ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-FIVE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM Wednesday, April 13, 2016
Ann Arbor, Michigan
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CAMPUS LIFE
‘U’ housing rate change larger than prior years ELIZABETH XIONG/Daily
University President Mark Schlissel speaks with students at the fireside chat in the Michigan Union Tuesday.
Mental health dominates discussion with Schlissel During fireside chat, students raise concerns with resources on campus
of Michigan President Mark Schlissel told students at a fireside chat on Tuesday. “We are working on ways to potentially open up a mental health clinic for students with very serious psychological and psychiatric disorders that would be within walking distance of the campus and that would be able to provide ongoing medical, psychological and psychiatric support,” Schlissel said.
By LUCAS MAIMAN Daily Staff Reporter
A new mental health clinic at the University of Michigan may be in the works, University
Schlissel’s remarks come in light of several speak outs, most recently on Monday, aimed at addressing issues of mental health on campus. The University also hosted a Twitter chat on Friday featuring Depression Center Director John Greden and other University officials to discuss mental health and sexual misconduct. Improving Counseling and Psychological Services
and overall mental health at the University dominated conversation during the fireside chat, which also was also attended by E. Royster Harper, Vice President for Student Life. Students present at the chat expressed multiple concerns about the availability of mental health services on campus. LSA senior Marlee Beckering said there is a lack of accessibility See FIRESIDE, Page 3A
Three-percent increase expected due to higher cost of living, ‘U’ says By BRANDON SUMMERSMILLER Daily Staff Reporter
The Residential Halls Association announced Tuesday that student housing fees at the University of Michigan will increase by 3 percent next year. The average on campus residence hall will cost about $10,870, according to the University. Housing costs for the 2015-2016 school year averaged $10,554. The increase is one percent more than the average University housing rate increase each year, which has been 2 percent every year since 2003. RHA hosted a presentation Tuesday for students to discuss their approval of the increased housing fees, noting that housing fees pay for a variety
STUDENT GOVERNMENT
CRIME
CSG reflects on successes, failures of year Charlton talks tenure while Schafer looks to body’s future By TIM COHN Daily Staff Reporter
Tuesday, newMICH members LSA juniors David Schafer and Micah Griggs were sworn in as president and vice president of Central Student Government, marking the end of LSA senior Cooper Charlton’s and LSA junior Steven Halperin’s terms in office. The Make Michigan party ticket was elected in late March 2015 by a margin of only five votes, defeating The Team’s ticket of then-LSA junior Will Royster and LSA sophomore Matt Fidel. The party ran on a campaign platform that included a number of initiatives to improve campus safety, such as introducing new safety-focused mobile applications and installing more
off-campus street lighting. Additionally, Make Michigan advocated increasing diversity on campus by revamping the course certification process for Race & Ethnicity requirements, improving diversity and inclusion training and connecting admissions offers with financial aid packages, as well as implementing a schoolwide honor code. Throughout Charlton’s tenure as CSG president, some of these goals were challenged by the University administration and, in the case of the street lighting, the city of Ann Arbor. In an April interview, Charlton said the goals often had to be redefined to address issues of relevance to the student body. Ultimately, many of the CSG resolutions and actions implemented throughout the year were in areas not heavily emphasized by the Charlton and Halperin ticket during their campaign. Over the past year, CSG pushed for policies like renewed student access to course evaluation data, early See CSG, Page 3A
of essentials but also help fund dorm renovations, as part of the Residential Life Initiatives. According to presenters, compared to other Big Ten schools’ housing fees the University ranked sixth most expensive both this past year and for the projected future. Ohio State University, Rutgers University and Northwestern University each had more expensive housing fees than the University, with Northwestern’s projected housing rate topping out at $15,412 for the 2016-2017 academic year. RHA adviser Beth Radecki, who is also South Quad Residence Hall’s Director, said she attended the discussion because she wanted to see the results of the organization’s work on behalf of the students they represent. “Housing rates typically don’t stay the same from year to year,” Radecki said. “I think they did a great job explaining where we fall within the different institutions and also talking about the reasoning, how we ended up there, too.” See HOUSING, Page 2A
Group calls for cameras on blue light telephones Students advocate for devices to aid in suspect descriptions, campus safety By IRENE PARK Daily Staff Reporter
ELIZABETH XIONG/Daily
LSA sophomore Victoria Rai presents her research on the transcription of RNA at the Honors UROP Symposium in Palmer Commons Tuesday.
Ceremony honors faculty, student research projects Jack Hu, VP for research, highlights importance of undergrad projects By LYDIA MURRAY Daily Staff Reporter
Faculty mentors were given awards and several students presented their various
research projects at the Honors Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program Mentor Awards and Top Oral Abstracts presentation to an audience of nearly 30 students, faculty and staff Tuesday. In past years the Honors UROP presentation has been incorporated into the UROP symposium, which will take place next Tuesday. This year, it was separated because of an issue with space inside the Michigan
Union, where the symposium is slated to take place. Vice President of Research Jack Hu told attendee that when he talks with alumni from across the globe, they often cite the incredible opportunities they had through UROP. “When graduates from Michigan come and talk with me, they don’t usually come and talk about football or coach Harbaugh,” he said. “One See UROP, Page 3A
Five University of Michigan students have started a petition to install cameras on the existing emergency blue light phones located throughout campus. As of Tuesday, 233 students have signed the petition. The petition was created on March 14, but was not heavily promoted until April 4, after the five students had a meeting with the Division of Public Safety and Security Associate Director Declan Lugin and police sergeant Gary Hicks to present and discuss their proposal. In the current blue light phone system, DPSS Communications Center is alerted if a call is made. An officer is sent to the location of the telephone when the See PETITION, Page 3A
the statement A look at the people and events that made the academic year memorable
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NEWS......................... 2A OPINION.....................4A S P O R T S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7A
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for gender differences in pay— for employers to adhere to the Equal Pay Act. Students at the University Pay Act in 1955, which required equal Some students emphasized the of Michigan took to Twitter in pay for comparable work, women are need to improve equal pay between observance of Equal Pay Day Tuesday. still paid about 77-79 cents for every genders, but also between races. The national event began in 1996 dollar a man makes, according to Beyond the University, the day to bring awareness to the unequal CNN, Pew Research and Fortune. LSA was heavily recognized by national pay women receive throughout the freshman Will Kutler was one of the figures like Madeleine Albright, the country. students to express his frustrations first woman to become the secretary In a Tweet Tuesday, College with society’s inability to create an of state, emphasized the need to Democrats explained the event is held equal environment on Twitter. keep working for equal pay in the in April because that’s how long it “Shouldn’t take my sister more workforce. takes women in this country to make than 3 additional months to make “I’ll celebrate when we no longer the same salary men made the year what I do in a year,” Kutler tweeted. need an #EqualPayDay,” she said. prior. Many supporters of equal pay “Until then, we must all keep fighting A tweet from @UmichStudents currently advocate for the Paycheck to close the gap.” echoed that sentiment. Fairness Act, which would give strong – WILL FEUER Despite the passing of the Equal incentives —like legal implications
3
THINGS YOU SHOULD KNOW
1
The Washington Post reported Tuesday that the FBI allegedly paid a group of hackers to unlock the phone of the San Bernadino shooter. They developed a software to crack the phone’s four-digit code without triggering security features, allowing access to the device for the FBI’s investigation into the incident.
2
The Statement reveals the Students of the Year: students who have made a big impact on campus over the 2015-2016 academic year. Check out the most memorable photos from the year in news, entertainment and sports. >> SEE STATEMENT on 1B
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
LSA freshman Will Kutler tweeted to express discontent about the impacts of the gender pay gap on his sister.
“
happy #equalpayday !! let’s close the gap! shouldn’t take my sister more than 3 additional months to make what i do in a year. 79 cents smh — @wkutler
“
2A — Wednesday, April 13, 2016
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U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.) proposed a national ban on fracking to extract oil and natural gas at a presidential campaign event in New York on Monday, ABC News reported. Though New York has large shale gas resources, an activist movement led to the state’s prohibition of fracking last year.
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CAMPUS EVENTS & NOTES
City Council debate
Dance performance
New Year celebration
WHAT: A debate between candidates for Ann Arbor City Council will be moderated by students of the course Public Policy 456/756. WHO: Center for Local, State and Urban Policy WHEN: 1 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. WHERE: Weill Hall, Annenberg Auditorium
WHAT: As part of the Ann Arbor Jewish Film Festival, dance majors will perform the choreography of Israeli dance artist Bosmat Nossan. WHO: School of Music,
WHAT: Several student organizations will provide food, cultural activities, music and dance in celebration of the Bengali, Hindi and Punjabi New Year. WHO: Bangladeshi Student Association WHEN: 4 p.m. to 6 p.m. WHERE: North Quad, Room 1500
Theatre & Dance WHEN: 2 p.m.
WHERE: The Michigan Theater
Philosophical Business movie screening etiquette
Positive Links speaker
WHAT: A screening of “Blueberry Soup: How Iceland changed the way we think about the world” will tell the little-known story of Iceland after the financial crisis of 2008. WHO: Philosophy, Politics & Economics WHEN: 6:30 p.m. to 9 p.m. WHERE: Angell Hall, Auditorium D
WHAT: Alison DavisBlake, the Edward J. Frey dean of the Ross School of Business, will discuss how small teams of people can address crisis management. WHO: Ross Center for Positive Organizations WHEN: 4 p.m. to 5 p.m. WHERE: Ross School of Business, Colloquium
WHAT: Keith Soster, the director of Student Engagement for Michigan Dining, will teach table etiquette skills for business settings. WHO: Center for Campus Involvement WHEN: 5 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. WHERE: Michigan League, Koessler Room
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Ann Arbor resident Michelle Brosius surveys the aftermath of a controlled burn, aimed at reducing fire hazards during the summer, outside the Ann Arbor YMCA Tuesday.
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City of Ann Arbor closes road ahead of events for SpringFest North University will be closed between Fletcher and Thayer Wednesday By LYDIA BARRY Daily Staff Reporter
With SpringFest slated to take place at the University of Michigan Wednesday, a series of road closures approved by the city of Ann Arbor will go into effect early Wednesday morning. SpringFest, which is hosted by MUSIC Matters, is an annual event that features activities around innovation, art and music. The event will be located on both North University Avenue and the Diag. As a part of the festivities, North University Avenue between Thayer Sudoku Syndication Street and Fletcher Street will be closed all of Wednesday, April 13. Additionally, event planners
expect large crowds will be drawn to the closing concert featuring headliner Migos, which will occur at 8 p.m. in Hill Auditorium, potentially causing traffic issues for local residents. City Councilmember Kirk Westphal (D–Ward 2), an urban planner by trade, saud despite closures, events are typically welcomed by local residents. “Most folks I interact with really value all the cultural events going on in Ann Arbor, and street fairs and events certainly have a role in that,” Westphal said. “The beauty of events that happen downtown is that typically since we have a street grid that doesn’t cause more inconveniences than benefits. So whether it’s University or a private organization, historically council has welcomed limited street closures” City Communications Specialist Robert Kellar said University street closures can occasionally prompt local resident complaints
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due to the nature of the events, but University events specifically do not generate a large number of complaints throughout the year. “University events tend to generate few complaints as they impact mainly those near campus,” Kellar said. “Most concerns are about access, inconvenience, timing or notification. We try to be proactive by asking applicants to submit a communication plan; we also utilize the city e-mail notifications as well as social media, and directing residents/ businesses to signing up on the street closure website so they are aware in advance of closures.” If local residents have concerns or complaints about the traffic surrounding University related outdoor events, they can share them on the city’s Traffic Complaint page.
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LSA freshman Kayla Fong teaches Rackham student Yi Niu how to do CPR as part of the American Red Cross CPR promotion event held on Central Campus Tuesday.
Club Sports teaches hands-only CPR to students walking to class
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HOUSING From Page 1A
In addition to approving the housing fee increase to $10,870, the RHA also discussed other proposals for next year, including upgraded drinking fountains with water bottle fillers and extended Java Blu hours when dining halls are closed. RHA President Lennox Ramsey, an Engineering sophomore, said proposals they’ve gotten approved by University Housing thus far include shifted weekend dining hall hours and new lobby access for students not living in residential halls. “(Students) can eat earlier in the morning, the lobby areas of other halls are going to open up — you won’t have to wait outside anymore,” he said. Ramsey said though he was confident the housing price hike is needed due to a heightened cost of living and operating costs, discussions like Tuesday’s were important to give more context to students who might face financial pressure from the change.
