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ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-NINE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM

Friday, March 27, 2020

Ann Arbor, Michigan

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Regents fire former SMTD Mobilize secures professor David Daniels CSG election win

Board, Schlissel discuss impact of coronavirus on campus Kaplan, Nandigama receive most votes ALEX HARRING Daily News Editor

DANYEL THARAKAN/Daily University President Mark Schlissel speaking at the Board of Regents Meeting at the University golf course Thursday, September 20.

PARNIA MAZHAR & ARJUN THAKKAR Daily Staff Reporters

The Board of Regents held its second meeting of the year remotely on Thursday to vote on firing David Daniels, a former Music, Theatre & Dance professor accused of sexual misconduct, and address the effects of the coronavirus outbreak on University of Michigan operations. All Regents and public commenters called in online and the meeting was livestreamed.

Early in the meeting, University President Mark Schlissel asked the Board to take note of his recommendation to dismiss Daniels without severance for allegations of sexual misconduct. The Board voted unanimously to dismiss Daniels without severance. “I have determined that Professor Daniels’ conduct is inconsistent with the character of tenure at the University of Michigan and therefore constitutes cause for dismissal,” Schlissel said. “I therefore recommend the

dismissal of Professor Daniels from his tenured position at the University of Michigan, effective immediately.” Daniels has been on leave from the University since allegations of sexual assault were made public in August 2018. A Michigan Daily investigation found that the University awarded Daniels tenure in May 2018 despite having knowledge of allegations against him. The University began the process of formally firing Daniels in July 2019. See REGENTS, Page 3A

Public Policy junior Amanda Kaplan and LSA junior Sav Nandigama will serve as president and vice president of the University of Michigan Central Student Government’s 10th Assembly, preliminary results from the March 25-26 election show. Kaplan and Nandigama ran with the party Mobilize, which endorsed candidates in the LSA, Public Health and Music, Theatre & Dance representative elections. Their platform focused on sustainability, affordability and accessibility, student wellness and preparing for the 2020 U.S. presidential debate being held on campus in October. In their party profile, Kaplan and Nandigama said they wanted to make CSG more inclusive of other student groups to better understand the needs of students. The pair reiterated this goal and thanked voters in a statement to The Daily released early Friday morning following notification of their victory. “We’re so grateful for all the support we’ve received over the past few weeks from our friends, family and campus community,” Kaplan and Nandigama wrote. “This has definitely been an unprecedented time on campus. However, we are both so excited to represent the student body in the upcoming school year and start working right away to

advocate with and for students. We want to thank all of the candidates who so passionately advocated for the issues important to them and we look forward to working with students from across campus to make our collective Michigan experience even better.” Among Kaplan and Nandigama’s large-scale goals are to ensure student wellness and safety, specifically in October when thousands will flock to Ann Arbor for the general presidential debate at the Crisler Center. Their platform also aligns with student activists’ goals when it comes to issues such as the One University campaign and climate action. Their ideas in the area of accessibility and affordability include aiding students in their housing search through the creation of guides and pushing for more transparency from the Office of Financial Aid on deadlines and the cost of attendance. Kaplan and Nandigama received 1457 votes, 578 more than secondplace finishers Rackham student Austin Glass and LSA sophomore Megha Jain, who ran with Change at Michigan. One of Change’s main goals was to use CSG’s resources to better advocate on behalf of students to the University in areas such as carbon neutrality, sexual assault policies and diversity, equity and inclusion.

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Sports ‘That was it’: Inside the moment ‘M’ found out its season was over 7A — Friday, March 27, 2020

BAILEY JOHNSON Daily Sports Editor

The Michigan hockey team was still on the ice when the decision was made, practicing for a Big Ten Tournament semifinal game that ultimately would never be played. At that point, the Wolverines were unaware of the specifics but deeply aware of the possibility. They knew what was likely coming. They just didn’t know when. On that Thursday — March 12, just over two weeks ago — Mel Pearson was on the ice running practice when he received word that he needed to be on a conference call at 3 p.m. He left the ice and headed straight upstairs to his office. Pearson told the team they’d meet at 4 p.m. when he was done with the call and after they finished practice. He didn’t yet know the extent of what he’d have to tell them, though he had an inkling. “I think we had all

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braced ourselves a little bit,” Pearson said. “Earlier in the day, we watched the basketball team come out (for its first Big Ten Tournament game) and then get whisked off and that was it. The night before, I’d watched the NBA stuff. Things were starting to happen real quick, so I think our guys had a little sense.” While his team practiced one floor below, Pearson sat on a conference call with Athletic Director Warde Manuel and all of Michigan’s head coaches. Manuel, who had told the men’s basketball team the Big Ten Tournament was canceled earlier in the day, laid out the rapidly developing situation with COVID-19 and explained the Big Ten’s decisions. “Warde Manuel let us know what was going down as far as they’re suspending all Big Ten play,” Pearson said. “And essentially, the Big Ten had also said even if there is an NCAA Tournament at this point, the Big Ten was not going to

You never got that chance to finish what you started.

participate. That was it.” That announcement came at about 3:15 p.m. The call continued right up until Pearson had to go into the locker room and tell his team the news. The players had all showered and dressed after finishing practice and were ready to meet, then continue on with their normal routine. They still didn’t fully know what Pearson was about to tell them. They didn’t know that their normal, for all intents and purposes, was gone. Pearson remembers still having his skates on

when he walked into the locker room. Everything happened so quickly that he didn’t have time to take them off between practice, the conference call and the team meeting. “When we told them, it was really hard to tell them and to look them in the eye, especially the seniors,” Pearson said. “Just basically tell them, ‘Hey, we’re done.’ Just the starkness of it. The raw words that come out like, ‘Season over. We’re done.’ ” Michigan was one of the hottest teams in the country in the second half of the year,

notching an 11-3-2 record and finishing No. 14 in the Pairwise — a ranking that had them in contention for an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament, something that seemed like an impossibility in November. The Wolverines moved in the Pairwise more than any other team in the country in the second half, up 22 spots between Dec. 26 and March 1, and rose even more after sweeping Michigan State in the first round of the Big Ten Tournament. In short, they were ready for an NCAA Tournament run. Then, in one fell swoop,

ALEC COHEN/Daily

The Michigan hockey team found out its season was over after a Big Ten conference call on March 12.

it was all over. “It was emotional,” Pearson said. “It was really hard. I’ve been in games, lost a national championship game in overtime and you have to go in the locker room and look at your guys, and that’s hard, but at least you had the opportunity. You gave it everything you had. You left it all out on the ice. Here, it’s like you never got that chance to finish what you started. “ ... We just had that hope we could get into the tournament. We were right there. Then you have a chance. Then all bets are off. And we had a group that could do it.” Now, the players have scattered back to their hometowns, with just four or five still in Ann Arbor. The last time they all gathered together was in that locker room, the moment Pearson told them they were done. “At that point, we just thanked them, told them we loved them, how we felt for them,” Pearson said. “But no words that I was going to tell them were going to make it feel any better. It’s just something that hopefully, over time, they’ll heal from.”

