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Tuesday, November 10, 2015

ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-FIVE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM

INDEX
Vol. CXXV, No. 27
©2015 The Michigan Daily
michigandaily.com

N E WS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

O PI N I O N . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

A RT S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

S P O R T S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .7

S U D O K U . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

CL A S S I F I E DS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

NEW ON MICHIGANDAILY.COM
Q&A with journalist Clarence Page
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WEATHER 
TOMORROW

HI: 58

LO: 46

Former faculty, staff 
discuss similarities 

between past, 
present climate

By ALLANA AKHTAR

Daily Staff Reporter

Though the event’s original 

intent was to convene a group of 
leaders to speak about the history 
of campus activism and diversity 
efforts, a panel discussion Monday 
afternoon instead largely focused 
on the fact that past grievances 
related to many issues of race and 
gender at the University continue 
to hold true today.

“It’s sad to think it is 2015 and 

we’re talking about the same stuff 
we talked about in ’49 when the 
first Black woman was allowed to 
live in a dormitory,” said panelist 
Charles 
Moody, 
vice 
provost 

emeritus for minority affairs.

Along 
with 
Moody, 
four 

other panelists discussed their 
experiences working to foster an 
inclusive community for minority 
students on campus: Associate 
Prof. Maria Cotera, former director 

of the Latina/o Studies Program; 
University alum Cynthia Stephens, 
a judge of the Michigan Court of 
Appeals; Abigail Stewart, director 
of the ADVANCE program, which 
aims to advocate for female 
faculty in science and engineering 
fields and the former director of 
the Women’s Studies Program; 
and James Toy, co-founder and 
former director of the Spectrum 
Center, then known as the Human 
Sexuality Office.

Lester Monts, a professor of 

music and former senior vice 
provost 
for 
academic 
affairs, 

moderated the conversation.

The panel was part of the 

University’s 
campus-wide 

diversity summit, which is to 
be headlined by an interview 
between 
University 
President 

Mark Schlissel and Pulitzer Prize-
winning journalist Clarence Page 
Tuesday morning.

The summit is a piece of 

Schlissel’s ongoing Strategic Plan 
for Diversity, which he launched in 
September by asking each campus 
school or department to design 
its own internal programs for 
enhancing diversity.

Robert Sellers, vice provost for 

President says 
rhetoric must be 

matched with 

progress

By GENEVIEVE HUMMER

Daily Staff Reporter

Ahead of Tuesday’s diversity 

summit, 
University 
President 

Mark 
Schlissel 
attended 

Monday’s 
Senate 
Advisory 

Committee on University Affairs 
meeting to discuss the impending 
school-wide diversity plan and 
the importance of balancing 
rhetoric with substantive action.

Monday marked Schlissel’s first 

time at SACUA since appearing 
there last November. During that 
visit, Schlissel spoke candidly 
about the University’s athletics 
program — a conversation that 
drew both praise and criticism.

On Monday, Schlissel said 

gathering input from as many 
people as possible will give the 
University’s diversity plan the 
greatest likelihood for success. 
However, he also acknowledged 
that it will take time to complete 
and implement.

“The thing I like about this 

process is that it’s the most 
bottom-up thing I’ve ever done,” 
he said. “It would be an easier 
and faster process if we took a 
group like this, sat in a room 10 
times and issued a plan for the 
University of Michigan. Strangely 

enough, that’s too easy.”

While encouraging patience 

during the long-term planning 
process, Schlissel also pointed to 
diversity initiatives the University 
has already implemented.

He pointed to the HAIL 

scholarship 
and 
the 
new 

Wolverine Pathways program, 
as 
well 
as 
the 
increased 

numbers 
of 
underrepresented 

minorities in this year’s freshman 
class, as evidence of tangible 
improvement. 
Schlissel 
noted 

the administration’s talk about 
increased diversity must continue 
to be supported by “concrete 
actions” like these.

“Any time that we devote a 

significant amount of time to 
talking, then we really do have to 
prove to people that talking leads 
to substance,” he said.

Following the discussion on 

diversity, SACUA chair Silke-
Maria Weineck, a professor of 
comparative literature, asked for 
Schlissel’s thoughts on Tim Wolfe 
— the University of Missouri 
system president who resigned 
Monday 
amid 
allegations 
of 

mishandling incidents of racism 
on the school’s campus.

“I don’t really understand 

enough about the circumstances 
in Missouri to have an opinion on 
it, I’ve only been following it for 
the last couple of days,” Schlissel 
said. “What was interesting was 
at the end of the series of events 
that led to his resignation, there 
were some pretty forceful student 

#StandWithAlex 

draws support 
for grad student 

terminated from job

By ALYSSA BRANDON 

and EMMA KINERY

Daily Staff Reporters

On Monday, the University’s 

Graduate 
Employees’ 

Organization filled a hallway 
of 
the 
Taubman 
College 
of 

Architecture and Urban Planning 
and tweeted #StandWithelx to 
protest the firing of a graduate 
student instructor.

