overall, many students currently
choose to finish their degree at a
four-year institution after spend-
ing several years at a community
college, meaning the proposed
reform could have implications
for four-year institutions like
the University.
Michael
Boulus,
execu-
tive director of the President’s
Council, State Universities of
Michigan, said the plan could
encourage potential students
to enroll in community colleges
rather than immediately enroll
in four-year institutions.
“I would assume it would,” he
said. “Just the simple dynamics
of having a guaranteed free first
two years of educations, assum-
ing that the 60 credits would
transfer.”
Education Prof. Peter Bahr
noted that though there could
be a trend of students choosing
community colleges, the effect
probably wouldn’t be signifi-
cant for four-year institutions
given the great imbalance in
tuition costs that already exists
between the two options, which
determines college choice for
many students.
“I think we will see some-
what more students in the com-
munity colleges for the first two
years, but I don’t think it will be
an enormously greater number
of students because community
colleges are already substan-
tially less expensive than pub-
lic four-year institutions,” Bahr
said.
Boulus said he thought the
number of transfer students
from community colleges to
four-year
institutions
would
likely to increase. However, he
noted that he would like to see
the plan go even further than
two years of free community
college.
“Frankly, it ought to be a free
two years regardless of what
post-secondary institution you
attend, whether it be the two
year or the four year,” he said.
Bahr agreed the implemen-
tation of the proposal could
potentially increase the number
of transfer students.
He said the proposal pro-
vided a good incentive for insti-
tutions to work on changing
their student transfer policies
and establish clear agreements
between four-year institutions
and community colleges.
“There is the aspect of which
of the credits will even count as
credits at the four-year institu-
tions,” he said. “But then there
is the more complex challenge
of which course at the commu-
nity college has a parallel at the
four-year institution.”
Morgan also acknowledged
that transfer policies needed to
be easier for students to under-
stand, though he pointed out the
Michigan Transfer Agreement,
which ensures that universities
accept certain number of cred-
its from community colleges.
He noted that many students
who come to WCC already
know they want to go to the
University, which has a spe-
cialized transfer process for
WCC students, and therefore
the school can advise them on
which courses to take so credits
can transfer.
“However the challenge, that
there isn’t a solution for at this
point, is that not every student
comes into the community col-
lege knowing instantly that they
want to transfer to a university
afterwards,” Morgan said.
University spokesman Rick
Fitzgerald said it was too soon
to speculate the effect the
proposal would have on the
University. He noted that the
University has programs that
work with community colleges
to facilitate transferring.
Whether or not the White
House’s plan will pass a GOP-
controlled House and Senate is
also unclear.
Boulus said under the current
circumstances, there does not
appear to be Congressional sup-
port and the proposal probably
won’t be taken up for vote.
However,
Morgan,
who
met with various members of
Congress and members of the
Department of Education this
week, said he came away with
the impression that the goal
wasn’t simply to get the propos-
al passed.
“The reason … is to start a
national dialogue and a conver-
sation about how do we support
community colleges and get
students in the door of higher
education,” he said. “The goal
is not just to pass this. The goal
is to throw out there something
really big and see if we can get
something small.
3-News
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Friday, February 13, 2015 — 3
his organization, but no official
collaboration has been proposed.
He also noted that more informa-
tion is needed before determining
whether or not MUSIC Matters
would play a role.
“Hail and Unite” also has a
philanthropic component.
“One of the things that we want
to do is when we’re raising this
money is that we want to give a
significant philanthropic contri-
bution,” he said.
Though musicians such as Emi-
nem and David Banner, a rapper
and music producer, were men-
tioned at the CSG meeting, Wein-
berg said those are two names out
of a list of 15 to 20 potential celeb-
rities participants. Organizers
also hope to create a music video
and a documentary showcasing
the process of creating the song.
“We’re trying to combine stu-
dents with outside talent to cre-
ate something that’s bigger than
a song,” Weinberg said. “It’s cre-
ating a movement and something
that’s from the ground organi-
cally, something that’s never been
done in music, college or sports
ever.”
Cooper Charlton, president of
the University’s Student Athlete
Advisory Committee, said that
though he can’t speak for student
athletes as a whole, he sees the
University as a place where new
ideas should be welcomed and
discussed.
“I personally support innova-
tion and creativity but I would
need to hear more about this
initiative before I gave a firm
answer,” he said.
Managing News Editor Sam
Gringlas contributed reporting.
demic programs and commit-
ment to global engagement that
nurtures a passion for creating
positive impacts across interna-
tional borders.”