A series of unnecessary questions: Getting to know the Wolverines KENT SCHWARTZ Daily Sports Writer

After 32 games and five months on a beat, you learn a lot about a team. What plays they run, what the rotation is, what their strengths and weaknesses are and even who the mom of the team is — senior guard Akienreh Johnson. The things you really want to know, though, can’t be figured out by simply watching the team. Instead, you’ve got to rely on awkward-looking 19 year-olds to ask those questions for you. So now, what originally began as a podcast gag and quickly turned into crowdsourcing for new meals I can make at college, will come to you in a written format. I apologize in advance. *** Favorite ice cream: Freshman guard Maddie Nolan: Something called “yellow cake batter.” At first we doubted its existence, but a thorough investigation yielded multiple other witnesses coming forward and testifying to its existence. Freshman guard Michelle Sidor: Mint chocolate chip. She actually said, “chocolate chip mint,” but the only ice cream I found that’s called that is from a company called Cascade Glacier in Oregon, and I had to go to the third page of Google for that — just to find out it’s the exact same thing as mint

chocolate chip. Johnson: Butter pecan. Freshman center Izabel Varejão: Salted caramel. Favorite Christmas songs: Sophomore forward Naz Hillmon: “Mary Did You Know?” by Pentatonix. An a cappella fan, who would’ve thought? Junior guard Priscilla Smeenge: Mariah Carey’s “All I Want for Christmas is You” Senior forward Kayla Robbins: Following in Smeenge’s footsteps, if only by order I wrote this. Sophomore guard Amy Dilk: “Mistletoe” by Justin Bieber. Hm. Johnson: Jingle bells. Sidor: “Last Christmas” by Wham! Michigan coach Kim Barnes Arico: Sleigh Ride. She sang it, too. Maybe she and Hillmon should start an a cappella group together. We also kept track of when the right time to listen to Christmas music is, but I lost all the audio and didn’t transcribe any of it. We all make mistakes. Fantasy vacation spot: Sophomore guard Danielle Rauch: Italy. When further pressed, she said, “I don’t know, it just seems cool.” Michigan has taken its past two team trips to Italy, says communications director Sarah VanMetre. Hillmon: Egypt. Same reasoning as Rauch. Junior forward Hailey Brown

and Johnson: Bora Bora. The pair both fell in love with the location after seeing multiple Twitter posts about it. They obviously have very good feed selections. Conspiracy Theories: Sophomore forward Emily Kiser: A whole lot of them. The one I feel comfortable sharing is aliens. Johnson: Snow isn’t real. There’s a video out there where snow chars after a lighter is put to it, she uses as her evidence. Johnson comes from Toledo, where it snowed on Monday.

Barnes Arico: After serious pressing, and confirmation that Kiser is a conspiracy nut, she came up with her own after Dilk nearly got a triple double: She pulled Dilk to prevent her from reaching that milestone. Recipes: There are too many pasta ones, so we’ll go with the crowd (my) favorites. Barnes Arico: Fish tacos. She doesn’t cook anymore, she has a husband for that. Hillmon: Orders from Uber eats. Johnson: French toast bread

with eggs, bacon and a drizzle of maple syrup for sauce. A word from the wise: Turn off the fire alarm when you make bacon on the stove, otherwise you get angry looks from your neighbors. Varejão: Beijinhos. Condensed milk, butter and coconut. Google calls them coconut kisses. Peanut butter and jelly sandwiches: Barnes Arico: Creamy peanut butter and raspberry jelly. Dilk: Smooth peanut butter

and nothing. Johnson: Chunky and grape. *** There were many more questions and many more answers, but due to our youthful ignorance, we forgot to transcribe them. So it goes. As we social distance in the new sports-less world, maybe take a page out of Johnson’s book and make some beijinhos, find out if snow is real and listen to some Christmas songs to remember when times were good two decades — I mean weeks — ago.

MILES MACKLIN/Daily

Sophomore forward Emily Kiser (far left) has gained a reputation as a “conspiracy nut” among many of her teammates and coaches.

Sports Breaking down three questions facing Michigan’s defense in 2020 8A — Friday, March 27, 2020

ARIA GERSON

Daily Sports Editor

In a normal year, this would be about the time Michigan would hold a coordinators’ press conference. Don Brown would stand in front of reporters, be his normal, animated self, and speak to the issues facing the Wolverines’ defense this season. But COVID-19 has changed all that. A press conference in the time of stay-at-home orders is both unwise and illegal. Instead, with no live sports left to speak of, we’re forced to speculate on the answers. In light of that, The Daily analyzed some of the unknowns surrounding the defense and where the solutions could come from: Who will be the third corner? Last year, Michigan had a steady cornerback rotation of Lavert Hill, Ambry Thomas and Vincent Gray. But with Hill graduated and on to the NFL, there’s an opening. Thomas has already announced his return and Gray will presumably start opposite him. But

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behind those starters, the Wolverines’ depth is murky. The favorites to see playing time seem to be redshirt freshman DJ Turner and redshirt sophomore Gemon Green. Both played a limited role last season — Green played in 11 games on special teams and had one garbage time appearance at corner, and Turner played in four games on special teams — but coaches spoke highly of both. Redshirt sophomore Hunter Reynolds, who appeared in two games at corner and eight additional games playing special teams last season and had a tackle-for-loss against Maryland, could also be an option. As could redshirt freshman Jalen Perry, who did not see game action in the fall but was a four-star recruit. Sophomore Daxton Hill, a five-star recruit at safety, can also play nickel corner, but moving there seems unlikely as Michigan also lacks depth at Hill’s natural position. Instead, expect him to start at safety alongside senior Brad Hawkins. Both were Pro Football Focus All-Big Ten selections last year and should prove steadying

forces in the secondary. Can Cameron McGrone build on a breakout season? After losing All-American Devin Bush — a first-round pick of the Pittsburgh Steelers in 2018 — Michigan faced plenty of questions at the MIKE linebacker position. The spot originally went to Josh Ross, who did a fine job. But when Ross went down with an injury, McGrone stepped in and became a revelation. In his sophomore season, McGrone had nine tackles for loss, five quarterback hits, 3.5 sacks, a forced fumble and a pass breakup while showing flashes of the sideline-to-sideline speed that made Bush so great. He also made his fair share of rookie mistakes. McGrone isn’t Bush, but the extent to which he can build on his All-Big Ten honorable mention season could determine how good the Wolverines’ defense can be. With longtime stalwarts Jordan Glasgow and Khaleke Hudson graduated, McGrone will have to step up as the leader of the linebacking corps. A vocal player last year, he’ll be tasked with keeping his unit