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Organizers hope education can help reduce cardiac arrest death rate By CHETALI JAIN Daily Staff Reporter
Monday and Tuesday outside of East and West Halls, U-M Club Sports partnered with SaveMiHeart to train hundreds of students in performing hands-only CPR. Club Sports and SaveMiHeart collaborated with American Heart Association, UM Emergency Medicine, Huron Valley Ambulance and American Red Cross to put on the event, which aimed to raise awareness about cardiac arrest and to prepare people for these emergency situations. Each day, anywhere from five to 12 instructors stood beside the practice mannequins and automated external defibrillators, ready to train the students who were passing by. Stephen Dowker, LSA junior and
SaveMiHeart member, helped to both organize the event and teach hands-only CPR to students. “We are trying to empower people to act in situations where cardiac arrest occurs,” Dowker said. “The primary goal of SaveMiHeart as a nonprofit is to double cardiac arrest survival in Michigan by the year 2020.” Robert Neumar, chair of emergency medicine at the University of Michigan, attended the event to lend his support. He said when cardiac arrest occurs outside of the hospital, the system of care is what determines if a person will survive or not, and less than one out of 10 people who go through cardiac arrest outside the hospital will survive. “One of the most important things in a patient’s treatment is what bystanders can do,” Neumar said. “Bystander CPR and AED can double a person’s chance of surviving.” Students were trained in hands-only CPR in about five minutes. LSA sophomore Musaab Muhammad was walking back to his dorm
when instructors at the event encouraged him to get trained. “I’ve never done CPR before, and I think it’s a valuable skill to learn,” Muhammad said. “I feel prepared, and I’m happy someone was there to actually point out the specific techniques.” Engineering sophomore Charlie Rogers was certified in CPR a few years ago and felt the event helped refresh his skills. “This was really great because some of the specifics of CPR like push down two inches into the chest, how you should place your hands and the specific steps of the AED were just kind of foggy so it was a great refresher,” Rogers said. “Beginners caught on really fast. I think the no-breaths thing really helps a lot.” LSA sophomore Michelle Baum said she hadn’t done CPR since taking a babysitting class in fourth grade. Baum said she felt her technique was improved and felt the event was helpful. “I think (a) really important thing they are doing is making people feel comfortable acting See CPR, Page 3A
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CSG From Page 1A dining hall hours on game days to improve safety during student game day tailgating events and on St. Patrick’s Day, as well as a change to the Board of Regents bylaws to reintroduce a provision eliminated in 2011, Section VII, which would increase student voice in University affairs. The issue of mental health also saw sustained attention from the assembly. Beginning with the class of 2020, all MCards will have the 24-hour Counseling and Psychological Services crisis line printed on the back, in part due to CSG advocacy. Another mental health resolution, which was co-sponsored by Schafer, would allocate $900 dollars to produce an informational video aimed to raise awareness about drug abuse on campus. Many of the body’s actions required a reallocation of funds to implement the programs. Business senior Kevin Ziegler, who served as CSG treasurer, said he thought financially, the assembly did a good job. “The CSG Fifth Assembly, executives and commission chairs also all did an excellent job of putting student fees to work, benefiting both current and future Wolverines,” Ziegler said. Schafer cited several initiatives as strengths of the outgoing assembly, saying he thought Charlton and the body succeeded in advocating for students. “From stressing the importance of student presence at the highest levels of our university’s administration to advocating for the release of course evaluations, Cooper and his administration constantly fought to expand the opportunities and enhance the voice of students,” Schafer said. However, Schafer added that despite the progress made in areas like mental health awareness, course evaluations and early dining hall hours, CSG experienced difficulty putting their plans into action in many areas of concern for University students. “Some of our initial work has been, and will continue to be, in the area of relationship-building with both University and city officials to achieve some of the goals of previous years that might remain unrealized,” Schafer said. “This involves sitting down and having conversations on how to, say, enhance off-campus safety.” Campus Safety Improving off-campus safety was one area where Make Michigan’s campaign plans lost momentum. One proposed remedy to off-campus safety concerns was the installation of more street lights. This idea was proposed by a previous administration following a lift on the moratorium on new city lighting in February 2014. The new lighting projects were proposed to include the areas of Hill Street, Oxford Road and Geddes Road. Though this campaign promise was one that garnered widespread support, especially from students who live off campus, CSG was unable to make progress in this area. Charlton cited the lack of cooperation between CSG and the city, and the overwhelming costs of light installation, as reasons the platform point went unfulfilled. “Off-campus lighting was probably our most ambitious plan for this year, but what gave us the most hope was the lifting of the moratorium by the city on the expansion of street lighting so that we could have at least a conversation about expansion,” Charlton said. “But we ran into two issues: the first problem is that it can cost as much as $400,000 to $600,000 per corridor for installation, so assessing the finances of the operation was a hurdle that we were unable to overcome. The other problem that we faced was with cooperation from the city. Ann Arbor city officials were not very open to collaboration, and I don’t think that our relationship with the city was nearly strong enough.” CSG also made little headway in the past year on another campus safety proposal — the development of a campus-safety app. The assembly from the year before, under alum and former CSG President Bobby Dishell, launched several projects in this area, including SafeRide and Night Owl apps. LSA sophomore Anushka Sarkar, the CSG chief programming officer, noted that Charlton’s administration did nonetheless address multiple campaign
promises succesfully while in office Sarkar was newMICH’s campaign manager and a member of Charlton’s Executive Committee. She emphasized CSG’s work on mental health issues in particular as an area of success this past year. “The work that has been done over the past year is impressive — between the expansion of the Wolverine Support Network, the availability of course evaluation data and the Race & Ethnicity Requirement hearings that were held, Cooper, Steven and this administration have a lot to be proud of,” she said. Campus Life Objectives like the expansion of the Wolverine Support Network — a student-led mental health resource — and the implementation of the honor code were also all campaign platform points for Charlton and Halperin during the 2015 CSG elections. Last November, CSG proposals for the University’s Statement of Student Rights and Responsibilities were presented to the Student Relations Advisory Committee. Among the proposed changes to the rights and responsibilities statement was the proposed formalization of a student honor code. The code was an area of particular importance to CSG this past year after the destruction of a ski lodge by members of the Sigma Alpha Mu fraternity in January 2015. The proposal to introduce an honor code to the Statement of Student Rights and Responsibilities was endorsed by both CSG and by SRAC chairman, Statistics Prof. Edward Rothman, who acknowledged the importance of building awareness about the causes of student misconduct. Charlton said the proposal failed because of dilution by SRAC. “SRAC was extremely out of touch with the student body, which left us fighting with them rather than working together,” Charlton said. “And because of this, the honor code that we brought into the process, by the time that it made it through the process, had essentially been disassembled, deconstructed into a shadow of what it once was. Therefore, it was no surprise that once the honor code was brought to President Schlissel, he was not able to approve it because it lost many of the key elements that were initially featured.” Academics Another area CSG heavily emphasized this past year was the strengthening of the Race & Ethnicity course certification process. Last November, CSG members heard from students about their concerns with the requirement. In January, Angela Dillard, the associate dean for undergraduate education, and members of CSG conducted a review of the course certification process and the necessary requirements for course designation. Following the review, CSG Chief of Staff Sean Pitt, an LSA junior, called for Race & Ethnicity classes to be smaller in an effort facilitate more discussion and dialogue on sensitive issues, implement required Intergroup Relations training for GSIs teaching Race & Ethnicity classes and to create a support network similar to the Sweetland Writing Center for Race & Ethnicity classes. One of CSG’s most contentious battles this year was over the publication of course evaluations for student course selections. When CSG faced opposition from the administration over the release of course evaluation data, CSG filed a Freedom of Information Act request. “Our biggest source of opposition for course evaluations came from the faculty,” Charlton said. “We didn’t want to simply tell the University, the professionals who are in charge of our education, to do what we want them to do. And there definitely were collisions and conflicts, but because we were honest with each other we were able to come to a compromise that will benefit students, and in time, the faculty too.” As a result of the FOIA request and the compromise made between CSG and the administration to not release course evaluations in their entirety, some course evaluation data will be available under the University’s stipulations for the fall 2016 semester with Provost Martha Pollack’s approval.
Read more at MichiganDaily.com
Wednesday, April 13, 2016 — 3A
UROP From Page 1A
FIRESIDE From Page 1A
PETITION From Page 1A
experience they discuss most often is their undergraduate research experience. Research is an opportunity to develop independent thinking and solve problems.” Six Mentor Awards were given out during the event to research scholars, research students in their second years who work with undergraduate students through the UROP program from student nominations. The winners included Daniel Lucas-Alcaraz, assistant professor of cell and developmental biology; Mark Clague, associate professor of music; Elizabeth Duval, lecturer in psychiatry; Elizabeth Goodenough, lecturer in arts and ideas in the humanities program; William Carson, research professor of pathology; and Chithra Perumalswami, lecturer of internal medicine. LSA sophomore Julia Kropa, one of the students who presented, discussed work on the Tel Kedesh Publication Project in which she is preparing a manuscript looking at the findings from the archaeological excavation of Tel Kedesh, Israel. The site featured more than 2,000 clay sealings, which were used by public officials to mark documents and featured artistic representations of different mythological figures or other symbols or animals. Kropa’s work centered on organizing the images of the sealings online in a more accessible format. She said this process is key to aiding future researchers in better understanding her field. “The information that it contains and that the manuscript will detail is really important to other archaeologists when they uncover other research on Hellenistic archives,” she said. “If these images are uploaded in a more accessible format it will widen the scope of the audience who will be able to access it and give other archeologists a better idea of how this information can be used.” LSA junior Kathryn Zoller and LSA sophomore Emma Kinery also talked about their work, which focuses on the History of UM Museums and Collections project. Kinery is also a news editor for The Michigan Daily. The research details the history of the University’s museum system from 1837 to 1900 and will be published in a book in 2017 as part of the bicentennial presentation, which funded their project. Zoller said recent contributions to the University’s museums demonstrate its continued prestige. “The fact that we were given the Bristol mammoth — discovered by Jim Bristol this past year — is important because they still see us as a depository for important specimens,” she said. “These collections help improve the prestige of the University and the University is seen as important because of all of these collections.” LSA junior Victoria Rai additionally discussed her research into the methods in transcriptional regulation of RNA, a step in the process cells use to make proteins in which DNA is copied to RNA. Rai has worked in with the Walter Lab in the Department of Chemistry since her freshman year. Her research aims to find ways to regulate the transcription process in order to combat diseases, which can occur due to errors in this stage. She said her research is valuable for its ability to impact the lives of individuals suffering from genetic disorders. “My research is important because there is a lot of genetic disorders — I have one myself — and it’s hard to deal with sometimes,” she said. “It shows that we are growing as a science community, and the ability to grow the technology and have these advances to impact people’s lives as a researcher is really valuable to me.”
to CAPS both online and on North Campus at the University. In response, Schlissel said the University will continue to address these issues and to meet as many student needs as possible. “We have to find the right level of staffing, a way to distribute this resource based on acuity of need, a way to assure that the wait is not beyond some reasonable length of time no matter what your problem is,” he said. Schlissel also said the University will print the phone number for CAPS on the back of student ID cards beginning with next year’s incoming class and current students will receive a sticker with the phone number to place on their MCards. During the event, students also asked Schlissel and Harper about ways to foster a relationship between the University and Detroit. In response, Schlissel emphasized work already being done. “The University has increasingly been doing more projects with Detroit on an educational basis,” Schlissel said of Detroit. “Around 1000 undergraduates do year-long engaged learning and volunteer projects with communities in the city year after year.” When asked to critique the ways schools within the University are connecting to Detroit, Schlissel said he did not have enough information to critique specifically what schools are not doing, but added that he knows with certainty many schools are taking initiative in Detroit. “The Business School is involved in Detroit at multiple levels, as is the School of Social Work and the School of Education,” he said. “The School of Engineering leads a very active effort in Detroit high schools, specifically around robotics, and the Medical School is also doing work.” Another area for improvement Schlissel addressed was working with deans in various schools and cultivating a sense of community, particularly for those who were recently appointed within the University. Nine out of the University’s 19 deans are currently new or the position is currently being filled. “There is still relatively new senior leadership and we’ve come up with new ideas and directions that we want to take the campus, so it’s actually nice to be able to hire and appoint deans who are in their skills and have interests aligned with the new things we want to do,” Schlissel said. “So there’s upsides and downsides to all that turnaround, but we are getting great people.” Schlissel also touched on the new Munger residence halls for graduate students and students pursuing professional degrees, saying he hoped they would inspire intellectual interaction between students studying different disciplines. Munger residents complained in March about a change in their leases and about students of different fields being segregated within the hall. Several students raised concerns over recent changes in th ebuilding, which has prompted complaints in past months, which many students felt inhibited their ability to continue to live in the University’s newest residence hall. In response, Schlissel cited logistical challenges with nine-month leases, noting the purpose of the program. “It’s specifically designed to have people from different disciplines live together,” Schlissel said. “I think putting people together in living circumstances allows them to come together in and outside the curriculum but a substantive way that might enhance whatever it is they’re pursuing.”
telephone receiver is removed from the cradle. Dialing or conversation is not required for the alert and the dispatch of an officer. LSA sophomore Helen Joa, one of the five students, said the camera would be the most useful in identifying an attacker since sometimes a student who was attacked or harassed cannot provide a good description of the perpetrator. “Once the camera is activated, we’re hoping that it will help take the pressure off from the person who was attacked to identify the attacker,” Joa said. “Crime alert (from DPSS) is a fairly good system … but the only downfall is that when you get to the description of the perpetrator, it’s something like ‘they are wearing a North Face jacket.’” Joa added that the cameras would be important especially given the light of recent events such as the anti-Islam chalking on the Diag last month. “People come to U of M to learn and study,” Joa said. “This should not have to be a topic of concern for them. So anything I can do as a fellow Wolverine to make someone else feel safer, I’m going to do it.” The proposed camera, outlined in the petition, would be activated only when the student pushes the emergency button, to alleviate concerns about privacy. In response to the petition, DPSS public information officer Diane Brown said there are currently discussions within the department about enhancing the blue light system. She added that in addition to installing cameras, DPSS has considered installing public announcement speakers on top of the blue light phones. “We could broadcast outgoing messages to the community for emergencies,” Brown said. “There have been discussions and there continues to be discussions about putting cameras at strategic locations.” Brown said one strategy for cameras on campus in general would be installing them where infrastructure,
CPR From Page 2A in a situation if it did happen,” Baum said. This is the event’s first year, and organizers said they hope to make it an annual occurrence. Wes Vear, LSA senior and president of the Club Sports Council, said CPR is an easy skill to learn, and training more people could help raise
such as data lines and cyber optic lines, are already in place. However, she noted that most of the blue light phones are too far away from such infrastructure, meaning it may be difficult to install the camera on existing phones. “It wouldn’t be just placing a camera on a top of a pedestal,” Brown said. “Some other infrastructure enhancement would have to be part of the project.” She added that the cameras do not necessarily have to be part of the phone system given the infrastructure problem, adding that many crimes don’t occur where the phones are located. She noted that the most common form of crime is stealing unattended belongings at libraries or recreational centers, which aren’t near the lights. “We simply don’t get that kind of reports (at the phones),” she said. “But there might be locations where adding the camera would help.” Brown emphasized DPSS is always interested in enhancing safety and security for the students, pointing to several existing services from DPSS such as using text messages to report crimes. “(Students) can send us a text message with specifics (of the crime),” Brown said. “It’s more consistent with the communication devices students tend to use regularly.” LSA freshman William Waters, one of the 233 students who signed the petition, wrote in an e-mail that interview he was motivated to sign the petition because he believes feeling safe on campus is extremely important, adding that he felt there is a low number of blue light phones available on campus. “I have friends that have discussed their concerns about walking home at night alone and have noted their specific concerns regarding the amount of blue lights available on campus,” Waters wrote. “When visiting other campuses, there are so many more lights and they’re more advanced with cameras. In residence halls, other campuses have one in each hallway on each f loor, but U of M does not have a single blue light in any dorm to my knowledge.”
Michigan’s 8-percent prehospital cardiac arrest survival rate. Neumar agreed with Vear and said he hopes this event will create more promising statistics. “Our mission here is to raise awareness of CPR and get as many people trained as we can in order to save more lives,” he said. “Anybody should be able to save a life.”
Opinion
4A — Wednesday, April 13, 2016
Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890. 420 Maynard St. Ann Arbor, MI 48109 tothedaily@michigandaily.com SHOHAM GEVA EDITOR IN CHIEF
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Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily’s editorial board. All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors.
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The world is a story
hey say you go away to college to learn about the world. To learn what makes the world spin, where your place is in it and how to someday change it for the better. So that’s what I did for the last four years. I passed my classes, made connections and got a job — all of the things that are supposed to happen in college. I DAVID studied computer science HARRIS and math. I lived in this STEM world where programming was the future and the world was seen as one big beautiful mathematical model. I liked what I studied. I liked thinking in numbers and algorithms. I liked being faced with a problem and moving toward a solution using the toolsets I had learned. Problem solving was the epitome of the engineering mindset, and it made sense to see the world around me in the same way. Observe a problem that’s out there, find a way to creatively work through it, then move on to the next one. It’s usually the way things work in college, where you find what you enjoy and immerse yourself in that paradigm. At one point during my time here, I had the opportunity to talk with a visiting priest at my parish, who along with his ordained role was a math professor at Xavier University. Clearly very smart and passionate about his work, he chatted with a group of us undergraduates about the way mathematics fits into his life and his worldview. He said that there was one question that every person always asks him. “Do you see beauty in mathematics?” He said of course there’s such a thing as mathematical beauty. Beauty in the way the numbers work out, beauty in things like Euler’s identity, beauty where you somehow combine the three basic arithmetic operations and the most important mathematical constants to somehow get e^i*pi = 0. But, what about if he actually sees beauty in the world itself through math? He said no, he doesn’t. Beauty in the numbers is only selfcontained. Numbers may be the governing model of the universe, but trying to describe the world around us in terms of numerics comes up empty and misses too much. The world was also meant to be described in ways that aren’t quantifiable or measurable. It was meant to be described with things that you can’t reduce into numbers or systems but nevertheless exist all around us. The world was meant to be described as a story. I spent Spring Break this year
backpacking and traveling southern Utah, and found myself on the last night of the trip with a couple friends at a blackjack table in Las Vegas before we f lew out the next day. At its core, gambling is just math designed not to be in your favor. So we played the odds that night, trying to stay af loat just long enough to get our free drinks and move on to see the next place on the strip. I learned how to count cards from a class here at the University, but I wasn’t there for the math. I was there to share stories and to write new ones. Looking at the world through stories led me here, to the newsroom at the Daily. I started as an Editorial Board member, served as an editor in the opinion section for a time, and then had my own space here on this page. There was a time I was the only engineering student in the opinion section, but there was always something far more beautiful about words and print to me than the numbers I surrounded myself with in the classroom. So I read stories, I edited them and, most importantly, I wrote them. I had a place to tell inconsequential stories, such as the time a squirrel fell out of a tree onto my head on the Diag one day. I told stories about the campus I loved and my hometown that I adored. When the Daily asked me to list a topic for my columns, I said “not politics.” So, I wrote about how much I hated politics. I wrote about the people who met the same misfortune as me sitting in the second f loor of the library on a Friday night. I wrote stories about newspapers themselves, and stories about my high school teacher who passed away — the one who told me to start writing in the first place. I wrote in a story one time about the phenomenon of spectators at a baseball game chasing after the balls hit into the stands. The souvenirs they make, from a price standpoint, are worthless, not even sellable on Amazon. Yet fans will chase after them with fervor and cheer for the lucky ones who can snag one. Over the years, I’ve caught a couple and lost all but one of them, but never the image of the ball falling into my hands each time. Just like the baseballs, I’ll leave after my years here with many “things,” whether it be skills or a diploma. But the things themselves become meaningless without the stories behind them. So yes, I did indeed learn about the world here at college. I learned from the stories that came in and out of this paper and this newsroom, the stories I was a part of and the ones all around me. Stories have an ending, as does mine which ends with this, my last column after the years with this paper. Yet, there’s always another issue tomorrow, because the world always has its stories that need to be told.