Alex Chen, a third-year dual 

degree master’s student in the 
Taubman College and the School 
of Engineering, was hired as 
a Taubman GSI in August and 
signed an employment contract, 
before receiving an e-mail a day 
later stating she was not fit for the 
position. The reason — according 
to protest organizers — cited by the 
University was that she was not a 
Taubman student, as the majority 
of the classes she was enrolled in 
were for her Engineering program.

Because she was fired from her 

position as a GSI, Chen lost her 
tuition waiver, health care and the 
salary she anticipated. According 
to GEO President John Ware, an 
Engineering graduate student, the 
loss has resulted in nearly $50,000 
in debt for Chen and a hold on her 
account so she cannot graduate.

Young Americans 
for Freedom mimic 

Berlin Wall, 26 
years after its fall

By ANNA HARITOS

Daily Staff Reporter

Twenty-six years after the 

Berlin Wall fell in Germany, 
the first blows were delivered 
to the make-shift wall on 
the 
Diag 
constructed 
by 

the 
University’s 
Young 

Americans 
for 
Freedom 

chapter. The wall, created 
to honor the anniversary of 
the real wall’s destruction, 
was built to protest political 
correctness, 
according 
to 

YAF chairman Grant Strobl, 
an LSA sophomore.

“Right now the bias hotline 

is 
against 
free 
speech,” 

Strobl said. “You can report 
a bias crime just because it’s 
offensive. That’s not in the 
constitution.”

Strobl is referring to the 

University’s telephone hotline 
and online forms available for 
directly reporting hate crimes 
on campus.

Members 
of 
the 

organization passed around 
a mallet, each taking a turn 
to smash the wall, which 
was covered with words like 
“safe space” and “trigger 
warnings.”

However, 
the 
display 

was not perceived well by 
many of those who passed 

by, including LSA freshman 
Kevin Sweitzer.

“It ignores all the progress 

we’ve made on promoting 
political 
correctness, 
and 

social 
justice 
across 
the 

University,” 
Sweitzer 
said. 

“It just puts it on some wall 
for some people who are 
privileged 
to 
take 
turns 

beating at. It’s unbelievable. 
This is a bias incident, and it 
needs to stop.”

For many of the students 

who stopped to watch the 
display, confusion centered 
around what YAF was aiming 
to 
accomplish. 
Additional 

oppositions 
were 
voiced, 

particularly by one student, 
LSA 
sophomore 
Fahim 

Rahman.

On anniversary of 
Rosser death, locals 
continue to advocate 

for change

By ISOBEL FUTTER

Daily Staff Reporter

After more than a year of 

national protests calling for an 
end to police brutality, Matthew 

Lassiter, an associate history 
professor, 
decided 
University 

students might be interested in 
learning more about criminal 
justice issues in the United States.

“I think there are a lot of 

undergraduate 
students 
and 

graduate students who have 
gotten really involved and really 
interested in the history of mass 
incarceration … so I wanted to 
bring in two scholars who have 
written a lot about this topic,” 
he said.

On 
Monday, 
Lassiter 

moderated a discussion between 
guest panelists Donna Murch, 
associate professor of history at 
Rutgers University, and Heather 
Ann Thompson, professor of 
Afroamerican 
and 
African 

Studies, to discuss these issues 
in depth.

Sponsored 
by 
the 

Metropolitan History Workshop, 
the Department of Afroamerican 
and African Studies, and the 
Program in Race, Law and 

History, the event drew about 
80 
undergraduates, 
graduate 

students and faculty members.

Both Murch and Thompson 

are leading historians on topics 
such as race, incarceration, black 
power, civil rights, criminal 
justice and the war on drugs, and 
both have forthcoming books on 
these topics.

One important topic discussed 

was the difference between mass 
incarceration and the carceral 

ROBERT DUNNE/Daily

LSA freshman Raenell Williams marches against police violence on the one year anniversary of the shooting of Aura Rosser by Ann Arbor Police Officer David 
Ried. The march was organized by Ann Arbor to Ferguson and took marchers from Ann Arbor City Hall to Liberty Plaza for a candlelit vigil. 

ALLISON FARRAND/Daily

Business graduate student Gautham Madhira tears down a mock Berlin Wall at an event organized by the Young 
Americans for Freedom on the Diag on Monday. The wall was decorated with phrases like “safe spaces,” “trigger 
warning” and “Political Correctness: the Iron Curtain of the University.”

See DIVERSITY, Page 3

See GEO, Page 3
See WALL, Page 3
See SACUA, Page 3

See PROTEST, Page 3

Panel talks
history of 
diversity at 
University

Ann Arbor activists march 
to oppose police brutality

Schlissel visits 
SACUA to tout 
diversity plan

GSI union 
protests ‘U’ 
handling of 
new hire

ADMINISTRATION

FACULTY
ACADEMICS

Demonstration on Diag 
fights ‘political correctness’ 