motivated and providing a steadying force at a position in the center of everything. Is Michael Barrett ready to step up at VIPER? The VIPER is a key position in Brown’s defenses. Jabrill Peppers spent two years manning the position, then Hudson took over for the next three. Together, the two have provided the kind of positional stability most teams would long to have. Now, though, Hudson has graduated and Michigan needs to find a new answer

at the position. The ideal solution is redshirt sophomore Michael Barrett, who has spent the last year being groomed as Hudson’s replacement. A former high-school quarterback, Barrett has already shown some of Hudson’s special-teams prowess, with two fakepunt conversions in 2019. But whether he can match what Hudson could do at the VIPER position remains to be seen. Barrett seems to have

all the tools to succeed, but he’s seen very few actual reps at the position. He appeared at VIPER in just three games in 2019, mostly in garbage time. Spring camp was supposed to help with that inexperience, but all spring football activities have been canceled in the wake of the pandemic. Now, the Wolverines just have to hope that the work Barrett put in last year pays off and he’s ready to fill the big shoes Peppers and Hudson left behind.

MILES MACKLIN/Daily

Junior linebacker Cam McGrone will be the heart of Michigan’s defense in 2020 after a breakout 2019.

Isaiah Livers and Franz Wagner ponder NBA Draft decisions DANIEL DASH

Daily Sports Writer

In the face of an unprecented NBA Draft season, two Michigan men’s basketball players are staring down the same difficult decision. As the dominoes begin to fall around the world of college basketball, junior forward Isaiah Livers and freshman wing Franz Wagner have yet to decide whether they’ll be returning to Ann Arbor next fall or entering the NBA Draft. For each player, there’s a strong case to be made for both routes. In Livers’s case, entering the draft provides an opportunity to pawn his stellar offensive performances from November and February into an NBA contract. On the flip side, missing 10 games due to three different injuries and shooting a combined 14-for-47 from the field over the Wolverines’ last four games might put a dent in his stock. “I trust that Isaiah will confide in me as well as his parents to help him evaluate what the best decision for his future is,” Michigan coach Juwan Howard said on a teleconference Thursday. “I will do whatever I can to give him my honest opinion.

MILES MACKLIN/Daily

Junior forward Isaiah Livers has a difficult decision to make over whether or not to enter the NBA Draft after missing 10 games this season.

Right now, we haven’t had a true discussion yet.” Wagner, meanwhile, could become one of the more intriguing prospects if he declares for this year’s NBA Draft. At just 18 years old, his long 6-foot-9 frame and two-way game could

be attractive to NBA teams looking for help on the wing. Wagner missed the Wolverines’ first four games after fracturing his right wrist during a fall practice, but by the end of the season, he was the team’s best offensive player. He averaged 16.6 points on

Right now, we haven’t had a true discussion yet.

62 percent shooting over Michigan’s last five games, raising the question of whether he may be NBAready in the process. “Franz and I have had a brief conversation about testing the NBA waters,” Howard said. “We haven’t had an in-depth

discussion at all yet. His name has been mentioned as far as a guy who could possibly test the NBA waters. I know he’s going to make the best decision for himself and his family.” Between Livers and Wagner, it shouldn’t come as a shock

They will ... make the best decision ... for their future.

when one or both opt to at least test the waters. Recent NCAA rule changes permit both to return to Michigan following the NBA combine if there is no financial arrangement with an agent, provided they terminate the relationship with the agent after the process. With the NBA season currently suspended, however, questions about the draft process remain unanswered. Livers and Wagner would each benefit greatly from a chance to boost their stock at the combine or individual team workouts leading up to June, but it’s unclear whether that will be possible amid the COVID-19 pandemic. At the very minimum, getting feedback is an effective way to implement feedback next season, putting each player in a better position for 2021. But for now, like the rest of the basketball world, Livers and Wagner remain uncertain. “They have been proactive in making sure that all of the communication and information the NBA is sending us, they are aware of it,” Howard said. “They will communicate with their parents and family members to make the best decision where they feel they’re headed for their future.”

statement T H E M I CH I GA N DAI LY | M A RCH 27, 2020

Students react and ref lect on the impacts of COVID-19

PHOTO BY VERITY STRUM

2B Friday, March 27, 2020 // The Statement

statement T H E M I CH I GA N DAI LY | M A RCH 27 , 2020

Managing Statement Editor Magdalena Mihaylova Deputy Editors Emily Stillman Marisa Wright Associate Editor Reece Meyhoefer

Designers Liz Bigham Kate Glad Copy Editors Madison Gagne Sadia Jiban

Photo Editor Keemya Esmael Editor in Chief Elizabeth Lawrence Managing Editor Erin White

When idleness becomes sweet

BY RICCARDO MARROCCHIO, STATEMENT CONTRIBUTOR

arrived at the University of Michigan in February as a visiting Ph.D. researcher from the University of Southampton in the United Kingdom. When I departed for Ann Arbor, the spread of the novel coronavirus was not so critical as it is today. There were about 32,000 cases worldwide, with only three in England and 12 in the United States. Even in my home country of Italy, now the global epicenter of COVID-19, only three cases were reported. To me, the situation did not seem particularly worrisome: We were still one month behind the World Health Organization’s declaration of a pandemic and the virus seemed destined to be contained to the Western Pacific region. Indeed, as I first set foot in this little city, Ann Arbor, home of one of the most beautiful universities, my mind was elsewhere. I was full of wonder and expectations at the possibilities of new experiences and friendships. A blanket of snow, not so common in England, covered the city, reminding me of the wooded landscapes back home in Italy. At the University, there were a lot of nice and friendly people all around: at the libraries, the laboratory and Pierpoint Commons. I was also making plans with my Italian girlfriend to come to visit me, so that we could admire, for the first time, the views of the Great Lakes, the architectural city of Chicago and other beautiful attractions nearby. But then, only a couple of weeks after my arrival, the coronavirus outbreak spiked in Italy and Europe — and the world began to shutter itself. Suddenly, everyone realized that to save ourselves, we needed to overcome our social instinct and desire to stay together — we needed to stay apart from each other, from our family, our friends and our loved ones. At the University, the libraries, classrooms and cafes in which I liked to spend most of my time became very different places. I couldn’t hear the cheerful, background chatter while waiting in line for my coffee. If I went to the library, a doomsday feeling ran down my spine as I saw empty seats and aisles. In all the buildings, classroom doors were fixed open, giving a perspective of an ominous future. It also became clear that my girlfriend would not be able to come to visit me any time soon, and I started to worry about my family who lives in Milan — located at the center of the peninsula’s outbreak. Dramatically, our social structure was turned upside down in just a few days, establishing a new normal. It is clear that we can’t go on with our usual routines anymore: There are no more colleagues to chat with, no more drinks at the cafe, nights out to make new friends or weekends to visit our parents. Nonetheless, people have found creative ways to adapt to this completely new reality. My colleagues and friends at Southampton University created group chats in which