At the University, students
complete a multi-step process
to apply for a Fulbright grant,
guided by the International
Institute. Perspective recipients
meet with a faculty and staff
fellowship team several times
to discuss their application and
prepare for further steps, such
as an interview.
Pauline Jones Luong, director
of the International Institute,
said there are several benefits
both for the students and for the
campus in devoting staff and
faculty time toward preparing
Fulbright applicants.
“It’s
incredibly
valuable
because it showcases both the
quality of the students at the U
of M, the international orienta-
tion of those students, the global
interests those students have, as
well as the commitment of the
University to ensuring that its
students have an international
experience, international edu-
cation,” she said. “It’s a win-win
both for students and the Uni-
versity.”
University
alum
Nathan
VanderVeen, one of the Ful-
bright recipients, is currently
stationed in Seropédica, Brazil.
He is pursuing an English teach-
ing assistantship at the Fed-
eral Rural University, as well as
using his science background
to work on a water purifica-
tion project in the Brazilian
favelas.
“The Fulbright Program in
general does favor the humani-
ties and people who are inter-
ested
in
intense
literary
research,” VanderVeen said in
a Skype interview Thursday
from Brazil. “But we’d be kid-
ding ourselves if we thought the
ambassadors of the world were
all English majors or foreign
language majors. Those people
who are constantly liaising with
other countries are also the sci-
entists, physicians, engineers of
the world.”
VanderVeen first applied as a
junior during his undergradu-
ate studies and was rejected, but
then reapplied for a 2015 grant.
He said the University’s sta-
tus as a public school makes
it unique in its amount of Ful-
bright grantees.
“Being a public institution,
I think that’s just so admirable
because it puts such an empha-
sis on embracing students from
all walks of life and still helping
them reach the highest level of
academic and professional suc-
cess,” VanderVeen said.
He added that as a part of his
experience, he hopes to draw on
the diversity of people he will be
exposed to abroad.
“For me, it’s really important
to connect with a diverse array
of people from different back-
grounds, people with differ-
ent belief systems, so that I can
become the best teacher that I
can possibly be.”
FULBRIGHT
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SONG
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siveness and productive dialogue,
Goldberg said while people gener-
ally support social change, they are
not given the chance to be includ-
ed or else are condemned for not
joining fully. He said liberals use
“moral bullying” on conservatives
to attack them politically rather
than create discussion.
“The same people who say we
need an honest dialogue on race,
we need to have an open and frank
conversation on race — the second
anybody takes that bait and says
something even remotely ‘un-PC’
or offensive in any way — or not
even offensive but that can be used
to pretend that they were offended
— they get beaten over the head
with it,” he told the Daily.
“In a culture, the majority
owes tolerance and respect to the
minority, but the minority owes
tolerance and respect to the major-
ity, too,” he said. “What is not
constructive is when the minor-
ity responds by simply shouting,
by this sort of moral bullying and
guilt tripping that says ‘you are a
bigot’ for absolutely well-inten-
tioned language that was accept-
able five minutes ago.”
LSA freshman Grant Strobl,
chairman and founder of the Uni-
versity’s chapter of Young Ameri-
cans for Freedom, said he was
happy to have Goldberg on cam-
pus to bring different ideas to the
forefront on campus.
Strobl mentioned Communica-
tions Prof. Susan Douglas’ Decem-
ber article in which she states, “I
hate Republicans,” and describes
conservatives as against change
and social tolerance. The column
resulted in backlash from Repub-
licans across the state. Strobl said
Douglas’ piece was an example of
the one-sided nature among Uni-
versity faculty and students.
“It kind of coerces people into
a certain ideology and that’s kind
of where ‘liberal thought police’
comes from,” he said. “It’s decid-
ing what gets heard rather than
allowing for a fair discussion
between viewpoints.”
Strobl also cited the Inclusive
Language Campaign as an exam-
ple of how the University professes
to promote positive discussion, but
excludes conservative students.
Having gone through the pro-
gram himself, Strobl said the ILC
doesn’t highlight terms attacking
conservatives — like “right-wing-
er” or “tea-bagger” — but it should.
While he said he agrees with
the end goal of promoting diversity
and inclusion, he said he took issue
with the idea of the program try-
ing to manage the words students
used, saying there are unintended
consequences to that approach.