“I wasn’t there for the math. I was there to share stories and to write new ones.”
—David Harris can be reached at daharr@umich.edu.
CONTRIBUTE TO THE CONVERSATION Readers are encouraged to submit letters to the editor and op-eds. Letters should be fewer than 300 words while op-eds should be 550 to 850 words. Send the writer’s full name and University affiliation to tothedaily@michigandaily.com. ANNIE TURPIN
E-mail Annie at asturpin@umich.edu
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Words count
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riting is hard. Not only is the process grueling (I’ve had this Google doc open for an entire week with absolutely no progress made on it whatsoever), it is also risky. Writing for a publication means being LAUREN vulnerable. It SCHANDEVEL means believing your opinion is valid and informed enough to contribute to a dialogue. It means elevating yourself to a level at which you can be scrutinized. It is long nights of research, multiple tabs open, scouring the thesaurus for another way to say “political” or “good.” It is absolute hell. But at the same time, writing is also rewarding. It is a platform from which you can reach hundreds, thousands, millions of people you will probably never meet in your life, whose identities are completely unknown to you. They could vehemently oppose every point you make or they could hang on every word. There is no way for you to know for certain. When I started writing for the Daily, I was unsure of myself and my ability to connect with my readers. I truly believed that no one would find my line of thinking relatable enough to appreciate. I made my differences known. I never shied away from discussing heavy topics like class structure, politics and sex. I opened myself
up to an anonymous audience and I was terrified of the consequences. For me, the greatest of these fears was being brutally honest without actually conveying anything meaningful. I could have easily made people very uncomfortable while contributing nothing of value to any conversation. It was a balancing act. My very first column, in which I recounted the events that rallied me to political activism, was originally part of my columnist application. I didn’t realize that it would actually be published before I had the chance to edit it, so when I saw it there on the website — my own name tacked onto a very passionate and personal piece of writing — my stomach dropped. I felt like a colossal segment of my soul had been extracted from my body and thrust into cyberspace for my peers to pick apart like vultures. There was nowhere for me to hide. I was exposed. I imagined the flood of inflammatory e-mails denouncing me as too liberal, discrediting my background, correcting my grammar. I firmly believed that if people actually cared about what I had to say, they would hate it. I pined for indifference. To my complete surprise (and contrary to what my paranoia led me to believe), the responses to my first article were overwhelmingly positive. While the compliments I received from friends and family made the effort worthwhile by themselves, it was the praise I received from complete strangers that really demonstrated to me just how powerful writing can
be. This momentum only built over the course of the semester when people of all ages and backgrounds wrote to me, corroborating my words with their experiences. I am not recounting any of this to brag about the quality of my writing (which I think is mediocre at best), and I imagine those people were not contacting me because they believed wholeheartedly I was the next Bob Woodward. I am just residually astounded that real people — people who will probably only ever exist as names in my inbox — have felt precisely what I have felt, seen what I have seen, done what I have done and believe that I captured aspects of their story in my own. I cannot begin to describe how incredible that is. That is what makes the hours spent writing and rewriting and rewriting the rewrites — to the point where the words swell and dance on the page and you wonder if they are even spelled correctly, or if they are even words anymore and not just figments of your imagination — all worthwhile. They are all worth the gratification of speaking to or for an audience. Regardless of whether or not I continue to publish my writing, at least I can live the rest of my life with the knowledge that someone else, somewhere, can relate to the nonsensical thoughts in my head — and sometimes, that is enough. — Lauren Schandevel can be reached at schandla@umich.edu.
EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS Claire Bryan, Regan Detwiler, Gracie Dunn, Caitlin Heenan, Jeremy Kaplan, Ben Keller, Minsoo Kim, Payton Luokkala, Kit Maher, Madeline Nowicki, Anna Polumbo-Levy, Jason Rowland, Lauren Schandevel, Melissa Scholke, Kevin Sweitzer, Rebecca Tarnopol, Ashley Tjhung, Stephanie Trierweiler, Hunter Zhao. DAVID MERTZ | OP-ED
Elucidating Higgs I don’t spend most Saturdays around a lecture hall, but this past March, I made an exception. I had noticed a Facebook event for the Saturday Morning Physics talk series titled “Higgs and the Beginning of the Universe,” to be given by Bibhushan Shakya, a researcher here at the University. It piqued my curiosity. I couldn’t believe it when I arrived early and yet found the largest lecture hall in the Weiser building (formerly Dennison) full, and the overf low lecture hall next door, equally as large, full as well, a total of more than 500 people. Most in this crowd, it seemed, were beyond their student years. Apparently for many, Saturday Morning Physics is a weekend staple, and some have been attending since its inception in 1995. Some of the facts about Higgs I already knew. The discovery of the Higgs Boson, as it’s called, was predicted by a physicist named Peter Higgs back in 1964. It was finally confirmed in 2012 by the large team of scientists at the Large Hadron Collider near Geneva, Switzerland, where experiments are performed by smashing together particles, smaller than the size of atoms, at a speed that approaches the speed of light. At the time of the announcement, it made mainstream media headlines, dubbed as the “The God Particle.” Why the name? Many tiny Higgs Bosons, within the Higgs Field, impart the property of mass upon all objects in the universe, and the ability for them to interact through gravity. “The God Particle” is responsible for forming matter into galaxies, stars and the planet that has provided us with the exact necessities for life. At this talk, I learned new things about Higgs, such as the answer to how the Higgs field gives matter its mass. Think of a shoreline where there are several different kinds of boats moving about. Some boats, like jet skis, barely skim across the surface of the water. Larger
boats, maybe the size of a cruise ship, are actually substantially submerged underneath the water. As a consequence, the jet ski can move around more quickly than the cruise ship, but it wouldn’t be able to move as fast as, say, an airplane, which doesn’t need to touch the water at all. The amount of water they touch the water gives them different properties. The same concept applies for Higgs. Some objects, like planets, which have a lot of matter, interact with the Higgs field more strongly than other objects, like snowf lakes, that have relatively less matter. And like the airplane in the analog y, a photon, or particle of light, doesn’t even interact with the Higgs field, enabling it to travel at a much faster speed. The amount by which objects interact with the Higgs field determines how much mass they contain and how much gravitational force they have. I commend Dr. Shakya; he’s built a career in studying theoretical physics, earning degrees at Stanford in physics and philosophy, and a Ph.D. from Cornell. As a graduate student studying biomedical engineering, I’m not unfamiliar with science, though theoretical particle physics doesn’t pertain much to my own field. His talk really challenged me, but it also fed my curiosity. I’ve found it fascinating to consider and discuss the big questions in science, and learning about “The God Particle” serves as food for thought. I would imagine that many Michigan students have an intellectual curiosity about something unrelated to their own field. People shouldn’t be completely siloed in their one specific area of study. It’s important to find ways to address those other curiosities and to make them a priority. Learning about something that I’m genuinely curious about, especially when I don’t know much about it, can be truly
gratif ying. I’ll conclude with my biggest takeaway thought from the talk. Higgs explains something as small as why objects fall when dropped, but also, on the cosmic scale, the makeup of the universe and why it is still expanding in size. It explains how it might eventually stop expanding, and that it might actually begin to contract back to its infinitesimal size at the time of the Big Bang, a theoretical phenomenon known as the Big Crunch. Assuming humans don’t succumb to climate change, to Earth’s eng ulfment by our expanding sun or some other, more immediate threat to our survival, preventing the Big Crunch might be the ultimate challenge for our species. If that sounds grim, it luckily won’t become an issue for at least tens of billions of years. Yet, according to Forbes in 2012, from the contributions of several countries, $13.25 billion was spent to conduct experiments at the Large Hadron Collider that helped discover Higgs. Peter Woit, a theoretical physicist at Columbia University, wrote in a blog post that, while small in comparison to the expenditures on military and biomedical research in the United States, hundreds of millions of dollars are still spent by our own government and private foundations to fund theoretical physics research. But why would these establishments provide funding for theoretical physics when climate change and other issues are far more imminent threats? I think it suggests that we, as humans, can be irrationally curious. Or maybe, preventing the end of the universe is a problem that really will take several billions of years to solve, and we can breathe a sigh of relief that we’ve already beg un to consider it now.
—David Mertz is a first-year engineering Ph.D. student.
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Arts
Wednesday, April 13, 2016 — 5A
MUSIC REVIEW
FILM COLUMN
M83 turns back clock with ‘Junk’ Techno-indie group channels ’80’s television romance By SAM ROSENBERG Daily Arts Writer
As both a musician and visual artist, M83 frontman Anthony Gonzalez makes his music sound as though it could B+ be a movie or TV soundtrack. Junk On 2011’s M83 acclaimed double-album Mute Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming, Gonzalez demonstrated his love of Terrence Malik and Werner Herzog films by employing epic, stadium-ready jams to create the sensation of child-like wonder and innocence. His band’s latest record, Junk, draws inspiration from 1980s sitcoms, particularly “Punky Brewster” and “Who’s the Boss”. And judging from Junk’s wacky album cover, Gonzalez shows that he isn’t afraid to move M83 into new directions. Though slightly uneven in its execution, Junk is M83’s weirdest, most ambitious and most experimental work to date. Similar to how Daft Punk revitalized ’70s culture on their Grammy-winning comeback record Random Access Memories, Gonzalez cherishes the soul and spirit of the ‘80s on Junk, transforming oldfashioned rhythms into modern pop songs. While appreciating a simpler time on American television, Junk also focuses on
darker themes of existentialism and mortality. As Gonzalez stated in a press release, the album is about how everything we create will become “space junk,” a concept Gonzalez describes as both scary and fascinating. Junk certainly has a mystical, philosophical quality to it, which only adds onto the album’s daring scope. Sonically, Junk doesn’t stray very much from M83’s grandiose electronic sound. There are still flourishes of saxophone solos, dizzying synthesizers and electric guitar breakdowns, but M83 goes a step further by utilizing New Wave and dancepop influences. Though there may not be a song on Junk as massive as M83’s excellent “Midnight City,” there are several that come close. On the shimmering opener “Do It, Try It,” Gonzalez longs for love and
Junk remains a grounded portrait. connection over a glittery, videogame beat reminiscent of the 1982 sci-fi flick “Tron.” “Go!,” the catchiest track off Junk, is bolstered by Mai Lan’s breathy voice and renowned musician Steve Vai’s monumental guitar solo. The album’s longest song, “Solitude,” is a chilling meditation on the past backed by an orchestral instrumental. Beck provides a much needed assistance on the spacey “Time Wind,” a whirlwind of electric
rock in the vein of Tears for Fears. The post-disco jingles “Walkway Blues” and “Bibi the Dog” each showcase Gonzalez’s range, the former throbbing with an atmospheric intensity and the latter operating as a fun, loose groove. Junk succeeds in capturing the ethos of ‘80s music, television and film, but it also delves into the sentimental and corny aspects of the three mediums with mixed results. The funky, string-heavy “Moon Crystal,” for example, is both captivating and confounding, especially since it sounds exactly like a mix between elevator muzak and a generic ’80s sitcom theme song. “For the Kids” is a dreary, mawkish slow jam that is fortunately enhanced by the beautiful vocals of Norwegian guest Susanne Sundfør. Similarly, “Atlantique Sud” suffers from an element of unflattering schmaltz, but Gonzalez and Lan’s mesmerizing French duet saves it from becoming too cloying. The two-minute interlude “Tension” also starts out with a syrupy guitar reverb, until Gonzalez lays down some tantalizing synths and transforms it into something awe-inspiring. Even with its overly romantic tendencies towards the past, Junk remains a grounded portrait of the importance and magic of art and its ability to last throughout generations. It’s definitely not M83’s most accomplished record, as it meanders between profound and sappy. But despite Junk’s imperfections, Gonzalez’s extraordinary vision shines through in the end.
