of the Sigma Alpha Mu frater-
nity and a University alum,
plead guilty in July to malicious
destruction of property totaling
more than $200, but less than
$1,000. He was initially charged
with a more serious, felony
malicious destruction of prop-
erty charge, but the judge later
reduced the charge to a misde-
meanor.
Vlasic is prohibited from
using drugs and alcohol while
on probation, and is subject to
random testing.
Vlasic was one of 270 SAM
fraternity and Sigma Delta Tau
sorority members from the
University who attended the
January ski trip at the Tree-
tops Resort in Gaylord. Chap-
ter members reportedly caused
more than $400,000 in dam-
ages during their stay.
Business
juniors
Joshua
Kaplan and Zachary Levin,
former president and treasurer
of the disbanded fraternity,
respectively, are scheduled to
appear in court Thursday to
file a plea agreement. Univer-
sity alum Jesse Krumholz, the
fourth SAM member to receive
criminal charges, plead guilty
to malicious destruction of
property less than $200 in July.
He will be sentenced October 5.
In March, the national SAM
organization
disbanded
the
University’s chapter, citing the
failure of its members to fully
cooperate in the investigation.
The
Treetops
Resort
announced in June plans to sue
the fraternity for hundreds of
thousands of dollars in dam-
ages.
site so it can be sustained without
further federal investment.”
The
federal
funding
will
go toward updating the site’s
vehicles’
software,
upgrading
infrastructure and security, and
marketing the site to potential
application
developers
and
external investors.
Amendments to snow removal
policy approved
Council
also
approved
an
amendment to sections of the
city’s snow removal policy — a
change recommended by the
recently-released
Pedestrian
Safety and Access Task Force.
The ordinance amended three
sections in the Code of the City
of Ann Arbor and added a fourth
amendment regarding sidewalk
snow removal policies.
One of the amendments asks
alters language in the section that
calls for the removal of snow greater
than one inch, so that residents
are now required to remove any
snowfall that lands on the sidewalks
outside of their property.
A second amendment states
that residents will have 24 hours
to clear their sidewalks, after
which they will receive a citation
from
Community
Standards.
From the time they receive the
citation, they will then have
another 24 hours to clear their
property themselves before the
City does it for them and issues
the resident a fee for doing so.
The third amendment clarifies
that the fine for the citation and
the fee for the City clearing the
resident’s
sidewalks
are
two
separate fees.
Councilmember
Stephen
Kunselman (D–Ward 3) said he is
pro-“clear pavement,” but he said
the ordinance presents too abrupt
of a change.
“I would like to define ways
of getting to a lower threshold
of snow, in a way that is gradual
and takes into account other
things like fines and really going
after the chronic offenders in a
way that doesn’t feel so abrupt
for the rest of the community,”
Kunselman said.
Vote
on
zoning
change
postponed
During Monday’s meeting, an
ordinance to amend a zoning law
pertaining to a new apartment
complex was postponed until
the Council’s second meeting in
November. The amendment, if
passed, will re-zone what is now
53.61 acres, located off of Nixon
Road and M-14, of agriculture
and wetlands to make way for
development of a new complex,
the Woodbury Club Apartments.
The apartment complex would
consist of 282 apartment units
and 575 parking spaces.
Many community members
who live in the area, which is now
composed mostly of wetlands,
spoke out against the development
project.
Among those concerned were
residents who live near Barclay
Park, an area that borders the
prospective development site.
“I speak for the board and the
membership when I say we are
opposed to any new development
north and west of Barclay Park,”
said William Quinn, Barclay Park
Board of Directors president. “We
are very concerned about the
impact the development will have
on the wetlands and traffic.”
Several councilmembers also
expressed concerns.
Councilmember Jane Lumm
(I–Ward 2) said if the Council
voted to postpone their vote on
the bill, it could use that time to try
to solve some of the community’s
concerns with the project.
“This time can be used to work
through all of the issues, get
more clarity, definition and get
in concert with the neighbors,”
Lumm said.