“I feel like we should be embrac-
ing the diversity rather than trying
to be too politically correct about it
because I think that almost makes
us more divisive,” he said. “I think
it all comes through education and
I think we’re all adults here and
I think we can all approach each
other in an adult-like manner and
discuss the real issues.”
ILC is part of the University’s
larger “Expect Respect” cam-
paign. Amanda McLittle, asso-
ciate director of diversity and
inclusion in University Housing,
wrote in an e-mail interview with
the Daily that ILC is not a political
organization and does not focus on
“conservative” or “liberal” terms.
“Students chose the words that
we are highlighting in this first
year of ILC,” she wrote. “Multiple
student focus groups were asked
which words they would like to
see included this year. The list of
words is not meant be exhaustive.”
The ILC drew national atten-
tion this week after “The College
Fix” reported the campaign cost
$16,000 to implement, confirmed
by University spokesperson Rick
Fitzgerald. He said it’s difficult to
put the cost of the program into
perspective with other programs,
but that the money went to bro-
chures and other awareness mea-
sures, not staff.
LSA senior Derek Draplin, the
editor in chief of the student pub-
lication The Michigan Review,
has been vocal about the ILC and
attended the speech Thursday
night. He said speakers like Gold-
berg are important to creating
opening people’s minds on campus.
“The frontlines of culture-wars,
so to speak, is on college campus-
es,” Draplin said. “There is a lock-
step belief in opinions on campus
so that’s kind of why I came (to
the Goldberg lecture) to challenge
those establishment-type beliefs
and comments and movements.”
Strobl said YAF plans to bring
more speakers by the end of the
semester, though the schedule is
not yet set.
GOLDBERG
From Page 1
OBAMA
From Page 1
do,” said Engineering junior Diego
Calvo, chair of the Commission on
Student Innovation.
He added that the Commis-
sion’s goal is to combine all of
the University’s entrepreneurial
groups into “one powerhouse.”
“We think that every student at
the University of Michigan should
have the opportunity to find a
team of crazy people and work on
some project that really gets them
going — more than just in classes,”
Calvo said. “We want to see engi-
neers and LSA students and art
and designers coming together
and coming up with these amaz-
ing projects.”
Representative of that mission,
the ICE Winter Blast was packed
with students from many of the
University’s different academic
units, including the School of Pub-
lic Health’s Innovation and Social
Entrepreneurship program, the
School of Information and the
School of Nursing. Various student
organizations and ventures were
also represented.
“To make the best ideas and
solutions come out of U of M,
and to give students the best pos-
sible experience, you have to meet
people who aren’t like you and
you have to work with different
people,” Calvo said. “And so the
commission has brought all these
groups together.”
Calvo said the ICE Winter Blast
served as a sort of finale event for
the University’s Month of Entre-
preneurship, which ran from Jan.
15 to Feb. 15 and included events
like Startup Weekend, MHacks
and Makeathon.
He said this event, in particular,
was organized with the hope that
students would come and see that
entrepreneurship was relevant to
them, even if they thought their
field of interest didn’t include an
emphasis on innovation.
LSA freshman Evan Garfinkel
also led the event as part of the
Commission on Student Innova-
tion.
“Mainly, the Commission on
Student Innovation wanted to
promote and expose innovation,
creativity and entrepreneurship,”
Garfinkel said.
For that reason, they named the
event “ICE.”
“We sat down as a commission
of the student government and we
said it’s really important to expose
more students to these ideas and
for the students that want to par-
ticipate in this type of stuff to be
able to connect them with orga-
nizations and with startups that
would really be meaningful to
them,” Garfinkel said. “There’s
just a growing entrepreneurial
presence and interest on campus
where a lot of students from a lot
of different schools across campus
— whether it be Ross, whether it be
Engineering or LSA.”
Art and Design senior Nick
Tilma ran the School of Art and
Design’s booth at the event. On
display in front of his table was a
prototype of what he called “Study
Buddy,” a multi-surface, swivel-
ing desk he designed in a class last
semester.
The class’s prompt was to
design furniture and accessories
for college students.
“We did the whole process of
researching what people need,
what people want and choosing
and developing our projects into
full-scale, working models,” Tilma
said.
With him was Art and Design
senior Xiaoying He. She, too, dis-
played a prototype of her prod-
uct, “Squishy,” a pillow holder for
iPads, glasses and other odds and
ends.