ILLUSTRATION BY ERIN RUARK

we can support each other: sharing our newly-created workout routines, proposing daily writing and creative prompts — like rewriting a chapter of our favorite children’s book or drawing a cartoon strip of our day — and giving suggestions on what music to listen to. Anything to keep us thinking positively and productively. Indeed, with so much idle time away from work, it is now not as cool as before to waste time laying on the sofa watching thousands of TV series and scrolling through endless Instagram posts. As Jerome Klapka Jerome nicely put it in his book “Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow”: “It is impossible to enjoy idling thoroughly unless one has plenty of work to do. There is no fun in doing nothing when you have nothing to do. Wasting time is merely an occupation then, and a most exhausting one. Idleness, like kisses, to be sweet must be stolen.” It seems that in this quarantine, we have found new ways to stay together, support each other and rediscover ourselves — maybe even more than we did before the outbreak — when many of us were too concerned with our smartphones to engage with each other. Now, people have rediscovered board games or found out about inner creativity that they didn’t even know they had, building the strangest instruments to put up against the virus outbreak. One man in Italy fabricated portable cardboard into

the form of a spaceship so that when worn, it would keep you the required one-meter distance from other people. In Rome, people decided to do a flash mob by singing and playing guitars from their windows. Nobody knows how long this outbreak will last and how much time it will take to go back to our previous routines. If I will not be able to explore Ann Arbor and the great land- and city-scapes of this state for at least a while, I can and am still having a meaningful experience in this city. The extra time at home gave me the opportunity to reassess my daily life. I have finally found the courage to begin those activities I always wanted to do but that I kept postponing: daily workouts, yoga, meditation, reading, video calls with my parents and friends. This, in turn, has helped me increase my productivity as a researcher. A few months ago, if anybody had suggested shutting myself in my house for a month as a way to improve my life routine, I would have never believed them. Yet, thanks to the mutual support of all the people around the world, it worked. Riccardo Marrocchio is a biophysicist and visiting researcher at U-M from Rome, Italy. He can be reached at ricmich@umich.edu.

Coming home during a global pandemic Friday, March 27, 2020 // The Statement

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BY ISABELLE HASSLUND, STATEMENT CONTRIBUTOR

he dark night sky outside filled the window of my studio apartment, but my nerves awoke me with a jolt of panic at 5 a.m. It was March 20 in Melbourne, Australia, and an anxious pit formed in my stomach as I got ready to hop on a flight to travel back to the United States. I prepared my N95 face masks, tupperware of sanitizing wipes, hand sanitizer and latex gloves for my journey. I watched my last Melbourne sunrise through my window, the usuallyhostile Australian sun diminishing into a soft, orange glow like a halo around the Melbourne skyline. Just a week ago, the Australian sun shone through that same window of my studio apartment, pleasantly warming up my cheeks until I slowly woke up. It was 7 a.m. on Friday the 13th, and I felt the nerves setting in as I pushed my bed sheets off my body. I stretched my torso across the gap between my bed and my desk, anxiously reaching for my phone and clicking on my email app. “[UPDATE] -- CGIS Winter 2020 Programs” read the subject line to a new email in my inbox. The words were ominous and sunk heavy in my mind. I took a deep breath and clicked the email. As my eyes perused the bright screen, they felt sandy from exhaustion. Then, in bold letters: “You must return to the United States by March 20, 2020.” I kept looking for the words “but” or “exception,” but I couldn’t find them anywhere. A few days before the news that I had to leave entered my inbox or thoughts, I was living a slow-paced life in Melbourne. I was taking three classes at the University of Melbourne about subjects I actually found interesting and the coursework was not overwhelming. In just a short few weeks, I had met enough people that whenever I walked through campus I bumped into someone I knew. My evenings consisted of sitting on benches in grassy park squares, basking in the sun to make up for the Vitamin D I had lost from being at home on the East Coast of the U.S. for too long during winter. I could understand Aussie slang well, but I was still learning and I indulged in at least two cups of coffee per day (Melbourne is known for their amazing coffee). I was preparing to go to surf camp with my friends at Lorne Beach, a little, surfer, hippy town on Great Ocean Road. After receiving the news that I had to return home, it felt surreal walking along the sunny streets of Melbourne, the cool breeze hitting my warm and flushed face. It felt like I was sleepwalking. My brain couldn’t process that I would have to leave Australia in a week’s time. I felt an unnamed emotion — fear and anxiety mixed with anger — hitting me so abruptly that I became dizzy from the impact. My anxiety took over as I thought

ILLUSTRATION BY LAUREN KUZEE

about the impact — on myself and others — if I were to contract COVID-19. There are currently fewer cases in the entire country of Australia of COVID-19 than there are in New York state. To get home, I would have to go through three airports and spend a total minimum of 24 hours traveling, including 18 hours on a plane. In the U.S., I would automatically join the shared mindset of panic and worry, not to mention I would be living in a home where a family member of mine recently suffered from a pulmonary embolism, a condition that increases risk for those who contract COVID-19. Even more so, as I read that email in Australia, one thought came to the forefront of my mind: It’s been a blessing being far away from the U.S. I watched from halfway across the world as the U.S. fumbled with the outbreak of the new virus: clumsily mishandling COVID-19 tests, having lax travel restriction policies and a president who ignores the warnings of public health officials. I watched as the U.S. slowly crumbled under the hands of this pandemic. The mental toll of the news was extremely difficult. I felt exhausted at every second of the day for a week, my eyes perpetually brimmed with tears that would spill onto my cheeks as I explained to my new Aussie friends why I had to go. Every morning that I walked to class, I would look around the beautiful city I’d come to love, watching the people walk by the street and giggling at the thought of the funny lingo and unnecessary abbreviations they use. While living in Australia, the pandemic, to me, only existed on social media and headlines. COVID-19 did not dominate everyday conversations yet; it was more of an afterthought. The government of Australia was preparing for the