FILM REVIEW
‘Demolition’ portrays midlife crisis in film By DANIEL HENSEL Daily Arts Writer
“Everything is a metaphor.” A cut, a beat, then he repeats, whispering to himself — “metaphor.” This was not the first Ctime during the course of Demolition “Demolition” Fox Searchlight that I rolled my eyes, and Michigan Theater it certainly wasn’t the last, but it was perhaps the most emblematic. The latest from Canadian director Jean-Marc Vallée (“Wild” and “Dallas Buyers Club”), “Demolition” is a midlife crisis comedy-drama burdened by its overly clear metaphorical premise. In “Demolition,” Davis Mitchell (Jake Gyllenhaal, “Nightcrawler”) is an investment banker whose wife, Julia (Heather Lind, “Mistress America”) is tragically killed in a car accident. While Julia’s parents are devastated, particularly her father Phil (Chris Cooper, “Adaptation.”), Davis seems to be all right, returning to work very soon after. But as Phil recovers from his grief, Davis seems to descend into it. He writes a letter to a vending machine company complaining about a stuck bag of M&M’s, which quickly devolves into a series of rambling confessionals about his former life with Julia. The customer service representative, Karen Moreno (Naomi Watts, “Birdman”), is a single mom who smokes pot. Concerned about his letters, she begins to develop a non-romantic relationship with Davis as she drifts away from her boss, whom she is dating. The key relationship in
the film, though, is between Davis and Karen’s son, Chris (Judah Lewis, “Point Break”), a rebellious tween who smokes, yet chides his mother for the same. Chris is stumbling through adolescence and finding his identity — Davis, whom Chris initially despises, comes to be his trusted confidant and counsel. Together, they become a team of demolishers. Davis finds that the only way to fix his life is to break everything in it (except, of course, his car and bedroom, because those are the important possessions for Davis. Can you read my sarcasm?), which can either happen by high-powered tools or by careful deconstruction, separating an object into all of its parts. Davis finds joy in the wreckage and pain. The audience will not. The screenplay by Bryan Sipe (“The Choice”) is awkward and clunky. In fact, it is like this paragraph — there are sentences with words in them that fit, but — there are no more positive attributes. More often than not, the sentences do not work together. Sipe uses the letters as narration instead of using dialogue. This is a cop-out. The film is billed as a comedy-drama but it is not funny. It is not very dramatic either. The events in the film are melodramatic, but there is no emotion. Vallée, in his prior two films, both of which were major Oscar contenders, established a visual storytelling style. They were subjective, in which visions blended into the screen, memories intruded on scenes, and a story was told by the sum of its parts. For “Wild,” a film especially tied to memory, this proved to be an adept technique, albeit with a side effect of confusion. Here,
though, Vallée loses his grip. The impressionist blend, for which Terrence Malick must be an influence, fails to unite all the moving parts of a needlessly complex story. While the film never drags (in fact, I was surprised by little I was bored by it), some transitions and images feel jarring rather than meaningful. But whatever can be said about Vallée’s visual style, he is certainly an actor’s director. In fact, “Dallas Buyers Club” netted two acting Oscars and “Wild” earned two more nominations. Thankfully, Vallée saved this film from misery by assembling a terrific cast, especially Cooper, one of the finest actors living. Watts and Gyllenhaal aren’t doing their best work here; their characters’ emotions are infinitely complex and they come close, but they never quite reach the finish line. The film is simply never compelling. Rather than focus on Davis’s inner turmoil, it turns to his recovery. But light is only valuable insofar as it prevents darkness; without understanding what Davis is feeling, we can never know why his acts of destruction, and his compassion for Chris, matter. Plus, because Davis’s life is so seeped in privilege, it’s impossible for us common folk to find solace in his decisions. Who among us can cope with loss by destroying all of our possessions and then, presumably, rebuying them? Vallée, it seems, wanted to make a film that can fit into midlife crisis film craze of the mid-1990s (think “American Beauty” or “Office Space”) but his twenty-first century update just doesn’t do anything new. Or interesting.
WARNER BROS.
Get a load of this guy!
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Witness me, remember me
here’s a very quick, subtle contrast in “Mad Max: Fury Road.” Throughout the film, we witness the brainwashed, blindly devoted War Boys hurl themselves at danger with the expectation of dying a warrior’s death. Just before their demise, they all call JAMIE out to their BIRCOLL comrades, “Witness me!” and then give themselves to Valhalla, as they believe. But just before protagonist Imperator Furiosa kills the megalomaniacal despot Immortan Joe, she locks eyes with him and growls not “witness me,” but “remember me.” Each time I’ve seen the film, this line has stuck out to me — remember me. On the one hand it’s an unusual phrase to utter to someone who is seconds away from death and will thereafter remember nothing. But on the other, it’s a very poignant declaration of defiance, power and legacy. Something witnessed is fleeting, offering only a few moments of experience or emotion before vanishing. Something remembered carries weight; to be remembered is not to disappear. Remembrance has been at the back of my mind, because at the end of this column I will, in all likelihood, never write about film again. It’s so strange to think that some 60-odd articles linked on a webpage will serve as the only markers of all of my effort, my time, my debates, my research, all of my studying devoted to the medium of film and all of its intricacies. Some of those articles I like a great deal; in others, I squirm at my obvious shortcomings as a writer and critic. But they are my legacy as a film critic. Even more, they are proof that I was a film critic.
At the end of this page, I can no longer call myself a film critic, or even a writer. And despite my frequent bouts with writer’s block as of late, I cannot help but be saddened by that realization, for I know there’s more that I can say: I never got to tell you how “Lost in Translation” so masterfully captures emotion through a combination of image and soundtrack, how the guitar fuzz of My Bloody Valentine’s “Sometimes” mirrors the dreamy haze of a late-night drive through Tokyo. Nor was I able to write about Jeff Nichols’s incredible film “Take Shelter,” how it thoughtfully and beautifully meditates on mental illness, sacrifice and family while also serving as a modern parable of the middle class American family living in the wake of the economic crisis of 2008. I never got my geek on and went in-depth into my love of “Star Wars” and how I live by the words of Yoda: “Only what you take with you.” I didn’t have time to find the release I’ve long sought by writing about my trips to the movie theater with my dad as he battled cancer in 2010. I couldn’t share how movies gave me heroes like Clint Eastwood and Harrison Ford to look up to, and how I grew stronger through them and the spirit they embody on-screen. Many of those articles are saved on my computer, critical skeletons dancing in the limbo of Microsoft Office. I never found the right words to complete those thoughts, and I probably never will. So I can only hope that my body of work was enough. I like to think it was. I like to think that my readership included more than my parents, their Facebook friends, the Arts writers at The Michigan Daily and a couple crass, easily irritable Stone Temple Pilots fans. But in the end, writing was an activity for me and no one else. It was a process to sort out my thoughts, to challenge myself with new ways
of thinking about film, creativity, interpretation and criticism itself. That it must end is, simply, bittersweet. As a result, I’ve thought a lot about endings lately. How some films have the perfect endings — “The Usual Suspects,” “Field of Dreams,” “Apocalypse Now,” to name a few — and how others simply don’t know when to end. I think of the ending to “Lincoln,” which effectively strips the film of the subtlety imbued in its logical ending shot, a weary Lincoln leaving the White House to meet his wife at the Ford Theater, to give us a “proper” Hollywood biopic ending that martyrs the man. An ending like that isn’t actually an ending: it’s a giftwrapped manufacture that tries to spell everything out for the audience. In a way I understand it, this desire for a well-packaged, digestible ending for audience and director alike. It’s hard to limit oneself, to willingly deprive oneself of making that one final point, the one that can tie it all together and make it pretty. It’s hard to know that to add more risks detracting from the work as a whole. It’s hard to simply walk away. But the proper ending can really be the difference between jumping out of your seat to beat the rush of exiting moviegoers and needing to wait for the lights to come back on because you’re just too moved to rise. It can be the difference between good and great — between witnessing and remembering. Which is why I leave it here: no grand overarching statements, no sentimental declarations, just an ending. I simply hope someone found my words worthwhile. Witness me. Remember me. It’s up to you. Bircoll will be missed very much. If you miss him already, email him at jbircoll@umich.edu
Arts
6A — Wednesday, April 13, 2016
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
COMMUNITY CULTURE PREVIEW
MUSIC REVIEW
Classic, impossible stories in ‘Sotto Voce’ By DAYTON HARE Daily Arts Writer
DUALTONE RECORDS
Live from the “Infinite Jest” book club meeting.
‘Cleopatra’ is sad boy-strumming By SHIMA SADAGHIYANI Daily Arts Writer
You thought the last haunting echoes of upbeat guitar strums and intermittent clapping that “Ho Hey” introduced had finally, finally, B died down. Cleopatra But The Lumineers are back The Lumineers at it again with their newest Dualtone Records release, Cleopatra. This album is starkly minimalist, with lead singer Wesley Schultz’s vocals accompanied only by quiet guitar plucks. Devoid of songs that are trying too hard to be upbeat (as seen in their self-titled first album), Cleopatra is unapologetically bittersweet and nostalgic: an ode to the past as much as it is hope for the future. Despite not having crazy rhythms or interesting beats, this album is exciting in its bare honesty. Cleopatra opens with “Sleep On The Floor,” a ballad featuring Wesley Schultz singing fearlessly about leaving the place he calls home. “ ’Cause if we don’t leave this town / we might not never make it out” stands starkly against a steady, muted background. “Ophelia” holds the same austerity (the craziest thing this song puts out are wild piano solos). Yet, similar to “Sleep On
The Floor,” “Ophelia” entraps listeners not with glitter or glamour, but with its barefaced humanity. The same concept is repeated in “Gun Song” and “Angela,” with both songs quiet yet powerful in the way they seem to offer listeners a window into something that’s incredibly private and tender. Wesley Schultz seems to be singing for nobody else but himself, and it comes through in the way that these songs are authentic, genuine and a lifeline to the very core of The Lumineers. It’s in this way that The Lumineers’ improvement from their first album shines through. With songs like “Ho Hey” and “Stubborn Love,” there was very much an apparent desire to create songs that were popular, which caused many of them to come across as stiff and forced. However, four years can really make all the difference: Cleopatra showcases how centered and comfortable The Lumineers have gotten with their personal voice. The songs are more natural, intimate and Schultz’s voice has no hesitation as he sings about everything from lost loves to strained family relationships. However, while this album does prove that The Lumineers can produce meaningful music, it still has its faults. While songs on Cleopatra are deeply intimate, they also can become repetitive as the album goes on. There was
no variation, which meant that eight or nine songs in the 11-track album, things get a little dull. The familiarity established with the first couple of songs vanishes, the point of no return is hit and The Lumineers turns into one flat line of sad-boy guitar strums. For example, “Sick In The Head” is serene, beautiful, melodious and delicate. Yet, because of its place in the album as one of the final songs, its completely lost under the cover of uniformity. “My Eyes” is similar in the sense that it had the potential to be an enjoyable song, but its place in the album ruined that possibility. If The Lumineers had used the ending portion of Cleopatra to introduce a new sound to break the mold of melancholy, the album would have finished strong. The genuine emotion this album introduces, despite its shortcomings, gives hope that The Lumineers have a voice with which they’re comfortable. Now that they’ve established a solid base, hopefully they can use the next albums they release to experiment and create music that pushes the boundaries of their sound. Altogether, Cleopatra is a solid album; one that not only establishes The Lumineers as a band who has found their voice but also builds anticipation for all the future music The Lumineers can produce.
Classifieds RELEASE DATE– Wednesday, April 13, 2016
Los Angeles Times Daily Crossword Puzzle
It is often remarked that great art is “timeless.” It’s a vessel which somehow transcends the sea of society and temporality to approach the undiscovered Sotto Voce country of an aesthetic Thurs. 8 p.m., ideal. Which Fri. 8 p.m., Sat. 2 certainly is p.m., Sun. 8 p.m. a romantic Arthur Miller thought, but one which Theater doesn’t Free necessarily hold up under close analysis — it could easily be countered that great art, rather than being “timeless” is in fact imbued with an excess of time, a multiplicity of temporal place. It isn’t that great art doesn’t belong to any time; it’s that it belongs to many times, contains themes with a cross-generational resonance, captures not only the zeitgeist of the era in which it was created but also imbibes the enduring spirit of humanity. And while it certainly is too soon to pass any judgments regarding its greatness, Ann Arbor audiences will have an opportunity to experience a play next week which embraces this principle of multiple times: Nilo Cruz’s “Sotto Voce.” “I was actually going to be assisting a director named Peter Brook on this play, and it was going to be performed in France in French,” said Héctor Flores Komatsu, a School of Music, Theatre & Dance senior and the director of “Sotto Voce.” Komatsu said he was initially introduced to the play through a production that fell through. “I read the play and I was immediately struck by all these three characters, and by the themes of refugees, and helping people in need, and the impossibility of love, discovering ourselves through literature, through reading
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other people’s things.” After the initial production failed to materialize, Komatsu contacted the playwright to inquire about the possibility of putting on a production of “Sotto Voce” in Ann Arbor. “This play has just sat in the back of my mind, so I spoke (to) Nilo (Cruz) and said ‘I would love to do this at Michigan’ — it’s not published yet, but ‘I would love if I could direct it and share it with the community of Ann Arbor, especially given the subject of refugees right now,’ ” Komatsu said. “It approaches the subject of refugees not in terms of key figures, or (statistics), but rather in a very human aspect. It affects us all; it’s a pain that creates more pain here and there, and in a way comes to affect people from all parts of the world.”
It is often remarked that art is timeless. “Sotto Voce” tells two stories which take place decades apart, linked by a common character, a German writer named Bemadette Kahn. The earlier of these two stories takes place in the late 1930s; a young Jewish man, Ariel Strauss, and his sister set sail from Germany bound for Cuba, fleeing from Hitler’s regime along with 900 some other Jewish individuals. Behind them they leave Ariel’s lover, Bemadette — before them they face the impassive visages of Cuba and America, both of which turn away the refugees. The ship turns back to Europe, and upon arrival the siblings vanish among Hitler’s horrors. Bemadette later moves to New York, where in the ensuing decades she has become a successful novelist, but has never written about her former lover. “Out of nowhere comes this young Jewish Cuban man, a student (named Saquiel Rafaeli), calling her home (phone)” Komatsu said. “He says ‘I’m here in New York to ask you about Ariel Strauss. I found the love letter you sent to him while he was on the boat, and we’re interested in the stories of the human tragedy that was forgotten, we want the world to hear these stories so it doesn’t happen again.’ ” Bemadette resists talking about Strauss, but Saquiel persists, communicating with the writer through phone and the intermediary of Bemadette’s Colombian maid Lucila Pulpo. “Little by little they start to develop this very intimate relationship, between writer and student, young and oldage,” Komatsu said. “In which (Saquiel) becomes the imaginary Ariel Strauss in (Bemadette’s) mind, because she can only hear his voice, and it reminds her so much of the voice of Ariel Strauss.” Komatsu views the play as containing a great deal of meaning beyond the actual words, conveyed through human interaction and subtlety of expression. “It’s the experience beyond the words that is at the core
of this piece,” Komatsu said. “It’s called ‘Sotto Voce,’ which means under voice … there’s something about the subtlety of words and the silence between the words, just like the silence between music. It’s a very lyrical piece. When you read it, it feels like a composition.” Komatsu also discussed the cast of the play — a small production, the play only calls for three actors and one musician, and is made up of students from the School of Music, Theatre & Dance. Bemadette, Saquiel and Lucila are played by Larissa Marten, Aaron Weinstein and Anastasia Zavitzanos, respectively, all of whom are pursuing a BFA. Julian Bridges, who is a SMTD Percussion and Jazz Studies major, will be providing music for the production. “It’s an international cast. The girl playing Bemadette is actually German … she was born in America, but she speaks German fluently, she goes there every summer, so she understands things very inherently about the character, because she understands that world a little closer,” Komatsu said. “The Colombian maid is being played by Anastasia Zavitzanos, who is GreekAmerican, and she’s quite fantastic … and there’s a connection right now with Greece and the refugee crisis, so it’s been very close for her.” Additionally, the actor playing Saquiel, Aaron Weinstein, was born in Puerto Rico, but was adopted by a Jewish family, thus making him almost a mirror imagine of Saquiel. “Each of us have our own personal searches that we’re figuring out, by reading the play,” Komatsu said. “I think it’s important then that it’s really sensitive actors, who really understand it to a much more human level.” The performance of “Sotto Voce” in Arthur Miller Theatre, which is sponsored by the Frankel Center for Judaic Studies, the Department of Latina/o Studies and Arts at Michigan, will be the first performance of the play on a college campus, and only its third performance ever. The play itself will be published the same day as the performance. Komatsu has had conversations with Cruz about the work, but he also notes much of the play has to be discovered in the process of rehearsing and performing it. “With any kind of literary work you have to sort of inhabit it, and figure it out with patience,” Komatsu said. “There’s nothing that Nilo could explain to us that isn’t already in the play … the important thing is empathy.” Komatsu also noted several themes which he has personally absorbed from the play. “As people who are young, we forget that time is a thing, and that time exists, but that time is also scarce,” Komatsu said. “As someone who is young, coming into a play like this, it has already started to teach me a lot, about ‘how can you still find life and the desire to live when you’re 80 years old, and you feel like you have nothing ahead of you?’ And then you find something that is there. There is always something to be found if you look.”
