dinosaurs that we have fossils of,” said University of Maryland paleontologist and Science and Global Change program director Thomas R. Holtz Jr.

Clinical Professor and Levenson Family Professor Susannah Washburn, who is also the program director of the Public Leadership Scholars program, was recently honored with the Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Teaching by the Office of Undergraduate Studies Programs.

Nicholas Fletcher, a lecturer in the University of Maryland’s Department of Biology, has been appointed director of the College Park Scholars Life Sciences program.“We are delighted to welcome Nick Fletcher to College Park Scholars and Life Sciences. Nick is a creative and caring teacher whose commitments to hands-on learning and inclusive community align perfectly with core Scholars values,” said College Park Scholars Executive Director Marilee Lindemann. “We look forward to working with him to extend the proud legacy of Scholars Life Sciences in exciting new directions.”

The University of Maryland's Office of International Affairs (OIA) recently honored Stacy Kosko, program director of International Studies (IS), as the inaugural recipient of the Outstanding Global Classrooms Faculty Award.A decade ago, Kosko launched UMD’s first global classroom on human rights with Tel Aviv University. Her commitment to, and success in this pilot served as the inspiration for scores of UMD faculty to participate in the Global Classroom Initiative (GCI). Today, UMD can boast more than 70 global classrooms involving universities around the world. Global classrooms have now become embedded in the curricular fabric of the university is now offered by every school and college on our campus.

In March 2024, the inaugural Provost’s Do Good Innovator Awards winners were announced. Out of 57 faculty named, Dr. Sarah Kilmer and Dr. Justine DeCamilis of the College Park Scholars program were rewarded for their joint work on the Terps Community Mentors program (TCM). Piloted in 2021, TCM builds bridges between first-year International Studies (IS), Justice and Legal Thought (JLT) students, and Afghan refugee families at the Parkview Garden Apartments in Riverdale. In the three years since its debut, these College Park Scholars students now routinely visit the Parkview Garden Apartments in Riverdale—cleaning up creeks and streams, donating meals, distributing school supplies and fostering big brother/sister relationships with the young children around the complex.