a global pandemic might be as mentally taxing as it is financially taxing. The University made me feel as if I was more of a liability to them than a student they cared about being safe, healthy and mentally-well — receiving information when it’s too late, giving me the same cookie-cutter responses and, most importantly, not making me feel like my voice or concerns were being heard. Even though I landed in New York City less than a week ago, there is an incredible sense of fear and panic that is constantly in the back of my mind. After enduring a 16 hour flight to Los Angeles International Airport, my first stop back in the U.S., I faced no screening — no one asked me any questions, no one checked if I had a fever or a dry cough. I was released into the empty airport, except for the people also trying to get home. I boarded a desolate flight to New York City, the epicenter of COVID-19 in the U.S. When I landed, I again faced no questions or recommendations to selfisolate for two weeks. I fear the possibility of having contracted the virus while traveling, that I might spread the virus, that I am an asymptomatic carrier and will add to the problem and, even worse, that if I develop symptoms, I will not be able to get the treatment that I need or even a test due to limited resources. Though there are signs of spring in the trees and bushes, the New York City streets and roads are barren from human life. Even though I have not seen anyone outside my own family since I’ve landed, I can still sense the mass panic hanging heavy in the frigid air. The once bustling streets in the city that never sleeps are empty and it’s a terrifying contrast to the sun-filled and easy-going atmosphere I was in not too long ago. Now, I struggle to find out what my academic schedule will look like my senior year of college given the circumstances and new “Pass/No Record-COVID” grading system, what the financial impacts of this pandemic will be on my education and whether or not, when I graduate next year, there will be a job waiting for me. The future is uncertain and up in the air as the world is at a standstill. I can’t help scrolling through my camera roll on my phone at least once a day to look at pictures of the Melbourne skyline pierced with shiny skyscrapers or the hilly landscape of the countryside. I think of the budding friendships that were cut short and the missed adventures at surf camp. While I am grateful to be home safe, I can’t help but think of what would have probably been the best four months of my life.

pandemic from its inception, with travel restrictions and monitoring border control. I felt like everything was going to be OK and that I had some control over the situation. I wasn’t afraid to look at numbers or projections, and I knew that if I were to experience symptoms, I would be able to get a test. Panic-buying toilet paper and other goods was still happening in Australia — there wasn’t a complete detachment of what the world was dealing with — but I still felt safer in Melbourne than back home in the U.S. The stark reality in the U.S. and around the world was very different. As of March 25, there are over 50,000 cases of COVID19 and 700 deaths related to COVID-19 in the U.S. Globally, there have been tens of thousands of COVID-19 related deaths, with that number climbing. Reaching out to the University of Michigan for answers and support proved moot. The feeling of not having control came back again — the familiar feeling that I can walk up the door to President Schlissel’s home, knock on it, scream my anxiety and grievances in his face and still not be heard. “Get out by March 20,” they said. Then, a generic list of our “next steps,” including booking a ticket and notifying our parents and a blurb telling us we should contact the institution we were currently studying at to determine an academic plan. It was business-like, transactional and cold, completely neglecting the fact that I might need time and space to breathe and genuine mental and emotional support to guide me through this process. I was left to strategize my exit plan with only Isabelle Hasslund is a junior studying my peers and whatever information our parents could gather, which was not much. Music in SMTD and Ecology and It did not seem to cross the minds of Evolutionary Biology in LSA. She can be those in power at the University that reached at hasslund@umich.edu. traveling halfway across the world during

4B Friday, March 27, 2020 // The Statement

Class of COVID-19: Seniors commune around increasingly uncertain future BY VERITY STURM, STATEMENT CORRESPONDENT

skipped my first BlueJeans lecture to buy a pair of shoes. The sole employee at the Ann Arbor Running Company looked surprised to see me. He kept pulling the wrong sizes and I kept feeling too socially anxious to correct him. It had been six days since Gov. Gretchen Whitmer announced a state of emergency, and we were both a bit rusty on our interpersonal skills. He untied a size-too-small sneaker from a stool rolled six feet away and went through all the correct small-talk motions: How was my running going? Was I a student? What year? President Donald Trump was announcing new restrictions from the flat screen in the back of the store that usually played silent reruns of pixelated cross-country races. “This is a bad one,” Trump proclaimed from the store speakers. “This is a very bad one.” “I’m a senior,” I replied to the salesman while tying up a size-too-large shoe, one eye on the screen. “Neat,” the guy replied. “Got anything lined up?” Before the COVID-19 outbreak defined our daily lives, my habitual reply to this dreaded question had been a good-natured “nahhhh,” friendly in its lingering “h,” or perhaps a more optimistic “not yet” if the questioner appeared genuinely concerned about my future or was related to me by blood. But in the Ann Arbor Running Company, while Trump announced we “may be” diving head-first into a recession (but will be “raring to go” by Easter), I began to feel uncertain in a way that resisted friendliness or optimism. “I, uhh, I really don’t know,” I told him. And I realized, for what felt like the first time, I seriously believed it. ast week the United States Labor Department released data indicating that, from March 7 to March 14, the rise in initial unemployment claims outnumbered that of any week during or since 2008. In a recent New York

Times article analyzing this data, Justin Wolfers, professor of economics and public policy at the University of Michigan, pointed out that this is unlike a “normal” recession, which typically takes months of joblessness, two consecutive quarters of negative GDP and a bureaucratic declaration to be universally recognized as an “official” recession in every sense of the word. “The last recession began in December 2007, but even half a year later, some economists were still debating whether the economy had entered a recession,” Wolfers wrote. “This time, there’s no debate.” But other experts have scrapped that vernacular entirely, insisting that the dystopian extremities of the COVID-19 economy cannot be explained with normal jargon. We are living in the most intense bear market on record: unprecedented declines in stock and security due to widespread sentiments of fear and pessimism. “What is happening is a shock to the American economy more sudden and severe than anyone alive has ever experienced,” stated esteemed policy journalist Annie Lowrey in The Atlantic last week. “This is not a recession. This is an ice age.” Right, wrong or indifferent, trauma has a history of changing the way we talk about things, each disaster with its own little vocabulary nebula. McCarthyism, Trumpism, Stalinism, the War on Drugs, the War on Terror — these phrases didn’t exist or matter before cluttering the national (or international) conversation with paranoid frequency during their respective moments. They carry their emotional history with them, grim little linguistic keepsakes fossilized into the way we speak. The alt-right. #MeToo. The dotcom bubble. Social distancing. Flatten the curve. No Record Covid. Economic ice age. Another term has squeaked into being amid this century of change: lost generation. Gertrude Stein is credited with coining the phrase, which Ernest Hemingway then popularized in the

epigraph of “The Sun Also Rises” in 1926 — “you are all a lost generation.” Just peachy. Stein and Hemingway were originally referring to the generation of people coming-of-age during or after World War I — the first global conflict to trickle down into American daily life in a way that felt personal. Since 1926, though, the term “lost generation” has slowly become unstuck from the context of its inception alone. The long-revered Oxford English Dictionary clarifies that the largely historic phrase is “also used more generally of any generation judged to have ‘lost’ its values.” Lexico, a more colloquial collaboration between Dictionary.com and Oxford University Press, gives the term an additional entry below the definition of its literal origin. It reads: “An unfulfilled generation coming to maturity during a period of instability.” aggie Li, an LSA senior studying biomolecular science, was breaking up with her boyfriend around the time the World Health Organization named the outbreak “COVID-19.” Li went home to weather the breakup with family, returned briefly to take her midterms and then flew right back home for spring break. She was recharging for the second half of the term, hopeful to return and end her final semester on a high she could ride into the start of her independent adult life. “And then right when I got back that Wednesday, they literally announced that all classes are going to be online for the rest of the semester. And I was like, ‘Are you serious?’ ” Li said in a phone interview with The Daily. “I was just ready to come back and swing into things and, like, get my life on track. And then now, nothing is normal.” Instead, Li found herself back home in New York for the third time in three weeks, grappling with much more than her lingering breakup.