HAVE A GREAT DAY TODAY!
Sports
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
‘M’ dominates Niagara Wolverines snap three-game skid, get back on track with blowout win
MAZIE HYAMS/Daily
Junior attacker Tess Korten led Michigan’s offensive output Tuesday with three goals and an assist against Niagara.
matched Korten’s goal output. The pair finished as the game’s highest scorers. “I was just really happy with the offense in general,” Ulehla said. “So many different people had opportunities and took advantage of them and scored.” Not to be outdone by the offense, Michigan’s defense stepped up as well. It forced 20 turnovers and held Niagara to only one goal. The effort matched the best defensive output in the history of the Wolverines’ threeyear-old program. “Defense has got to be a strong unit, and they didn’t play individually today,” Ulehla
said. “There was a little bit of a breakdown at one point, but then they regrouped. I thought that the 77 defense was strong, the goalie performances were strong and I thought we did a great job in our transitional defense as well.” The tough stretch prior to the game wasn’t the first of the season for Michigan, as it had another three-game losing skid from March 4 to March 18, eventually halted by a 9-4 win over Duquesne. Now, the focus turns to maintaining this momentum and stringing together some wins. But the schedule doesn’t
“It always comes back to us trying to grow from every experience.”
get easier for the Wolverines. They will host No. 12 Penn State on Sunday before No. 1 Maryland comes to Ann Arbor the week after. “(The win) definitely was important for the team morale and to get everyone back on the same page, to know we have something to work towards,” Korten said. “We have two, three big games coming up and then the Big Ten playoff season to look forward to.” Added Ulehla: “(It’s) just great for camaraderie, and (we can) feel the big pressure off our back. We know what’s coming this weekend: Penn State. We know we’ve got to get back to business.” If the Wolverines are able to get back to business and fire on all cylinders like they did Tuesday, perhaps they may earn their first win over a ranked team in program history.
SOFTBALL
Wolverines face struggling Spartans Daily Sports Writer
Averaging more than eight runs per game, the No. 2 Michigan softball team’s offense scores in a prolific manner and receives Michigan at abundant production from Michigan St. Matchup: top to bottom. In their first Michigan 29-4; two conference Michigan St. 20-19 series, the When: Wolverines scored 65 runs Wednesday 4:30 P.M. in six games and notched a 5-1 Where: record. Junior Alumni Field third baseman TV/Radio: BTN Plus Lindsay Montemarano emerged during that stretch as Michigan’s most potent bat, setting a new career high for home runs in a season. Senior second baseman Sierra Romero
Michigan falters in sixth inning of loss Daily Sports Writer
Daily Sports Writer
By TYLER COADY
BASEBALL
By NATHANIEL CLARK
By MIKE PERSAK
It had been a tough stretch for the Michigan women’s lacrosse team going into a home game against NIAGARA 1 Niagara on MICHIGAN 13 Tuesday. The Wolverines were coming off a three-game losing streak, which included a blowout loss to No. 16 Northwestern. For a moment against the Purple Eagles (2-2 MetroAtlantic Athletic Conference, 6-6 overall), it looked as though it might be another tough outing for the Wolverines (0-2 Big Ten, 6-8 overall). Their offense came out sputtering, and nearing the midpoint mark of the first half, they were still scoreless. Then, with 16:02 remaining in the half, junior attacker Tess Korten struck first and Michigan never looked back, winning 13-1. “I think (this win is) incredibly important for our program and for these women who work hard every single day,” said Michigan coach Jennifer Ulehla. “It always comes back to us trying to grow from every experience and get better every single day. When you’re building a program, it’s not easy and it takes time. It’s a journey. It’s not a sprint, it’s a marathon.” Korten was at the center of Michigan’s offense all game, with three goals and one assist. The offensive production didn’t stop with her, though. Seven different players scored goals for the Wolverines, including junior attacker Kelly Schlansker, who
Wednesday, April 13, 2016 — 7A
also upped her batting average to .500, good for fourth in the nation. Then, in last weekend’s seriesopening game against Nebraska, the Wolverines’ offense went missing. Facing Cornhusker ace Cassie McClure, Michigan struck out just twice, but registered a meager four hits. “I think you have to credit their pitching,” said Michigan coach Carol Hutchins. “(McClure) was on her game.” Frazzled by McClure’s prowess in the circle, Romero, Montemarano and junior left fielder Kelly Christner were all kept hitless in Michigan’s 1-0 loss. “To give up one run and lose, that’s not because of the pitching,” Hutchins said. “We were all trying too hard, and trying too hard is as bad as not trying at all.” On Saturday and Sunday, the Wolverines’ lineup — revitalized and eager to move beyond the previous night’s goose egg
— reemerged in commanding fashion. Sierra Lawrence homered in each game, and Sunday’s tworun blast was the culmination of a late Michigan comeback that propelled the Wolverines (7-2 Big Ten, 29-4 overall) to their second win of the weekend. For Michigan, a chance to improve upon its offensive numbers and record another conference win presents itself Wednesday in the form of a struggling Michigan State team. The Spartans (2-7, 20-19), who entered conference play with a winning record but without a win against a ranked team, have won only one of their last six games. That lone win came against fellow Big Ten cellar dweller Maryland. However, Michigan State possesses ample offensive talent and is sure to challenge the Wolverines’ inconsistent pitching staff led by fifth-year senior Sara Driesenga and junior
Megan Betsa. Ebonee Echols, Lea Foerster and Sarah Gutknecht each hit over .350, combined for 61 RBI and have totaled nine home runs, which pales in comparison to Michigan’s power hitters. But a Spartan pitching staff marked by youth and inconsistency is sure to be a boon for the Wolverines’ prospects. Dani Goranson has been plagued by a tendency to give up home runs and walks, as she has given up 10 and 18, respectively. Kristina Zalewski logs the majority of innings and enters the game with a 9-10 record. Despite its recent skid and evident shortfalls, Michigan State has played close with top teams this year and nearly recorded an upset win in Ann Arbor last season. The Spartans will be a testing opponent for Michigan, one sure to relish the chance of potentially knocking off their in-state rival. Meanwhile, the Wolverines hope their offense paves the way to a routine win.
EAST LANSING — The Michigan baseball team was engaged in a pitcher’s duel through the first five MICHIGAN 5 MICH. ST. 11 and a half innings of its contest with Michigan State. But that low-scoring game was a fleeting memory one inning later, after the Spartans put up eight runs in the bottom of the sixth en route to defeating the 22nd-ranked Wolverines, 11-5. The loss for Michigan (3-2 Big Ten, 21-9 overall) marked its third in a row, its worst losing streak since a four-game skid in March last season. “We’ve certainly hit our share of adversity the last seven days,” said Michigan coach Erik Bakich. “It happens in sports. It certainly happens in baseball. You just got to stay positive. We look forward to playing better tomorrow.” The score was tied at two in the bottom of the sixth when Michigan State (5-1, 22-6) loaded the bases with no outs. The situation prompted Bakich to replace junior left-hander Brett Adcock — who had just come on in relief of senior left-hander Evan Hill — with junior right-hander Mac Lozer. Unfortunately for the Wolverines, Lozer was unable to escape the jam. Right fielder Kris Simonton, the first batter Lozer faced, hit a single to center field that drove in two runs. Third baseman Justin Hovis followed up with a sacrifice fly to right field to put the Spartans ahead, 5-2. Catcher Matt Byars then hit an RBI double to extend Michigan State’s advantage to four. After shortstop Royce Ando grounded out, it appeared that Michigan might end the sixth down by a manageable four runs. But a fielding error on the next at-bat let the Spartans tack on yet another run. First baseman Jordan Zimmerman further rubbed salt into the Wolverines’ wounds with an RBI single of his own. One batter later, Bakich replaced Lozer with sophomore right hander Jayce Vancena. “(For) guys who pitch in those high-leverage situations, there are going to be days that are just not their day,” Bakich said. “They have to have a short memory. They have to have amnesia, and we’re going to count on (Lozer) to make big pitches in big spots again this weekend, if not tomorrow (against Eastern Michigan).” Vancena, too, was victimized by a fielding error that widened Michigan’s deficit to seven. While Vancena allowed an RBI single on the ensuing at-bat, the carnage was ended when senior catcher Harrison Wenson whipped
the ball to freshman shortstop Michael Brdar, who tagged the runner at third to finally get the Wolverines out of the inning. “It’s always a relief to get off the field after a long inning like (the sixth),” said senior outfielder Matt Ramsay. “It was great to get back in the dugout, because everyone looked at each other and we were like, ‘It’s go time.’ There wasn’t any doubt on anyone’s faces.” Before the sixth-inning collapse, it was Michigan who scored first. With two outs in the third inning, Ramsay stole third and scored on a throwing error, and the Wolverines then mustered a pair of two-out singles. But they were unable to extend their lead. “I think we were hitting the ball pretty well as a team,” Ramsay said. “But I think what wasn’t happening was that we weren’t getting those timely hits — those hits with runners in scoring position.” With the bases loaded on one out, the Spartans struck back in the bottom of the third by driving in two runs off a single and a fielding error, but Hill limited the damage to just that. “I thought our defense played sloppy today,” Bakich said. “Pitching and defense has been a staple of our success in the early goings, and it needs to continue to be a cornerstone of our success. We just gotta be better in those two areas to be the best team that we can be.” The Wolverines remained down, 2-1, until the top of the fifth, when they put runners on second and third with no outs. Junior right fielder Carmen Benedetti brought the tying run home when he grounded out to second, scoring sophomore infielder Jake Bivens. That left Ramsay on third with only one out. But Michigan was unable to take the lead, as Wenson struck out and senior outfielder Cody Bruder grounded out to finish the inning. The score remained tied until the deluge of the sixth frame. “We had some spots in the early innings where we weren’t able to capitalize,” Ramsay said. “It’s good to get early runs.” The Wolverines did show some life in the top of the ninth when they trailed, 11-3. Senior catcher Dominic Jamett roped a basesloaded, two-run double to left field to cut the deficit to six. But the Wolverines’ rally was quickly extinguished when Bruder lined out and Benedetti was thrown out at second base. “We just got our bats and continued to put quality at-bats on,” Ramsay said. “It’s a sign of a good team that even after getting punched in the face, we were still able to put together some quality at-bats together after that.”
“We’ve certainly hit our share of adversity the last seven days.”
Sports
8A — Wednesday, April 13, 2016
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Grading Michigan’s hockey season By KEVIN SANTO Daily Sports Writer
After making the NCAA Tournament for the first time since 2011, the Michigan hockey team ended its season with a 5-2 loss to North Dakota on March 26. Before we turn the page to next season, the Daily evaluates the Wolverines’ performance in 2015-16. Offense: A+ The Wolverines boasted a historic offense this year, averaging 4.76 goals per game. That mark was good for first nationally, and no team has scored at that clip since at least the 19992000 season. Michigan was held under three goals just seven times in 40 games
— one of which came in the NCAA Tournament against eventual national champion North Dakota. The CCM line — composed of freshman forward Kyle Connor and junior forwards JT Compher and Tyler Motte — led the prolific attack, combining for 83 of the Wolverines’ 181 goals. Connor notched 71 points, while Compher and Motte tallied 63 and 57, respectively. The trio was among the top four nationally in points. Additionally, Connor led the country in points and Compher earned the No. 1 spot in assists. The power-play unit was exceptional as well, ranking first nationally with a 32-percent conversion rate. After losing Andrew Copp, Dylan Larkin and Zach Hyman
last year, the expectations for Michigan’s offense were on the modest end. That trio accounted for more than 25 percent of the team’s points, but the Wolverines made it look like they didn’t even miss them this year. Still, Michigan will be faced with another retooling process on the offensive end next season, as Motte and Connor have signed professional contracts and Compher’s decision has yet to be announced. Defense: BIt was essentially the same story but a different season for Michigan’s blueliners. The Wolverines strung together some stout defensive performances throughout the
season, but those stretches didn’t come nearly often enough. Frequently, Michigan’s potent offense carried the team to victories even after conceding four to six goals. The team tied for 38th in team defense nationally — averaging 3.03 goals against per game. In that category, Michigan regressed a bit from last season, when it conceded an average of 2.9 goals. That’s not to say there weren’t flashes of success. The Wolverines ended the regular season with a sweep of No. 14 Penn State, in which the Nittany Lions mustered just two goals. In November, Michigan also held then-No. 11 Boston University to four goals in two games. But there were always hiccups, such as the penultimate series against an unranked Ohio State team when the Wolverines conceded 13 goals. Sophomore defenseman Zach Werenski headlined the defense, accumulating 35 points with 11 goals and 24 assists. His point total was good for fourth on the team behind the CCM line, and the nexthighest scoring defenseman was junior Michael Downing with 20. Now, Michigan is tasked with finding answers in its defensive zone, as both Werenski and Downing left for the NHL. The impacts that freshmen Nicholas Boka and Joe Cecconi had, in addition to the emergence of Nolan De Jong, are encouraging for future success. But the Wolverines certainly still have plenty of room left for improvement. Goaltending: AThe goaltending situation was shaky to begin the season, as senior Steve Racine and junior Zach Nagelvoort looked poised for yet another position battle. Racine picked up an injury early in the year, and Nagelvoort took over the starting duties. But Racine returned from
JAMES COLLER/Daily
Junior Nolan De Jong is the Daily’s vote for Michigan’s most improved player.
the injury in the Great Lakes Invitational and firmly seized a spot between the pipes for the remainder of the season. For the most part, the senior netminder seemed to get better with each weekend, culminating with two exceptional games in the NCAA Tournament. He played like a man possessed, making sprawling save after sprawling save. Racine notched 28 saves against Notre Dame and played with the pressure of a 2-1 deficit on his shoulders for nearly two whole periods before the Wolverines scored an equalizer and sent the game to overtime. Though the final score didn’t indicate it, his performance against eventual national champion North Dakota was even more impressive. Racine allowed five goals, but that was largely due to the fact
that Michigan was outmatched all over the ice. Without him, the Wolverines could have found themselves in a 5-0 hole as early as the first period. The Fighting Hawks peppered him with 49 shots, and two of their goals came on the power play. He finished the season with a .914 save percentage and a 2.89 goals-against average, and given his performances to end the season, Michigan has a void to fill in between the pipes next season. The Daily hockey beat also voted for Offensive MVP, Defensive MVP, Most Improved Player, Unsung Hero and Comeback of the Year: Offensive MVP: Kyle Connor Defensive MVP: Steve Racine Most Improved Player: Nolan De Jong Unsung Hero: Cutler Martin Comeback of the Year: Red Berenson
The students & photos of the year issue
statement THE MICHIGAN DAILY | APRIL 13 , 2016
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Wednesday,April 13. 2016 // The Statement
t h e s t at e m e n t
the tangent
Magazine Editor: Karl Williams
Design Editor: Shane Achenbach
Creative Director: Emilie Farrugia
Deputy Editor: Nabeel Chollampat
Photo Editor: Zoey Holmstrom
Editor in Chief: Shoham Geva
Students of the Year: Letter From the Editors
Copy Editors: Emily Campbell Alexis Nowicki Jose Rosales
Managing Editor: Laura Schinagle
Photos of the Year: Letter From the Editors Magazine Editor, Karl Williams
43,625 students attend the University of Michigan. Only 12 are Students of the Year. Nominated by their peers and mentors, this small handful of students has been chosen for a multitude of reasons. An ability to exceed in both sport and academics, a commitment to community service, a resilience in the face of personal struggle — these are just a few of the qualities that the students that populate these pages possess. But they, like every student, are also much more than 750-word profiles. They are dreamers, friends, inspirations. They make mistakes (but maybe less than others). They are complex, dynamic humans. They are the leaders and best.