Councilmember
Sumi
Kailasapathy (D–Ward 1) echoed
Lumm’s opinion.
“I would like to see a move
from a perspective of mitigation
to
actually
preservation,”
Kailasapathy said. “The whole
lens through which we now see
things is ‘Okay, let’s destroy some
trees and then let’s plant some
other trees over there.’ I think Ann
Arbor can do better than that.”
the right direction.
“We’re
not
talking
about
something that is going to
change the entire culture of the
University overnight, nor are
we suggesting that the majority
of our students aren’t extremely
serious,” he said. “What we are
suggesting is that there has been
an upsurge in alcohol-related
issues and that if Friday becomes
a regular school day … the issue
of drinking will decline.”
SACUA
chair
Silke-
Maria
Weineck,
professor
of
comparative
literature,
said University officials have
expressed
support
for
the
proposal, but would prefer the
initiative be driven by faculty, not
the central administration.
“The
administration
has
signaled to us that they would be
very open to such a suggestion
coming from the faculty, but
they don’t want to be the ones
introducing it because it would,
of course, require that quite a few
of us actually show up on Friday
to teach classes,” Weineck said.
Weineck
also
proposed
offering some sort of incentives
for
departments
willing
to
have more classes on Fridays,
especially
those
with
large
introductory courses.
“We haven’t discussed this
in any detail but maybe the
University could offer some
incentives
for
departments
willing to do that,” she said. “If
you have the Econ 101 and Psych
101 as a required lecture on
Friday morning, you take out a
lot of drinking.”
Senate
Assembly
discusses
release of student data
The issue of whether or not to
publicly release student course
evaluations
also
generated
debate among members of the
Senate Assembly.
Biology Prof. John Lehman,
a SACUA member, said that
last
November,
Pollack,
the
University provost, asked the
University’s Academic Affairs
Advisory Committee to consider
the
release
of
numerical
responses in student course
evaluations to the following
four prompts: overall this is an
excellent course, overall the
instructor
was
an
excellent
teacher, I learned a great deal
from this course and I had a
strong desire to take this course.
Lehman said he presented the
proposal to the Senate Assembly
and conducted a straw poll
among members of the assembly
that same month. Among those
who responded — which was
about half of the assembly —
close to 60 percent supported
releasing the scores.
In their April meeting, Lehman
said, AAAC members discussed
creating alternatives to two of the
four prompts — overall this was
an excellent course and overall
the instructor was an excellent
teacher — because of concerns that
they were based on popularity, not
student-learning objectives.
According to Lehman, Pollack
said she would ask the Center
on Research for Learning and
Teaching
to
formulate
new
questions. However, Lehman said
as of SACUA’s Sept. 11 meeting
with Pollack, those questions
hadn’t been generated yet.
Lehman
said
student
representatives at the AAAC
meeting said they want the
evaluations made public to help
answer questions such as which
professor they should select for
courses taught by multiple people
and the difficulty of the course.
“We need to take notice of
the fact that student faculty
governance
has
unanimously
called for the release of this
information, they’ve transmitted
all of this to the provost and
met with the provost,” Lehman
said. “It certainly seems to me
speaking with her that she’s
receptive to this.”
Weineck, the SACUA chair,
presented several caveats to
releasing course evaluations to
the assembly, such as that faculty
might teach to the evaluation,
the evaluations might hurt junior
faculty seeking tenure, race and
ethnicity courses tend to score
lower in evaluations because the
course content is uncomfortable
and data shows students treat
female faculty and faculty of
color differently in evaluations.
Comparative Literature Prof.
Catherine Brown said reworking
the course evaluations so that
students actually care about the
results could boost response
rates and make the evaluations a
better student tool.
“The percentage of people
that respond to the evaluations is
tremendously low,” she said. “So
my concern would be that folks
would be making their decisions
based on extraordinarily low
response rates.”