“I’m taking a gap year before med school, and I’m in touch with a lot of research labs. But I don’t know what I’m going to do with my life because all of the labs obviously are not focusing on hiring right now, which I completely understand. But now my life is on hold.” Through the phone, Li paused to take a breath. Later in our conversation, she told me that she actually had had a lab contract lined up with Massachusetts General Hospital, but it happened to be in close proximity to her then-boyfriend. She turned the offer down when they broke up, to open her future to positions and opportunities elsewhere. And labs elsewhere — including Mount Sinai in New York — had been really receptive to her application. Things were looking good. Empowering, even. But that was before, as she put it, “this whole thing blew out.” “Now the MCAT is canceled for quite some time … and if they’ve canceled school (through spring and summer terms), then they’ll probably cancel testing, and then when am I going to take it? Like, am I going to have to take another year off just because of a situation that’s kind of out of my control?” Rachel Rudd, a senior in the School of Nursing, expressed similar uncertainty about the NCLEX, the nationwide exam for graduating nurses. “We all have to take the NCLEX in order to get our RN licensure, and we don’t really know what’s going to happen with that, because usually, we take them in late May or June,” Rudd told The Daily in a recent phone interview (note: starting March 25, the NCSBN, which administers the NCLEX, has reduced testing to “a limited number of test centers” according to federal guidelines). “So, it may be over by then and it may not be. So, I think that’s just like a wait-and-see sort of thing.” While some seniors are questioning the status of their already-scheduled exams, others have been freshly motivated to

consider taking them in the first place — the binary tension indicative of a populace nearrobotically uncertain about which way to turn. Public Policy senior Elise Rometsch expressed as such in a recent phone interview with The Daily. “I don’t have anything lined up … and was looking for a job, but I also had plans of going to maybe grad school or potentially law school down the road, and I’m like, ‘Should I hurry those up?’ Because I know when the economy’s not doing well, that’s generally like, ‘Okay, time to go to grad school.’ ” eventually confessed to the man at the Ann Arbor Running Company that I was a size 8.5, that his 7s and 9s weren’t going to help me meet the sick mileage goals that had become increasingly integral to my sense of self-worth with every day and email since March 11. They had none in stock, which I refrained from reading symbolically. I ended up ordering a pair through the store, making some comment about how I’d rather give my money to them than a third party on the internet. “Thanks,” the man told me, unimpressed, gingerly holding out my receipt. A week later, I called the Ann Arbor Running Company to check on my order. It was March 23, and when I woke up, Whitmer had issued her “Stay Home, Stay Safe” Executive Order, toppling a domino network of tense conversations and packed bags between friends, family and loved ones statewide. I too was throwing socks and books into my duffel, phone wedged between shoulder and ear, preparing to move to my boyfriend’s place a whopping block down the street. He and his housemates had decided to use the Whitmer’s order as grounds to self-quarantine their house for two weeks, legitimately, to ensure they didn’t have the virus before going home-home to more immunosuppressed or elderly familiars. I was invited, so long as I followed the sole Spartan rule: No one goes in or out. I was down to confidently delay my own seemingly inevitable breakup for two more weeks, so I agreed. In or out. Together or not. Life had really

Friday, March 27, 2020 // The Statement 5B

gone binary. Back on the phone, a non-identified male running voice spoke: “Sturm … I remember your name, let me check the book.” It didn’t sound like the guy I had talked to in the store from the week before, which relieved me. “Hmm. OK yeah, order placed, but not in yet. Soon, though. We’ll give you a call.” “Okay,” I replied, dropping a pair of pink silk pants that I would never wear into my bag. “But I’m kind of moving to a sensitive household, we’re in town but I don’t think I can …” “We’ll bring it to you,” this anonymous man said, cutting me off. “Of course.” “Whoa. Like, to the door?” I asked. Momand-pop running shops don’t operate like Grubhub. “Yes. We’ll bring them to you. Doorstep. Don’t worry about it. We’ll give you a call, and we’ll bring them.” t the time of my interview with Rometsch, my recent Google searches included “GRE,” “GRE when,” “how long writing sample English Ph.D.” and “LSAT casual.” Safe to say, my feet were firmly planted in the same tenuous camp as Rometsch re: continued education. And, as she pointed out, it was economic anxiety that sent me there, not my boundless zeal for specialized study.

I went into this year tabling grad school because I didn’t want to waste my time diving so expensively into something I wasn’t 100 percent certain about. Now, I’m just seeking refuge. Historical data, as usual, tells me this plan is unexceptional. In October 2009, the number of LSAT examinations administered reached an all-time high of 60,746, a 20 percent increase from

the year prior — that is, before the 2008 financial crisis. Similarly, the number of Americans who took the GRE in 2009 rose 13 percent from the disastrous year prior, peaking at 670,000 test-takers. What that does to the selectivity of the applicant pool, I don’t even want to know. But Stanford economist Caroline Hoxby has studied the pattern and confirmed that interest in higher education has indeed increased during every recession since the 1960s. Who can blame us? On Monday, Vox published the “scariest unemployment chart ever,” depicting a projection from Goldman Sachs — 2.25 million new claims — that pushes the y-axis to a point where an illustration is moot. The labor market doesn’t even feel like an option. “Most people at our school usually get a job coming right out of college. That’s just, like, how that works. … But is anyone really even going to be hiring people right now?” Stephanie Stan said, an LSA senior studying biopsychology, cognition and neuroscience, in a recent phone interview with The Daily. “It’s not only the people who have a job lined up (who are impacted) or those that won’t make as much money as they would have coming right out. It’s now people who are still applying, or thinking