Deputy Editor, Nabeel Chollampat
Design Editor, Shane Achenbach
Creative Director, Emilie Farrugia
With the onslaught of approaching elections, the revival of Michigan football, and a colorful array of happenings throughout Ann Arbor, this has been an exciting year for our staff. In this final issue of The Statement, we offer you a summary of the year’s best moments as seen through our camera lenses. Join us in the front row of your favorite concert, on the court, on the streets, and in between the sheets during the 2015-2016 school year. Enjoy!
Meet the Students of the Year. They’re happy to meet you. Photo Editor, Zoey Holmstrom
on the record: university success stories “The job is to ask questions—it always was—and to ask them as inexorably as I can. And to face the absence of precise answers with a certain humility.”
— Playwright ARTHUR MILLER, who graduated from the University in 1938, on the importance of asking questions..
“The logic of an occupation, I think, is if you feel voiceless about a burning issue of great, great importance, and the institutions have failed you, the only way to get leverage for your voice is to occupy their space in order to get their attention.” —Activist TOM HAYDEN, who graduated from the University in the early 60s, and was a major figure of the civil rights movement.
“The worst crime of all would be that a mistake happens and no one talks about it or learns from it. So, as unsettling as it is to think about, these mistakes, complications and unexpected outcomes get discussed openly and everyone hopefully gains something from it. —Dr. SANJAY GUPTA, who graduated from the Medical School in 1993.
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LAURA MEYER B Y LY D I A M U R R AY, D A I LY S TA F F R E P O R T E R
MAZIE HYAMS / Daily
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SA senior Laura Meyer’s immediate response to being chosen as Student of the Year was to share the recognition with all the other member of the Sexual Assault Prevention and Awareness Center. “It’s really fun to be recognized for something that I’ve worked really hard on,” she said. “But at the same time a lot of the stuff that we’ve all accomplished has been done together, so I want to recognize the people who have also helped make everything happen.”
Meyer is volunteer coordinator at SAPAC meaning she organizes all of the volunteers to make sure everything runs smoothly and does community organizing and outreach. She helped coordinate big events like the annual Speak Out, Revolution — a spring art show — and the Week of Activism. Meyer said she first joined SAPAC because she wanted to be a part of an organization that actually took action on a larger scale and made a significant impact on the community it is a part of.
REBECCA ROSENTHAL BY LARA MOEHLMAN, D A I LY S TA F F R E P O R T E R
GRANT HARDY / Daily
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ailing from Manhattan’s Upper East Side, LSA junior Rebecca Rosenthal seems to naturally thrive under the fast-paced lifestyle that accompanies the pressure of a busy schedule and a variety of extracurricular commitments. Double majoring in English and Political Science, Rosenthal plans to attend law school after she graduates. But when she’s not writing papers or studying into the early morning hours at the library, she’s focusing on creating positive change on campus. She joined the Wolverine Support Network, a peer-led mental health support group piloted last winter, during its inau-
gural semester. She has since then played a major role in developing and expanding the program. Next semester, she will serve as a director of the program. WSN places participating students, at random, into confidential, weekly support groups. Student leaders are trained to facilitate dialogue between peers coping with a wide variety of mental health issues, including eating disorders, issues of gender or sexuality, anxiety and depression. WSN also offers “Kickback Fridays” every other week for both members and the campus community at large, in which leaders plan activities such as yoga or other stress-relieving activi-
“I got involved as a sophomore because I was really interested in being involved in an organization that had a more formalized structure,” she said. “That way I knew that the work I did would be executed and be continued into the future. I was tired of being in organizations and them not being organized enough to really accomplish anything.” Meyer has touched the lives of many through SAPAC, but more introspectively, Meyer said the organization has greatly influenced her own life too. SAPAC emphasizes reflection for its leadership members, which has allowed Meyer to think about her own qualities as a leader. “It has allowed me to think about my values, leadership style and identity and how that impacts how I am as a leader,” she said. “It’s sharpened my vision into the future and made me think more about what my guiding values and principles are. I’m constantly learning from all of these people, and that has been the biggest place of growth for me.” SAPAC also focuses on self-care for all those involved in the organization. Meyer said if she feels she is not properly taking care of herself, then she cannot do as much for others as she would like. “You can’t do this work if you are at 100 percent yourself,” she said. “Centralizing that and focusing on it in my own life can be really difficult. I always made to do more, but I can’t always accomplish much if I’m not at 100 percent.” But, for Meyer, the most important aspect of SAPAC is its social justice element. She said social justice is a core part of her person-
ality and SAPAC gives her an outlet to apply that. “For me something that guides me and is very central to who I am is the vision of a socially just world,” she said. “Working in SAPAC we centralize our work on one issue, but we complicate that with all these other issues that also impact that. I am really interested in social change, and I feel like I can accomplish that through SAPAC.” For Meyer, SAPAC has become an incredibly important part of her life, giving her energy and encouraging her to do as much as she can to help her community. She also noted the importance of community within the group, noting one of the reasons she became so involved was all of the “bomb-ass people.” “I’ve adored my time at SAPAC,” she said. “It is the engine of my life. It drives me forward. It gives me this energy that I did not have before. I’m so thankful for the experience to learn more about who I am.” Because of her work at SAPAC, Meyer said she wishes to continue this sort of work with social justice by working in government relations for a women’s health non-profit following her upcoming graduate. “Working at SAPAC has helped me think about what I want to do sort of day-to-day,” she said. “And it helps me with thinking about the way you can incorporate social justice into everything you do and make it more of a daily practice rather than a broad longterm goal. I know whatever I do, that I idea of justice will be with me and shape what I do.”
ties as relaxing alternatives to other weekend plans. “When I came to college, I was lucky enough to find a niche and a group especially through joining a sorority that I fit into quickly,” Rosenthal said, referring to her sorority, Delta Delta Delta. “So if I ever needed anything, I had friends to turn to, but I met a lot of students through different classes and activities who I could see were struggling with anxiety or depression — and they were things that I knew really well — and I could tell they had nowhere to turn.” Rebecca said she sees WSN as an important alternative resource for students who may not feel comfortable making appointments at Counseling and Psychological Services. She noted that student leaders are trained to direct students to other professional resource centers on campus, such as CAPS or Sexual Assualt Prevention and Awareness Center, if they identify a need. Currently, WSN has 150 active members and 60 student leaders. “The hour I lead group every week — which is Thursday from 8 to 9 p.m. — that’s the highlight of my week, and it’s the one hour of my week where I feel like I can be myself because I know the students enrolled in my group don’t judge anything I’m saying,” Rebecca said. “I think it’s helped me being a leader just as much as I hope it’s helped them.” As a director of WSN, she plans to both expand membership and promote mental health awareness on campus by reaching a larger audience of students and encourag-
ing them to attend Kickback Friday events. In addition to WSN, Rosenthal also helped found Salad’s UP, a salad restaurant on East Liberty that was opened in December 2014 by then University seniors Robby Mayer and Max Steir. She currently works with managing, menu planning, marketing and design for the restaurant, which is set to expand this summer. “It’s been crazy,” she said. “We had no idea what we were doing when we opened a restaurant, but it’s been so fun, and I love that.” Rosenthal credits her passion and drive as an active member of the campus and Ann Arbor community to her parents as well as her grandfather, who was student body president during his time at Michigan. “I’ve always been a busy person,” Rosenthal said. “Some people might say I stretch myself too thin, but I love being busy. I thrive when I’m busy because I’m more focused.” “Sure, some nights I’m exhausted — I’m getting two hours of sleep and I’m miserable, and I wish I could stay at home and watch Netflix for six hours and go out with my friends more, but I wouldn’t change it,” she continued. “I’m so thankful for every opportunity I’ve been given at Michigan and that I’ve done outside of Michigan as well, and I think that I’ve become a more well-rounded individual.” After college, she plans to continue impacting positive social change, either in the nonprofit or human rights law fields.
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SAN PHAM/Daily
Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti residents march in memory of Aura Rosser for the May Day March for Justice on May 1, 2015.
A YEAR IN NEWS
ALLISON FARRAND/Daily
Two thousand ninety-six women dressed as Rosie the Riveter gather at Willow Run Airport in Ypsilanti, Michigan on October 25, 2015 to reclaim the Guinness World Record for the numbers of Rosies in one place.
HALEY MCLAUGHLIN/Daily
Members of the Ann Arbor Alliance for Black Lives lead a walk in the memory of Aura Rosser from the League to the pedestrian bridge over Washtenaw Ave. on January 20, 2016.
Wednesday, April 13, 2016 // The Statement
AVA RANDA/Daily
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Ann Arbor resident Libby Hunter calls for Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder to be fired at a weekly protest on Main Street on March 9, 2016.
EMILIE FARRUGIA/Daily
Engineering freshman Gabriel Croitoru tries out Google Cardboard VR at TedxUofM at the Power Center on April 1, 2016.
ROBERT DUNNE/Daily
Ypsilanti resident Khaman Thomas holds a banner in a protest against police violence on November 9, 2015.
EMILIE FARRUGIA/Daily
A child sits on a Ducati bike at the North American International Auto Show in Detroit on January 16, 2016.
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HANNAH BUCK BY MAGGIE K O L C O N , D A I LY SPORTS WRITER
ZOEY HOLMSTROM / Daily
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n paper, LSA sophomore Hannah Buck looks like every other highachieving person enrolled at the University of Michigan. She double majors in English and Communications with a concentration in creative writing. She is currently acting as the Public Relations Chair member for the Groove Performance Group, a percussion team that entertains audiences with trashcan drumming and plenty of glow-inthe-dark paint. However, the people that she befriends (and there are many) might be surprised to learn that Buck has more than just a rigorous class schedule and Groove performances to keep up with. Every day, Buck has to focus on her breathing, something that most people can take for granted. She is constantly bat-
tling cystic fibrosis, a chronic illness that attacks the lungs, causing often severe damage over time as well as many other issues that affect quality and duration of life. “It’s really hard to get out of bed in the morning when your body is just fighting itself,” Buck said. Yet somehow, she manages to not only get out of bed, but also accomplish more each day than many people do with a healthy set of lungs. Buck’s disease is something that is hard to comprehend and even more difficult to live with, so she has dedicated herself to easing the burden for others by sharing her story. Her YouTube channel, HannahBreathes, is where she shares information about how she’s feeling, what her current health status is, and any helpful tips she has for other
AHMAD HIDER BY I R E N E PA R K , D A I LY S TA F F REPORTER
GRANT HARDY / Daily
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I just love life, I really do,” LSA senior Ahmad Hider said with a wide smile at the start of the interview, with energy and enthusiasm that were present throughout the entire conversation. Hider began by listing what he loves about his life — family, friends, basketball, food and so on. His list was endless, but he noted education as his primary focus and
passion during his three years at the University. He said education is the most powerful tool one can have — it provides people opportunities to succeed, and it stays with you for life. “I believe everyone should have all the opportunities to succeed in their lives,” he said. “You can strip someone of everything they have, but you can never strip away
people with CF. She also runs a blog for the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. “I get messages and e-mails on probably a weekly basis, from mostly students around the country and around the world either saying that I’ve helped them or asking for advice,” Buck said. Her advice is usually about things like how to stay organized with the almost 30 different medications she has to keep track of. However, most of the reason she has such a large audience is that her video chats tend to spill into general life philosophies and ideas that she is passionate about. “I have so many platforms. I feel like that’s what I am on social media, just a human platform,” she said, ticking them off on her fingers. “You should read books. You shouldn’t smoke cigarettes. You should be an organ donor. You should be an advocate for mental health and you should fight the stigma. Just be a decent human, really, is my main thing.” Buck’s life is an open book for the most part, even when talking about things that most people try and block out of their minds, for all the world to see and critique. “Some things are uncomfortable,” Buck said. “More uncomfortable for me to share than my cystic fibrosis or my asthma or all my physical things was when I started speaking out about my anxiety and depression, because that is something that the general public is conditioned to believe should be kept secret. You shouldn’t talk about that, it’s so embarrassing. And it was embarrassing, until I started getting those messages about
how other people felt the same way.” Many people that have cystic fibrosis do not attend college, and if they do, they take courses online or at a community college close to home. Just the fact that Buck is here, several hours away from home at the University of Michigan, is a huge deal. “The biggest thing is that it is very hard and the balance does not come easily,” Buck said. “The semesters where I physically felt better, my grades were not as high, because I spent a lot more time focusing on running every day and I spent more hours doing treatments. The semesters where my grades were better, I just felt like crap by the end of the semester because I neglected everything.” It’s easy to forget that this vibrant, wellspoken girl in the neon pink and yellow sweatshirt also sometimes finds herself laying in a hospital bed connected to a breathing tube. It doesn’t happen often, but occasionally her health declines to the point where she has to go to the hospital for a few days so that they can monitor her breathing and get her back on track. “For the record, cystic fibrosis is the most curable incurable disease. All we need is funds,” Buck said. “I’m very looking forward to new treatments and eventually the cure for CF. I am very confident in saying that it is within reach within my lifetime.” In the meantime, Buck will be focusing on finding her perfect balance between school and health, writing, blogging and, of course, drumming on trashcans.
their education.” For Hider, it was important to maintain a busy lifestyle to get as much out from his college education as he could. His main motivation is his family, whose early struggles motivated Hider to be passionate about education. “I’m a first-generation college student,” Hider said. “I saw the struggles (my parents) went through. My father started at a gas station before he began working at a mechanic shop and was able to raise a family. My mom has always been the heart of the home, and I can never repay them for their sacrifices.” Currently, Hider works as an undergraduate researcher in Haoxing Xu’s group. Xu, an associate professor of molecular, cellular and developmental biology, and his team study lysosomes, waste disposal systems in the cell. Without lysosomes, the waste builds up and ultimately kills the cell. Hider is involved with a project that focused on a disease with defective lysosome functions — how mutations in a protein called TRPML1 causes the defects leading to the disease. The results were recently published in Nature Cell Biology, and Hider is one of the co-authors on this publication. Hider said he initially put in about 10 hours a week to his experiments, but as he gained more responsibilities in the lab, he began to put in close to 30 to 40 hours a week. “It got to a point where I went ‘you know what, I’m just going to sleep in the lab today,’ ” Hider said. “The amount of work paid off
because we got a paper published in Nature, which was a major accomplishment.” But Hider cares deeply about education for other students, too. He has taught CHEM 125 and 211, which are general chemistry and organic chemistry lab courses, respectively. Hider said he loves seeing the reactions of the students from the instructor’s perspective — another reason for him to care about teaching. “To see the happiness and smiles on people’s faces when they learn and understand something new is amazing,” Hider said. “That really motivates me to focus on education.” His passion for education does not stop at the University level. He is constantly keeping himself busy with his ideas — he is planning to launch a tutoring program for local elementary school students because “(education) starts there.” He envisions the tutoring to provide a more “hands-on” tutoring experience for the students. “I just want to better the education for everyone, not just my own,” Hider said. As for future plans, Hider said he’s unsure where his passions will take him exactly, but he intends to go into the medical field to help other people because the experiences will be rewarding. Right now, cardiovascular surgery is on the top of his list, but he also has other interests. “I really want to go into cardiovascular surgery,” Hider said. “But I always wanted to go into public health too … to focus on global health problems such as HIV.”