Stationed at the A2Geeks table,
a nonprofit entrepreneurial hub
in Ann Arbor, was Roger Rayle, a
venture catalyst at R2VIVE. One
of A2Geeks’s notable events is the
monthly A2NewTech event, an
idea-pitching session where entre-
preneurs can share ideas and net-
work.
“Half of the students here have
already presented (at the event),”
Rayle said.
In line with the event’s mission
to connect entrepreneurs, sets of
partnered organizations — one
from the University and one from
the students — have also created
an events list on Innovation Blue’s
website.
By way of this “central hub”
they hope to keep students of all
different backgrounds connected
to entrepreneurial opportunities
on campus and in Ann Arbor, Gar-
finkel said.
In addition to events like ICE,
Jeni Olney, student affairs special-
ist at the Center for Entrepreneur-
ship, said the University wants to
extend entrepreneurial opportu-
nities to all students by way of the
Minor in Entrepreneurship.
Motioning to the student-filled
Rogel Ballroom floor, Olney said
students are already passionate
about entrepreneurship.
“The minor offers that curricu-
lar stamp, saying that the Univer-
sity acknowledges and recognizes
the efforts of these students at a
curricular level,” Olney said. “We
want to further equip them with
the skills and the tools that will
assist them in their endeavors out-
side of class.”
Calvo said he believes the drive
to involve students from all over
campus in entrepreneurship is
unique to the University because
of its interdisciplinary nature.
“We’re the only school that I
know of where we’ve made entre-
preneurship integrated into the
most general, largest college at
our school, to show people that
hey, no matter what you are study-
ing, there’s opportunities here for
you,” Calvo said.
ICE
From Page 1
other were pointed inquiries
about topics like familial rela-
tionships and death. At the 36
Questions event hosted at the
University, participants were split
into groups and then, from the
groups, further divided into pairs
to answer the questions.
LSA junior Nivedita Karki,
who is a web editor at the Michi-
gan Daily, and Engineering senior
Madhav Achar, who both said
they attended because its gen-
eral premise looked interesting,
had met two years ago at a South
Asian Awareness Network con-
ference before being coinciden-
tally paired together.
“It was just interesting to me
that someone would think just
knowing another person would
be enough to fall in love with
them,” Karki said. “It was kind of
like being a part of a social experi-
ment.”
Achar said he didn’t mind
answering some of the more per-
sonal questions included on the
list.
“I had more fun answering
them than if I was to go on a
date in general,” he said. “The
first time you meet someone you
might ask a couple of questions,
‘what’s your major? Blah, blah,
blah.’ I’m glad to see that major
wasn’t on here, because that’s
not the most important thing
about someone.”
After answering all 36 ques-
tions on the list, the next step
for participants is to stare into
each other’s eyes for four min-
utes without looking away or
speaking. When it came time for
participants at the University’s
36 Questions to move on to this
part of the event, the room was
filled with sporadic giggles and
whispers.
“I have trouble making eye
contact with someone when I’m
talking to them,” Achar said.
“It’s just a habit. So just four
minutes of eye contact without
talking? That was kind of hard.
But we had a good time, I think.
We’re survivors.”
Achar and Karki said they
were both planning to stay in
touch and meet up again this
weekend.
Sakallah,
the
co-organizer
of the event, said it was impor-
tant for her to host 36 Questions
in a University setting because
oftentimes college students have
a difficult time being open with
others, even with people they’ve
known for years.
“Especially at Michigan, peo-
ple aren’t apt to be super vulner-
able,” she said. “I was reading
through these 36 questions and
for some people I would think I
know really well, I wouldn’t know
the answers to these questions. I
think that’s important for college
students specifically to have those
kinds of relationships especially
at this time because we’re all at a
formative stage of our lives.”
Nielsen said she and Sakallah
had discussed hosting 36 Ques-
tions as a way to offer an alterna-
tive to “hook-up culture.”
“On the romantic side, for
people who are looking for that,
on a college campus, you’re not
really getting into these deep
relationships,” she said. “A lot of
times everyone’s so caught up in
their classes that you miss a lot
of opportunities to really get to
know people that you’re suppos-
edly close to.”
Moving forward, Sakallah and
Nielsen said they plan to make
36 Questions a series of national
pop-up events. Sakallah said she
had a friend in San Francisco
who had a similar idea and had
held a successful event similar to
36 Questions last week.
“We kind of decided that we
were going to launch this whole
thing and have a bunch of events
all over the country,” Sakallah
said. “Ann Arbor is just one out
of a bunch.”
36 QUESTIONS
From Page 2
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