people? I’m not sure if that’s even going to affect me or what’s going to happen,” Rudd said. The rules we’ve been raised on don’t seem to apply to the class of 2020. Stan is right, the University frequently tells us that most people at our school usually get a job coming right out of college. But that data doesn’t account for an economic ice age. Similarly, labor statistics tell us that nurses are projected to remain in high demand. But job security seems more complicated when entering an industry at a time when demand is so disproportionately inflated. “Graduating generally is terrifying,” Rometsch told me. “And now, not only are we dealing with classes we’ve never had anything like (before), we have to deal with adapting to new situations. We have to deal with trying to find a job in an economy where no one knows what’s going on.” ike most self-conscious writers, I began to gaslight the validity of my own piece about halfway through my research. What if this isn’t actually happening on an individual basis? Data can say most anything if you just zoom out enough. Am I misreading the signs? Am I going to publish something that stirs more panic for less reason? As if on cue, I got an email from a publishing firm that I was prepping for a round two interview with, declaring “all summer internships canceled due to the ongoing health crisis.” I dissociated momentarily before texting my mom “the thing I made second round for was canceled lol.” She replied immediately: “That sucks. Andrew’s job postponed indefinitely, too.” My brother Andrew graduated from a small liberal arts school with a degree in aquaculture this past May. He’s been living at home most of the past year, doggedly applying to jobs. He’s on the Asperger’s end of the Autism spectrum — more than capable of doing excellent work, but outside neurotypical. And, of course, job interviews are implicitly designed around (and evaluative of ) neurotypicality. Andrew works three times as hard for an “average” degree of opportunity, at least according to University standards. He and INFOGRAPHIC BY MARIAH PARKER I have never enjoyed the same about applying.” amount of agency in this world, especially And although Rudd is pretty confident regarding academia and work. that she’ll find employment upon her RN In late February, Andrew finally got a job licensure, she’s wary about the larger labor offer. Now? pattern that will eventually cut into her “Oh shit,” I replied. industry as the pandemic naturally ebbs. “A lot of people are talking about how Read more at there may be this surge in (health care) workers, but then when COVID-19 is over, MichiganDaily.com what are we going to do with all the extra

Pomp and circumstance

Friday, March 27, 2020 // The Statement

BY REECE MEYHOEFER, DEPUTY STATEMENT EDITOR

tug my sweatshirt sleeve over my fingers to avoid direct contact with the door handle as I walk into the Michigan Union. Sam walks up with me, saying “Well, let’s go downstairs to the bookstore to buy our graduation caps and gowns.” Only minutes ago, we received the Universitywide email, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, announcing that classes would be transitioned to online platforms for the rest of the semester. A few months prior, I had been pondering the thoughts of T.S. Eliot — Do I dare? — as we read “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock” in my poetry course. I felt invincible entering my last semester at the University of Michigan: so liberated, so empowered, so restless over the endless opportunities to be explored post-graduation. Eliot ponders, Disturb the universe? I felt as if I could possess the world if I dared. Back in the Union with Sam, the employees at the bookstore partake in the frenzied dialogues occurring on campus: Whether or not their store would be open tomorrow, whether or not commencement would even happen, whether or not students will start to leave. “Reece, should I get the block ‘M’ stole for my gown?” Sam and I distracted ourselves with the faint hope of a remaining commencement; after all, at that point, classes were technically canceled in-person only until April 21. Earlier in the semester, I told myself that graduation would come so quickly, but I now found that I was lying to myself about the proximity of May 2. Surely, the chaos of the pandemic would subside by then, right? One day at a time. A few days later, along with the cancellation of March Madness, Broadway shows and the closure of Disneyland, I walk into my kitchen to place my newly purchased package of Clorox wipes on the counter, only to find my roommate Nicole tearing up. My heart skips a beat as she tells me that all commencement activities are canceled until further notice: the unfathomable actually happening. In a minute there is time / For decisions and revisions for which a minute will reverse. The universe had disturbed me. I

couldn’t understand the meaning behind all of this. When I had joked I never want to graduate from college, this was not what I was referring to. That is not what I meant at all; That is not it, at all — Eliot’s words echo in my mind. I tap skip as “Landslide” randomly plays from my shuffled Spotify songs, and by this point, I had left Nicole and retreated to the succulent-filled, coffee cup-cluttered desk in my room. No Stevie Nicks, I can’t sail through the changing ocean tides. My world of the Michigan maize and blue had faded to a solemn gray. My family overwhelms me with text messages: Grandma Fran assures me that we will celebrate eventually, my mom tells me that a delayed ceremony will be all the more rewarding and Aunt Trish says we can set up a faux-mencement with chairs in the backyard. Doesn’t that then make graduation some meaningless social construct? What I thought had been feelings of sadness, devastation, bitterness and anger, were actually emotions of anxiety and fears of missing out: I can’t get these meaningful last two months of my life back, they won’t be postponed to a later date. It’s a loss of closure, traditions and promises I made to myself as a freshman — all of which are now broken. Of course, my time at the University wasn’t exactly picture-perfect, but I thought taking that last photo of my friends and I in caps and gowns, blissfully spraying bottles of champagne in front of the Big House on an April afternoon

these unprecedented times. I expected to be overwhelmed with new assignments and deadlines, yet they’re trying to get their bearings no differently than we are. It’s inspiring to see how they’re not trying to mask the challenges of this transition. My political science professor now signs every email with “this too shall pass”; one of my English professors inspires us to “lean into” the moment and that, from a writer’s perspective, it’s almost better when things don’t go as planned. He brings up novels including Thucydides’ “Peloponnesian War,” “The Decameron” and William Maxwell’s “They Came Like Swallows” to remind us that this confrontation of unknown circumstances ILLUSTRATION BY DORY TUNG isn’t as unprecedented as would filter out the insecurities of the it seems. He also asks us past. to think about how today’s circumstances Others encourage me to “phone it in” will matter in five days. Five months. Five with my classwork as a second-semester years. senior, and though I quite literally phone My other English professor passes into Google Hangout, my classes are along articles from The New Yorker, in what keep me energized. I thought I was which teachers sympathize with the hitting my stride as I finally found my sorrows of students during the disrupted voice as a writer and a passion for my narrative of our undergraduate careers. English major. Now was supposed to be She stresses to us that staying connected the pinnacle of my academic experience. is what matters most in these stressful I wanted to soak up every late night in the times, and remarks that hopefully, the library, every sentence of that court case readings can provide a good distraction reading, the rush of turning that essay for us. Through it all, the literature in two minutes before the deadline, the persists. As we discuss the confusion of moment of nearly making it to class on pronouns in Anne Carson’s poetry during time, the class discussions, the capstone our Google Hangout class, my mind assignments. wanders and I rearrange the pronouns So how should I presume? Eliot asks. in my own circumstances. Why does Harking back to my freshman year history the pronoun “my” have to come before class, I recall the ancient Incan construct canceled commencement and not the of time. The Incans understand time as a pronoun “your”? This cancellation past in front of them and a future behind doesn’t coincide with the class of 2021 or them. In a spatial sense, their backs are the class of 2019. I have to take possession turned against the future and they are of the chaos and remember it’s actually faced toward the past. Time, therefore, “ours” to dare. I turn the page of my Eliot flows forward and into the past. I’m poem, And indeed, there will be a time. At left to confront the past in order to find this moment those words feel hollow to clarity in my present, and eventually my me, rather — It is impossible to say just future. Even Shakespeare reminds me what I mean! that the “past is prologue” — there is an unraveling of beginnings as well as an unraveling of endings. Reece Meyhoefer is a senior in LSA My email inbox becomes deluged studying English and Political Science and by messages from professors. There’s is a Deputy Statement Editor. She can be a connected disconnect between reached at reecemey@umich.edu. me, my professors and peers in