In a straw poll, the assembly
voted to bring the issue of
releasing student evaluations to
the faculty as a whole during the
next Senate Assembly meeting on
October 19.
happening.
With the new and sweeping set
of data, University administrators
will now be able to both gauge the
accuracy of its own campus sexual
assault survey results and assess
how the University’s findings
compare
to
peer
institutions
nationwide.
According
to
a
University
release, 6,700 University students
participated in the AAU survey,
making for a 17.6-percent response
rate. The national response rate
was 19.3 percent.
The AAU survey also pointed to
high numbers of sexual harassment
among students. Nationally, 61.9
percent of female undergraduates
reported being sexually harassed.
At the University specifically,
54.7 percent of students reported
having
experienced
sexual
harassment
since
entering
college, and 73.2 percent of female
undergraduate students reported
instances of sexual harassment.
The AAU survey found 60.4
percent of gay and lesbian students
report being sexually harassed,
compared to 45.9 percent of
heterosexual students.
The AAU survey also reported
that transgender, genderqueer,
non-conforming or questioning
students had the highest rates of
sexual assault.
The national data also reveals
a general hesitance to report
instances of sexual misconduct,
with some variance based upon
the severity of misconduct.
Nationwide,
the
highest
reporting rates occurred when a
subject was stalked (28 percent) or
physically forced into penetration
(25.5 percent), but drop to 5
percent if the subject was sexually
touched while incapacitated.
Additionally,
35.9
percent
of
students
who
experienced
sexual misconduct did not report
because they were “embarrassed,”
“ashamed” — or because doing
so “would be too emotionally
difficult.” One-third of students said
they did not report because they did
not think anything would be done.
In a conference call with
reporters, AAU President Hunter
Rawlings said he hopes the
participating universities will use
the survey data to the benefit of
their students.
“The purpose of this survey is
to enhance the safety of students
on our campuses,” he said. “It is
our hope that these universities
and others will be able to make
use of these data on behalf of their
students.”
The
AAU
survey’s
large
sample size, in both universities
studied and number of student
respondents, makes it unique
among similar surveys conducted
on campus climate.
With a national response rate
of 19.3 percent, Bonnie Fisher,
professor at the University of
Cincinnati’s College of Education
Criminal Justice and Human
Services and developer of the
survey, said the relatively large
sample size allows analysts to get
a more accurate picture of campus
climate.
“This is a strength because it
allows for a greater estimation
of the prevalence of different
forms of sexual assault and sexual
misconduct on each campus,”
Fisher said in a conference call
with reporters.
Some
data
points,
including
whether students would report and
how students believed the University
would respond to a reported assault,
varied by up to 25 percentage points
among college campuses. According
to David Cantor, who is vice president
of Westat, the research firm that
conducted the survey, factors such
as size and whether the institution is
public or private only provide a weak
correlation to explain the variance.
“It is important to slice and
dice these events very carefully
and that is one of the strengths
of the survey,” Cantor said in the
conference call.
University
President
Mark
Schlissel has identified sexual
assault on campus as a top
priority for his administration.
The
University’s
response
to
allegations of sexual misconduct
is currently under investigation by
the U.S. Department of Education.
Earlier this month, Schlissel told
The Michigan Daily that he hopes
to update the University’s Student
Sexual Misconduct Policy before
the new year.
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Tuesday, September 22, 2015 — 3
SURVEY
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capacity rats.
“We believe these studies will
lead to focused translational
studies for humans,” Britton said.
Nursing junior Alex Fauer,
president of Michigan Triathlon,
said he is optimistic the study’s
results will provide even more rea-
son to engage in regular exercise.
“The first stage of change that
will make people motivated and
aware to health benefits of high
capacity exercise is just getting
the data out there,” Fauer said.
STUDY
From Page 1
HALEY MCLAUGHLIN /Daily
SACUA Chair Silke-Maria Weineck, professor of Comparative Literature, addresses the Senate Assembly in Palmer Commons on Monday. The Senate
discussed the possible publication of students’ online teacher evaluations.