Wednesday, April 13, 2016 // The Statement
Big Ten’s and nationals her freshmen year. Despite some setbacks due to injury, Phelan continued to persevere and just recently finished off this past indoor season with an AllAmerican title in the distance medley relay at NCAA Nationals and numerous personal records. However, Phelan quickly emphasized group effort, pointing to her teammates as sources of strength and encouragement over the course of the season. “It felt awesome to be able to share it with the three other girls on the DMR team right there with us,” she said. “But I think everyone on our team kind of helped us get there.” She shows this perspective in all aspects of her life, and not just on the track. “I’m definitely grateful to be a part of organizations that are so much bigger than myself,” Phelan said. “In Women’s Track
and Field, we all put on the singlet with the block ‘M’, and then as soon as you put on that singlet, you’re representing Michigan. Then with the Depression Center’s Student Advisory Board and Athlete’s Connected, it’s trying to help everyone else deal with anything that they’re dealing with, anything that they may be struggling with.” Phelan got involved with Athlete’s Connected and the Depression Center’s Student Advisory Board during her sophomore year, and credits Will Heininger, Michigan defensive end, and Trish Meyer, Program Director for Outreach and Education, for helping introduce her to the programs and developing her passion for mental health. As she continued to attend more meetings, she felt like she could open up and share her own struggles that she was dealing with, while also becoming more aware of the resources available on campus. “My freshman year I feel like I didn’t know about the resources that were available for mental health, and I think with how passionate I became for mental health, that’s one of the big things for me,” Phelan said. “I don’t want other people to feel confused. We all want it to be accessible for everyone on campus.” Phelan describes Athlete’s Connected as an “open space” where student-athletes can come together to discuss anything and everything on their minds — whether it be academic stress or clinical depression. “It’s very similar to an athletic injury, just the same way as if you were injured with anything. Like if we have a hurt ankle, we can go into the training room, get help
from our trainers, it’s the same with mental health,” Phelan said. “If you are struggling, or just having a rough day and you need to take a step back, you can either come to Athletes Connected, or there are the resources where you can get help from a professional or anyone else.” Phelan’s joy for life at the University is absolutely contagious. This campus, she said, had a big impact on her. “I honestly feel like Michigan is my second home,” she said with a smile spread across her face. “Every time you walk by and see a block ‘M’, it just makes you smile. I just love it.” Her summer plans include continuing to advocate for mental health and working as hard as she can for her team, but Phelan has another noteworthy goal — making the Olympic Trials. “I’m going to try to go to trials, and with Nicole Sifuentes being here, it’s going to be a good experience. I get to go back home, see people and continue training,” she said. Though she has big goals and high expectations of herself, as both a national-caliber athlete and prominent leader, Phelan stresses the importance of taking life day-by-day and focusing on the little things. Her favorite quote is, “The smallest deed is better than the greatest intention.” She aspires to do all of the little things she can for the team, and all of the little things she can for the University of Michigan. “I think doing the little things goes a long way and can mean a lot to someone,” Phelan said.
optiMize is centered on social impact — a phrase that Johnson says guides what she does. “I think it’s just looking at everything you do on a daily basis and trying to figure out the most positive way to do it,” she said. “So if you want to accomplish something or make something better, how many people’s days can you improve?” she said. Originally from Orlando, Fla., Johnson came to the University after childhood visits to Detroit and the surrounding area. Having attended smaller schools her entire life, the University offered the opportunity for “something bigger.” And after a chance
encounter with an optiMize poster that said, “Why not me? Stop waiting for someone else to change the world,” Johnson was sold. “That resonated with me just because I had never really had something phrased like that before,” she said. “I never thought of service as social change, as something that could have a worldwide impact.” Johnson joined as a core team member, but was quickly moved to the marketing team her freshman year. Team leaders try to identify each member’s strengths and move him or her accordingly. OptiMize’s main event is the Social Innovation Challenge. Students who have ideas for social innovation and entrepreneurship apply in October, and over seven months, optiMize mentors and various workshops provide various resources to help turn these ideas into startups, student organizations or other. At the end of the year, a few of these groups are chosen for funding from optiMize. This allocation of funding is based on each team’s ability to make a social impact, its cultural competence and its growth throughout the year. The organization’s biggest donor is the nonprofit organization United Way, and it also raises money from anonymous alumni donors. This year alone, Johnson and optiMize have raised $750,000 and have worked with more than 250 students. Johnson is careful to note the difference
between competition and challenge: teams that apply do not get cut; they just don’t get all the funding. She distinguishes this kind of structure as a “self-challenge.” “If every team were to be successful, everyone would be better off, because every team is making social change,” she said. “I think that’s the main thing that differentiates optiMize and makes me love it so much.” This summer, Johnson plans to help out with the optiMize Fellows program, in which she will mentor students who stay at the University over the summer and work on their projects. Friends alternately describe Johnson as possessing “a kind of energy that lights up any room into which she walks” and someone who “would rather see someone else take ownership of a role and thrive.” It’s clear that Johnson, as optiMize’s president, is popular. “We like to think of the environment and sustainability, but I like to think of sustainability as also sustainability of people,” she said. After this year, Johnson will no longer be the president of optiMize, but her involvement with the organization will not stop there. Whether it’s being a future mentor or continually helping out and advising the group’s fundamental goal of social change Johnson has one main objective: “I just like making people feel important.”
JAIMIE PHELAN BY KAELA T H E U T, O P I N I O N COLUMNIST
MARINA ROSS / Daily
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SA junior Jaimie Phelan has a lot on her plate: playing an instrumental role on the Women’s Track and Field team while working tirelessly with Athletes Connected and the Depression Center Student Advisory Board as an advocate for ending the stigma surrounding mental health issues. Yet, she never lets herself get too overwhelmed. “It definitely feels like a lot, but I also kind of have that mindset that I’m still learning,” she said. “I’m still growing and I’m surrounded by so many amazing people on campus at Michigan and on our amazing team.” Hailing from Ontario, Canada, Phelan decided to attend Michigan based on the strong psychology program and the success of the track and field team where, she immediately made an impact — scoring at both
ERIN JOHNSON
BY NABEEL C H O L L A M PAT, S TAT E M E N T D E P U T Y EDITOR
GRANT HARDY / Daily
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n a campus teeming with innovators and entrepreneurs, Erin Johnson stands out. The sophomore, who is studying business and international studies, wants to clarify, though: hers “isn’t some superstar story.” “I feel like all these other people are going to have all these crazy stories,” she said of the rest of the Student of the Year nominees. “I just feel like I decided to take on this role and I took it on to the best of my ability.” Johnson is the president of optiMize, a student organization on campus focused on helping student entrepreneurs materialize their ideas. Unlike similar organizations,
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A YEAR IN ENTERTAINMENT
EMILIE FARRUGIA/Daily
Valley Hush performs at the Blind Pig on December 3, 2015.
ZACH MOORE/Daily
Paul McCartney performs at Joe Louis Arena in Detroit on October 28, 2015.
ZOEY HOLMSTROM/Daily
Twenty One Pilots perform on their Blurryface tour at Saint Andrew’s Hall in Detroit on December 17, 2015.
EVAN AARON/Daily
DJ Scout performs at VictorThon 2016 in the intramural sports building on March 12, 2016.
LIZZY XIONG/Daily
A ballroom couple dances bolero at the Ohio Star Ball professional show on November 20, 2015.
DAVID SONG/Daily
Giraffage performs at Populux in Detroit on November 27, 2015.
CLAIRE ABDO/Daily
Samsoche Sampson dances for Native American Heritage Month at the Michigan Union on Monday on November 30th, 2015.
MARINA ROSS/Daily
Stevie Wonder performs at Joe Louis Arena in Detroit on November 21, 2015.
ZACH MOORE/Daily
Zedd performs at the Masonic Temple in Detroit on October 30, 2015.
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RAMA MWENESI BY LOGAN HANSEN, D A I LY S TA F F R E P O R T E R
AMANDA ALLEN / Daily
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ackham student Rama Mwenesi means a lot of different things to the people who know him. Within the University of Michigan community. To his fellow engineers — and many others, actually — he is the founder of E-MAGINE, a multidisciplinary student startup working to bring Internet access to remote areas in countries like Brazil, Sierra Leone, Kenya and Zambia. To those others who know him from academia, he is a determined student, who has already completed an undergraduate degree in Industrial and Operations Engineering through the University — accompanied by two minors, no less, in International Studies in Engineering and Design Engineering as well as a certificate in Entrepreneurship. As well, he who will be graduating this spring from an integrated master’s program at UM combining IOE and Health Management & Policy. To his superiors and coworkers within the University’s health system, he is a health care engineering consultant, constantly seeking ways to improve patient care and safety, looking to avoid what he calls “stop-valve solutions” and instead concentrating efforts on long-term solutions and policies. To those he works with through the office of Services for Students with Disabilities, he is a member of the Student Advisory Board, who has helped students all across campus through the development of outreach and mentorship programs, making the navigation of tumultuous waters just a little bit. To the members of the University’s club boxing team, he is a trusted coach (and former four-year captain), confident in his athletes’ abilities and endlessly, tire-
lessly cheering them on when they enter into competition around the country. He is all of these things to all of these groups of people, yet he still says most people don’t know him all that well. This, he elaborates, is because they don’t know where he’s come from, what he’s been through and just how difficult it has been for him to reach a position where he has garnered not one, but two Student of the Year nominations — the first coming in 2013, when he was still an undergraduate. What the majority of these people are unaware of is that Rama suffered a brain injury due to multiple sports-related concussions when he was younger, and his doctors, he said, were uncertain whether he’d even be around today to tell his story, let alone to be nearing the completion of a second degree from an institution of higher learning. “When I came here to Michigan and I realized I am quote-unquote 'disadvantaged' compared to the rest of my peers in certain aspects, neurologically that is … the question was: Am I going to give this up or not?” he said. “And then I reached out to the SSD [Services for Students with Disabilities] office and they really just transformed my entire experience here in terms of helping me understand what it is even that I’m going through.” “It’s not like a broken arm or a broken leg where you can clearly see that so-and-so has, maybe, a challenge here or a problem there,” he continued. “The more neurologically complex these issues are, the harder it is to even explain to just any other person out there.” Before coming to the University, Rama’s family and friends dissuaded him from doing so, saying they didn’t
think it was worth it, that they thought he “wasn’t neurologically able to make it through.” But Rama was determined to seek out education in the United States, despite the fact that he might someday not remember a thing he learned due to neurodegeneration. “My whole M.O. from the very beginning was, as cliché as it may sound: impossible is truly nothing,” he said. “Impossible is nothing, (and) as I look towards graduating in less than a month, this whole process — even this interview and everything — I am truly grateful for Michigan, truly grateful for the opportunities it’s awarded me.” So yes, Rama is many things — an international student from Kenya; holder of an undergraduate degree in Industrial and Operations Engineering; a one-time double minor; a former fellow involved with the University’s hospital system; founder of E-MAGINE, bringing Internet access to remote areas in Africa and South America; a coach for the club boxing team; the list goes on. But the one thing he wants you to know is this: he has struggled along the way, has tried to be the most genuine version of himself he can be and, above all, he just wants to make a difference while he still can. Nearing his second graduation from the University, he says, “This is something special, and this is something that I hope others can truly just, like, take a page, see, like, if this kid can do it, if this kid can do it … ” And he can’t even finish the thought. He is so humbled, so grateful, so overwhelmed to be recognized for this award for a second time, that he cannot find the words to express what it all means. That’s OK, Rama. We know.
Wednesday, April 13, 2016 // The Statement
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FABIANA DIAZ B Y E M M A K I N E R Y, D A I LY N E W S E D I T O R
MATT VAILLIENCOURT / Daily
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ver her time on campus, LSA senior Fabiana Diaz has realized the necessity of advocating to prevent sexual assault, even if she herself isn't fully healed. “It is a privilege to be able to talk about [sexual assault] and advocate for it, because not everyone has that opportunity, but at the same time sometimes it can be tiring mentally,” Diaz said. “Just because I’m advocating for something doesn’t mean I’m completely 100 percent healed. There are moments where I still feel like a victim. There are moments where I still feel like I need support. But it’s hard because there’s like people coming to you for support — you have to learn to balance it.” On her second night campus, while at the summer Bridge program, she was raped, Diaz said. “I was so alone," she said. "I was coming here and I didn’t know anybody, and because I was in the Bridge program, so everybody knew something had happened. People talk.” She said was told if she took her case to court her assailant would not be prosecuted against, and the process of going through questioning would be more draining on her. Diaz, who was beginning her freshman year on campus — adjusting to college can already be hard, but the experience made it even more isolating. “I had just started. I just started school,” Diaz said. “I was missing class all of the time being called in for questioning — whatever it was, it was exhausting. It was a very exhausting process, and that just makes it harder. Who would want to go through that? I would not want to go through that again.” She said she had been assured she would not see her assailant in her dorm or classes, but on her first day of class, he was there.
Diaz said she stayed quiet about her experience for a long time, and it was not until her junior year when the “Carry The Weight” march happened on campus she felt comfortable speaking out and joining the movement. She began volunteering at Sexual Assualt Prevention and Awareness Center after the march and being open about what happened to her. “I think that’s when I realized I wasn’t alone: It wasn’t just happening to me,” Diaz said. “It was kind of silent on campus; I didn’t really know any other survivors at all actually.” Later that year when “The Hunting Ground” — a documentary on campus sexual assault — was screened at the Michigan Theater, she met activists Andrea Pino and Annie Clark who were both survivors of rape while at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and are the primary subjects of the film. Through Pino and Clark, Diaz was invited to stand onstage at the Oscars with Lady Gaga and other victims of sexual assault. Diaz said the experience was amazing and marked the first time she was surrounded by so many survivors, but after she needed to remind people of the reason she was there. After receiving many texts from people saying she was “lucky” for the experience and wishing they were her, Diaz felt compelled to write a piece on the reality of her situation. “It was very cathartic to write about that, but it was also hard because I don’t want people to think I’m not appreciative of them,” she said. “I just wanted them to further understand I’m not lucky. I’m not lucky for this opportunity. People weren’t understanding, like ‘I’m so jealous’ well, I’ll give it to you. I don’t want to be at the Oscars for this reason.” Being open about being a survivor is often a catch-22 for Diaz. In some ways it has been a positive experience which
has altered the course of her life — she now wants to continue activism after graduation — but she does not want people to see it as her defining quality. “People would say: ‘I’m so proud of you.’ They are. I understand why people can be proud of me,” Diaz said. “Why I decided to write the article is because I don’t want to be proud, and I don’t want other people to be proud of me, for what someone else did to my body. I don’t want that to be the defining factor; I know that’s not how people see it, but sometimes it’s hard to be the face for this movement because I’m so much more than my identity as a survivor.” Continuing to work with Pino and Clark, Diaz has contributed to writing a book titled “We Believe You: Survivors of Sexual Assault” which came out on April 12. In it, she and 35 other survivors share their story of sexual assault on campus. Diaz said she wished she had a book like this when she was assaulted — seeing it at SAPAC or coming across it in the library, Diaz said, would have helped her feel less alone. Being one of the faces of the sexual assault prevention movement is difficult for Diaz at times, but she said it’s necessary. “It’s hard, but it has to be done,” Diaz said. “It’s hard to sometimes be the voice because you don’t want to speak for everyone. Survivorhood isn’t just like one all-encompassing thing: It’s different for everyone. Everyone has their own personal story, their own personal narrative. There might be commonalities in the sense that, yeah, our schools are betraying us — there are 160 schools under federal investigation for potentially violating Title IX — that’s a national narrative that’s happening, but at the same time, our traumas are different, and our traumas don’t define us either.”