What now? T

Friday, March16, 27,2019 2020////The The Statement 7B 7B Wednesday, January Statement

BY ANDIE HOROWITZ, STATEMENT CONTRIBUTOR

he first time I read about COVID-19 was over Winter Break. It was early January, and I was in Florida with my family on vacation. Iranian General Qasem Soleimani was just killed, and I was mentally preparing for war. My thoughts were running in a million different directions. Social media wasn’t helping. Twitter, Instagram, Facebook and even my group chats were flooded with topical memes. I couldn’t concentrate or focus without theorizing about what was to come and yet, amid the possible World War III madness, there came another chilling report: A new, highly contagious virus was identified in China. Nope. Not today. I shut off my phone, took a deep breath and pretended as if I didn’t just read that. At the time, that was a sufficient coping mechanism. The report was posted on Instagram by a meme account that issued out any content for clickbait. If @todayyearsold was willing to post baseless news claims only to delete them after a few hours, how could I trust this report? It seemed almost obvious to dismiss it and move on. The weeks to follow seemed to calm down in their own ways. While tragedies were still occurring around the world, my everyday life seemed to once again be filled with trivial pursuits upon returning to school. There, I settled into what I thought was an unbreakable routine. My roommate and I would wake up at the same time every morning, snoozing nearly five alarms before starting the day. I went to classes Monday through Friday, with club meetings on Monday and Tuesday evenings. On a night in, my friends and I would attempt to stop working around 11 p.m. and watch “The Bachelor” or “Sex and the City” until we couldn’t keep our eyes open. On other occasions, we would find ourselves out, house party hopping until it was time to debrief over bagels in the kitchen. This schedule was a solidified pattern, only to be broken by cramming for an exam or a trip out of town. I was no longer wrapped up in what doom was filling the world on a greater scale. I no longer had the time to ruminate over the “whatif” society scenarios, so they quietly left my mind. There wasn’t room for me to be consumed by international politics — I was consumed by the world directly in front of me. The second semester of my sophomore year was supposed to be the best term yet, and a few weeks into the semester, I felt that prophecy coming into fruition. The year was scheduled to pick up around the first weekend of February with my parents flying in to visit. After that, my friends and I could name what was on tap for every weekend to come: Mom’s Weekend, Winterfest, Spring Break, date parties, the Michigan Fashion Media Summit, a Toronto trip, birthdays, Hash Bash, a possible Windsor outing and then finals. Wine Tuesdays, new restaurants, random late night excursions to Target. Nights spent at parties wreaking of stale beer and sweat, in bars we could barely get into, in libraries more social than academic, in meetings taken as seriously as class, in bedrooms plastered with polaroids, in my best friend’s car for hours on end. Distraction after distraction. Moment after moment. Talk around our house was therefore focused on the

into political mania. While we were half watching the votes come in and half making TikToks, we were interrupted by inevitable news: Michigan declared a state of emergency. There were two cases in the state. The University canceled any event that was scheduled to have over 100 people in attendance. By that Wednesday, it seemed like every university around the country was going online. Since we were at a large public university, we guessed it was unlikely the dorms would close due to the amount of students that relied on them for food and shelter. As sophomores in off-campus housing, we were not yet forced out of our house nor were we worried that we would be. The others around us weren’t either. Because of this, we gave into our optimism and assumed the rest of the semester would continue as semi-usual. We were hopeful and naive, never having experienced a pandemic in our lifetimes. In our minds, it almost seemed like a utopia: Everyone would stay at school, taking online classes with minimal schoolwork, spending endless amounts of time with friends, going out whenever seemed fit, twiddling our thumbs to figure out what new adventure we should take on the day with. Looking back now, it seems irresponsible that we even thought this way, but we were tucked away in our personal bubbles of college and youth. Of course, this unrealistic mindset changed almost instantaneously. More drastic news was being released on an hourly basis. On Friday morning, classes were moved to online platforms, all commencement ceremonies were canceled and all students were strongly encouraged to go home as soon as possible. On Monday, dorms were closing for all but those who relied on them. On Monday night, we learned that we had to be out of our house by Thursday afternoon. Within a matter of days, it became evident that our previous plans did not mirror reality. Mixed emotions were everywhere. People were crying during meals, while ILLUSTRATION BY ERIN RUARK on the phone with their families or in the middle of a gathering. Conversations were world crept back into my vision, invited to the table by my dominated by how much we would miss life in Ann Arbor, mother. She had warned me that the Michigan Fashion reminiscing on all of the times we’ve had thus far. Snapchat Media Summit, an organization I was a part of, was going stories were all centered around the last endeavors of the to have to cancel its yearly summit. Typically, the event con- year. Some would break down at the mention of when othsisted of 15 or more fashion industry professionals, offering ers planned to leave, seniors especially and reasonably so students a chance to learn and network with top names in — they were promised a sense of closure, a final semester retail. The summit took a year to plan, with a team of over filled with bittersweet last hoorahs. Everything they had 50 students dedicated to our efforts. I wouldn’t let myself imagined was now blurred and distorted. Everyone felt a little cheated. I myself did. I didn’t want believe her, calling her crazy and paranoid while tearing up at dinner. I refused to listen — we worked too hard to go home. I had work to do for classes, pieces to write for for a virus to stop us. Yet the Monday I returned back, the the MFMS, interviews to prepare for. I had my friends that I MFMS’ Presidents announced that news exactly. Fourteen wanted to do nothing and everything with. I had met people out of 19 speakers had pulled out, as they were put on trav- this semester that I expected even just a few months more el quarantines. We could not put on an in-person summit of time with. All of that was melting away. Yet as much as this stung, and as much as it still does, I without them. Everything after that night seemed to pick up very quick- know I am one of the lucky ones. ly. On the Tuesday night that followed, I was nursing a Read more at glass of wine, sprawled across my friend Andrew’s couch. MichiganDaily.com Him, my friend Natalie and I were indulging in a Michigan Democratic primary watch party, channeling our energy exciting times to come, as if they were promised. What time do we wake up for Winterfest? How much are you packing for Spring Break? Did you get a dress for date party yet? Did you find a date? How many exams do you have this week? Are you going out tonight? The next set of COVID-19 related news seemed to change the course of conversation only marginally. Some study abroad programs were being cut short, and in turn, some Spring Break trips to Europe were canceled. Instagram pictures from Florence abroad turned to Snapchat stories of plane rides back homes, but the virus had yet to hit the United States. While people sympathized with those affected, life continued as normal. After all, the Spring Break trip I planned with my friends was still on, and we had yet to establish who was packing what. After the aforementioned vacation, I went home for part of Spring Break. At my first dinner back, the reality of the

Friday, March 27th, 2020 // The Statement

VISUAL STATEMENT: TANGIBLY EMPT Y PHOTOS CONTRIBUTED BY BETH DEVLIN