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Wednesday, April 13, 2016 // The Statement
A YEAR IN SPORTS ALLISON FARRAND/Daily
MAIZE HYAMS/Daily
Junior tight end Jake Butt makes confetti angels after Michigan's victory over Florida in the Citrus Bowl in Orlando, Florida on Friday, January 1, 2015.
Freshman Collin DeShaw dives at a swim meet against Michigan State at Canham Natatorium on February 6, 2016.
ALLISON FARRAND/Daily
An in-camera multiple exposure of University of Michigan gymnast Lauren Marinez competing in a meet at the Crisler Center in Ann Arbor, Michigan on January 16, 2016.
MARINA ROSS/Daily
Members of Michigan’s soccer team celebrate a goal made against Michigan State on October 31, 2015.
ROBERT DUNNE/Daily
Junior Zak Irvin attempts a lay up in a game against Youngstown State on December 19, 2015.
LUNA ANNA ARCHEY/Daily
Sophomore Brianna Brown performs on the balance beam at a meet on February 14, 2016.
ZOEY HOLMSTROM/Daily
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JAMES COLLER/Daily
Wednesday, April 13, 2016 // The Statement
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Junior wide receiver Da'Mario Jones celebrates with students after Michigan's 31-0 victory over BYU on September 26.
ZOEY HOLMSTROM/Daily
Freshman Olivia Karas performs on the uneven bars in the Crisler Center on February 8, 2016.
MAIZE HYAMS/Daily
Sophomore Emily Kopas dives in to swim breaststroke at a meet against Michigan State at Canham Natatorium on February 6, 2016.
STINA PERKINS/Daily
Michigan infielder Lindsay Montemarano chases down a bunt in front of third base on March 26, 2016.
ALLISON FARRAND/Daily JAMES COLLER/Daily
Freshman Nicholas Boka hugs his teammate after defeating Minnesota in the Big Ten Hockey tournament on March 19, 2016.
Michigan wide receiver Jehu Chesson stretches for the Wolverines' only touchdown of their 42-13 loss to Ohio State at Michigan Stadium on November 28, 2015.
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Wednesday, April 13, 2016 // The Statement
BRITTNEY WILLIAMS
that many obstacles, and it can make students who have had significant challenges feel badly or like they don’t fit in,” Williams said. “But to me, what I have gone through, and what other people who have faced hardships have gone through, is the quintessence of what a victor stands for. To be a victor and to be a Wolverine means that you have had to fight to get to where you are today.” Williams had to fight harder than most. When she enrolled in the University of Michigan in 2005, she planned on pursuing a degree in Political Science. Her first four years at the University, however, were less defined by her
academic ambitions and campus involvement than by her battle with depression. Williams’ depression became so severe in November 2009 that she attempted suicide and was hospitalized for five days. Following the hospitilization, Williams was faced with the decision of whether to take time off from school to focus on her mental health. “ I was advised by my advisers, my family and my friends to take a semester off to figure some things out,” Williams said. “I just kept on saying, ‘I’m OK’ and so I kept pushing through. I would continue to struggle academically, personally, mentally. But some of that was the culture that exists here at Michigan that compels you to burn yourself out before you take any sort of break.” Williams continued her studies at the University until 2011, when stress caused her academic performance to deteriorate until her academic suspension at the end of the winter semester in 2011. When she returned home, Williams faced her next challenge — caring for her mother, who had been diagnosed with early-onset Alzheimer’s disease in April 2008. She became the primary caregiver for her mother, whose health was quickly worsening. “When my mother was diagnosed, I was a junior,” Williams said “My siblings were, at the time, 17, 11, 10 and 9 years old. So it was really rough on everyone in my family, but it was the most heartbreaking for the youngest, who would later struggle to remember her before her disease.” Her mother passed away on Oct. 11, 2013,
a day after her sister’s birthday. Williams assumed responsibility for all of her mother’s funeral arrangements, which took place the day after her 25th birthday. The following May, Williams returned to Michigan and re-enrolled at the University. When she returned, she said she found the place that she left in 2011 had changed in many ways: some positive, some negative. Upon her return, she joined the Central Student Government and founded her own organization, Michigan Organization of NonTraditional Students (MONTS), to give voice to other nontraditional students. “When I came back I had a hard time because I was so much older than everyone, and I did a focus group where the Center for the Education of Women was doing a study on nontraditional students,” Williams said. “And the focus group had such a great conversation, and it led me to want to start a student organization to bring people like this together. In her typical “victor” fashion, she embraced and overcame these challenges. Later this month, Brittney Williams will be graduating with her bachelor’s degree in sociology. She hopes to attend the University’s graduate program in Social Work and pursue a career in Alzheimer’s advocacy, using her skills in gerontology to help families — especially children — of Alzheimer’s patients receive counseling. “My goal, down the road is to be lucky enough to not have a job,” Williams said. “That would mean that we have accomplished our goal, and Alzheimer’s will be a thing of the past.”
The Peace Initiative is a project whose purpose is to promote understanding between cultures through artwork, specifically in regard to dialogue between Muslims and some of the larger groups within the nation, a cause which is very personal for Ghias. “My parents are Pakistani, but I was born and raised here, so I always see myself as a blend of both Pakistani and American … that’s played a huge role in my
life,” Ghias said. Her experience of growing up as a Muslim in Michigan has played an important role in her motivation to start The Peace Initiative, but she also is driven by her passion for art. “I’ve always been an artist, that’s been a huge part of my life,” Ghias said. “And growing up wearing the hijab, I did get a lot of negative comments … so the way that I expressed myself is by creating art.” The origins of the project started in Ghias’s senior year of high school. Prompted by what she saw as a greater number of Islamophobic events happening around the world, dehumanizing coverage in the media, a feeling of frustration and the desire to do something, she started working on an art portfolio for herself. “(The portfolio was meant) to creatively show that Muslims were just normal people,” Ghias said. “We have all the same dreams, passions — we want to be successful, we want to have a family — all that.” Ghias’s personal art portfolio expanded this semester into a larger scale project after an encounter with the co-founder of optiMize, a social entrepreneurship club at the University. “(optiMize) holds a social innovation challenge every year,” Ghias said. “And basically what you can do is you can apply to this challenge with an idea to change the world, and they give you the tools to expand on your project.”
Ghias’s organization was able to receive financial support from optiMize, and she and her four co-founders will be giving a presentation about The Peace Initiative at optiMize’s showcase on April 13. Though the project is not yet complete, Ghias intends for there to eventually be a showcase of all the artwork created for it. In addition to working with optiMize, Ghias intends for The Peace Initiative to collaborate with other social justice organizations around campus. “We’ve reached out to groups like Lean In, the Muslim Students’ Association and Hip Hop Congress,” she said. “And we want to reach out more to ethnic and religious groups as well, specific groups that work with social justice issues, and work with them to use art as a medium to release information.” Ultimately, Ghias wants to use art as a means to open up discussion in that same way, to promote peace and to help create a world that is more open, just and understanding. “I want to use art as a way to be that pushing point where people are comfortable to ask questions in a positive way, to reach out to other people,” Ghias said. “If we can use art to make people feel empathy, or make people feel anything honestly, it will help to overcome the issues we have today.”
BYTIM COHN, D A I LY S TA F F REPORTER
ZOEY HOLMSTROM / Daily
Family, faith and friends are what LSA senior Brittney Williams credits to her success today. The presence of all three has empowered her to overcome her own struggles with depression, an ill mother and the academic challenges she faced during her time as an undergraduate student. Williams, who began her undergraduate odyssey in 2005, acknowledges her path to graduation later this month has been atypical — but don’t try and convince her that she is not representative of the leaders and best. “For many students here, the typical experience is that you succeeded, you didn’t face
HAFSA GHIAS B Y D AY T O N H A R E , D A I LY A R T S W R I T E R
GRANT HARDY / Daily
Intercultural understanding has always been a topic of high importance on campus — as evidenced most recently by contention over anti-Islam drawings in the Diag. Hafsa Ghias, an LSA freshman, wants to change that. “The idea behind this project is to use art and creative expression as a way to reach out to people and evoke emotion,” Ghias said of her creation, The Peace Initiative.
Wednesday, April 13, 2016 // The Statement
YUMI TAGUCHI BY AMABEL KAROUB, D A I LY S TA F F REPORTER
Despite sitting in Starbucks on a rainy April afternoon, LSA junior Yumi Taguchi sported a warm smile. This, combined with her big eyes and sympathetic tone of voice hinted at why she might be such a comfort to students with mental health difficulties on campus. Saying Taguchi is a mental health activist at the University of Michigan would be putting it mildly. She is involved in four different mental health-related extracurriculars — Active Minds, the Wolverine Support Network, the Counseling and Psychological Services Student Advisory Board and the Depression on College Campuses Planning Committee.
forums where students are encouraged to share their stories, as well as by hosting educational events. One such event was Send Silence Packing. Last September, students walking to class could hardly help but notice the 1,100 backpacks scattered across the Diag, which were meant to represent the number of students who commit suicide every year in the United States. Taguchi co-planned this event along with LSA junior Alexandria Kolenda. “The feedback we get from people who understand that mental health is something that is really important to take care of has been tremendous,” Taguchi said. Sharing stories is something Taguchi cited multiple times as an important gateway to decreasing the stigma around mental health so common on college campuses. “Through story sharing, you get an idea that DAVID SONG / Daily this is not a problem that one specific group might have,” she said. “Everyone has feelings; Taguchi is most heavily involved in the Uni- everybody doesn’t feel well sometimes.” versity’s chapter of Active Minds, a club she Taguchi has experienced mental health helped found in 2014 and will be co-director issues both personally and peripherally. Her of in the 2016-2017 school year. Taguchi said two sisters suffered from depression as she when she came to the University, there were was growing up, and she suffered from an eatvery few mental health organizations com- ing disorder during high school. Taguchi said pared to now. she often shares her story at different events, “The interest in mental health maintenance including the Mental Health Monologues, has risen so much,” she said. “There are so where she performed last year. many more mental health organizations on “One of the most important things I’ve campus now. We’re really proud that we get to learned is for people to be able to open up to be a part of that.” you, you have to be willing to open up to them,” Active Mind’s goal is to destigmatize men- Taguchi said. tal health problems on campus by providing As a student adviser for CAPS, Taguchi also
has an opportunity to see the more administrative approach to students’ mental health difficulties on campus. She acts as a liaison between students and CAPS, and she said the role has been eye opening. “Through active minds you hear a lot of things about CAPS — people aren’t as happy with CAPS,” Taguchi said. “Now that I’m on the CAPS SAB I have more of an appreciation for what CAPS does. I realize what the hurdles are for CAPS to be able to provide more services.” These hurdles, Taguchi said, include both funding and a lack of available staff members to accommodate the high student demand. “There’s not enough people to actually be able to provide these services,” she said. “And people cost money.” With the WSN, Taguchi contributes to the creation of weekly safe spaces where students can share their troubles. As for her involvement in the Depression on College Campuses conference, she said she helps recruit different types of mental health professionals from across the nation to come and speak on campus. Through her participation in so many mental health organizations, Taguchi has one overarching goal: she wants students to feel comfortable. “Making sure people feel comfortable in their own skin, where they are currently, and they’re able to make the best out of their every day because they feel comfortable,” Taguchi said. “That was one of the things that really attracted me to an organization like Active Minds.”
Detroit public schools, where its volunteers bring books and backpacks and work with students to prepare them for high school and college. BFB began as a book club where college students could interact with students in the Ann Arbor community, but it has grown into something much more. “We want students to realize how important school, education and reading is,” Jawad said. Though her family was not well-off, as a young child, Jawad said she was fortunate to have parents who took the time to read to her and take her to get books and go to the library. Thinking back on the support she received from her family, Jawad recalled the countless times she would wake her mom up at midnight frantically asking her what a word meant so she could continue to read. Reading became a way for her to overcome hardships she faced in her childhood, and she said she wants to provide that opportunity for as many children as she can. That said, though BFB hopes to start a Flint chapter, its goal is not infinite expansion. “We want to make sure that this isn’t a thing where people are trying to build their resumes or do it for the wrong reasons,” Jawad said. “We want to leave a long-lasting impact on the communities. We really value quality over quantity.” When describing BFB, Jawad speaks in terms of we want, what we value, underscoring her understanding of the organization
as a collaborative effort. Despite being a cofounder — the concept of BFB was her idea — when talking about the organization, Jawad consistently emphasizes that it hasn’t been just her. The board of BFB in particular has been a driving force in the organization’s success and expansion, she said. “What is most rewarding is not only seeing the impact on students we serve but also on the volunteer side, seeing people who are equally — if not more — passionate about the cause than I am.” Despite the largely rewarding experiences she’s had through BFB, Jawad is still grounded in reality, asking herself hard questions. “Issues are so systemic. When you’re at a school, you ask, ‘are you really doing anything for these kids? Books, backpacks, do they make a difference?’ ” she said. “Giving them a book isn’t going to change the fact that they are poor, or the fact that their mom’s single or the fact that no one pays taxes and they’re so poor, so their education system sucks.” Jawad believes that enacting change it is not only about tapping into what you are passionate about, but also realizing what the root cause of the problem is. “People on this campus are so social justiceoriented,” she said. “But it’s not just about doing what you’re interested in, it’s also realizing the root causes of these issues, and poor education is a root cause of many issues, whether they concern medicine, law or policy.”
NADINE JAWAD B Y A N N A P O L U M B O - L E V Y, S E N I O R E D I TO R I A L PAG E EDITOR
AMANDA ALLEN /Daily As diversity committee affairs vice chair in LSA Student Government and co-founder of Books for a Benefit, Public Policy sophomore Nadine Jawad has been at the forefront of working to address important societal issues for awhile, especially when it comes to literacy. When asked about how she spent her Saturday night, Jawad admitted she stayed up a little too late — later than she should be — reading classics. “I recently bought 10 new classics because I love Oscar Wilde and Ernest Hemingway,” she said. “They’re taunting me because I’m
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sitting there doing my homework and they’re sitting there and I want to read them so badly.” In just two years at the University, Jawad has transformed her love of literature into founding BFB — a student organization dedicated to promoting education and literacy in at-risk and low socio-economic status communities. Now with five chapters at different colleges in Michigan, BFB has expanded to provide tutoring services and a pen pals program with Syrian refugees to help them improve their English. BFB also coordinates outreach trips a few times per semester to
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Wednesday, April 13, 2016 // The Statement
EVAN AARON/Daily
Students celebrate Holi, a Hindu festival for the beginning of spring, at Palmer Field on April 3, 2016.
AMANDA ALLEN/Daily
Protesters hold signs against a deer cull in Ann Arbor parks at an Ann Arbor City Council meeting at 220 N. Main St. on January 4, 2016.
MAIZE HYAMS/Daily
An Ann Arbor resident celebrates Hash Bash near the Diag on April 2, 2016.
ZOEY HOLMSTROM/Daily
Former Ohio state senator Nina Turner speaks at a rally for U.S. Sen. Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.) on March 7, 2016 in the Crisler Center.
EMILIE FARRUGIA/Daily
Audience members listen to performers at the 39th Annual Ann Arbor Folk Festival on January 29, 2016.