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Tuesday, February 16, 2016

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Vol. CXXV, No. 74
©2016 The Michigan Daily
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WEATHER 
TOMORROW

HI: 33

LO: 10

Researchers aim to 
use new technology 
to reduce injury in 
high-contact sports

By ALEXA ST. JOHN

Daily Staff Reporter

Researchers at the University 

of Michigan are aiming to make 
progress 
toward 
encouraging 

safer equipment for athletes and 
raising awareness about common 
brain injuries that can occur 
on the field — an issue of rising 
concern in both professional and 
college sports — through new 
helmet technology.

A new sports-helmet prototype 

capable of dissipating impulse 
from impact and taking kinetic 
energy away from the skull and 
brain while playing high-contact 
sports is being developed by a team 
in the College of Engineering. 
Though helmets currently used for 
sports like football are intended 
to protect against skull and brain 
injuries, this new prototype aims 

to step beyond that with new 
understandings about how the 
brain becomes injured.

Co-author of the study Ellen 

Arruda, a professor of mechanical 
engineering, said the project 
began by looking at applying 
lightweight materials to the blast 
and impact associated with high-
contact sports.

“It’s only recently that we’ve 

understood 
traumatic 
brain 

injuries,” 
Arruda 
said. 
“The 

helmets that we’re using weren’t 
designed to protect the brain; 
they were designed to prevent 
skull fracture … Now that we 
understand that they also have 
to protect the brain, we realized 
that literature had virtually no 
information on how to go about 
doing that … no one carefully 
looked at what it would take to 
optimally reduce the force and 
impulse of an impact in a helmet 
design over and over and over 
again.”

Arruda said she and her 

colleagues specifically researched 
football and were thus well 
prepared 
to 
try 
to 
initially 

See HELMET, Page 3

Political candidate 
addresses packed 
EMU audience 

By CAITLIN REEDY and 

LYDIA MURRARY

Daily Staff Reporters

More than 9,000 people 

cheered and stomped their feet 
in response to the arrival of U.S. 
Sen. Bernie Sanders (D–Vt.) at 

Eastern Michigan University’s 
Convocation Center Monday. 

Sander’s visit was his first to 

the state of Michigan during his 
campaign and comes just three 
weeks before the Michigan 
primary on March 8. Sanders 
will return to Michigan on 
March 6 for a Democratic 
debate held in Flint.

At the Monday rally, he 

largely 
addressed 
familiar 

topics 
surrounding 
his 

campaign, many of which had 

personal connections to the 
mostly young, local crowd — 
including 
issues 
pertaining 

to Flint, higher education and 
youth voter turnout.

He also touched on recent 

events, 
referencing 
U.S. 

Supreme 
Court 
Associate 

Justice Antonin Scalia, who 
died on Saturday.

There 
is 
immense 

speculation 
about 
whom 

President Obama will choose as 
his nominee to replace Scalia, 

and 
how 
much 
resistance 

that nominee will face from 
the Republican majority in 
Congress. 
Senate 
Majority 

Leader 
Mitch 
McConnell 

(R-Ky.) said in a statement 
Saturday that he thought the 
seat shouldn’t be filled until the 
next president takes office.

Calling the GOP’s response to 

Scalia’s death an example of the 
party’s doctrine, Sanders said 
it was their chance to prove 

See RALLY, Page 2

KRISTINA PERKINS/Daily

U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.) enjoys a warm welcome from the crowd at the Eastern Michigan University Convocation Center on Monday.

See SANDERS, Page 4

Researcher focuses 

on Greek life in 
discussion of 

racism on campuses 
 

By SOPHIE SHERRY

For the Daily

More than 100 people filled 

the Michigan League ball-
room Monday night to hear 
author Lawrence C. Ross dis-
cuss research highlighted in his 
latest book “Blackballed: The 
Black and White Politics of Race 
on America’s Campuses.” 

The event aimed to both dis-

cuss Ross’ research and prompt 
audience members to reflect on 
how his findings regarding race 
relations on college campuses 
apply to the University of Mich-
igan, organizers said.

Courtney Monroe, council 

adviser for the Office of Greek 
Life, planned the event along 
with the Office of Multi-Eth-
nic Student Affairs and the 
Department of Afroamerican 
and African Studies. Members 
of the Panhellenic Council also 
attended and lead a Q&A ses-
sion after the event. 

The event began with liba-

tions offered by Prof. Elizabeth 
James from the Department 
of Afroamerican and African 

Studies, which are given as a 
sign of respect and acknowledg-
ment for those who have passed. 
During the event, Monroe said 
she asked James to deliver these 
libations in the spirit of Black 
History Month, saying it was 
important to peacefully reflect 
and pay homage to those who 
made it possible for everyone to 
be at the lecture and at the Uni-
versity.

Ross began his lecture by 

reciting an infamous chant from 
the University of Oklahoma’s 
chapter of Sigma Alpha Epsilon 
that made national headlines 
in 2014. A video showed mem-
bers of the fraternity chanting 
“they would never let a n****r 

See RACE, Page 3

RYAN MCLOUGHLIN/Daily

Lawrence Ross, author of “Blackballed: The Black and White Politics of Race on America’s Campuses,” discusses 
racial prejudice on college campuses in the Michigan League on Monday. 

Body will also vote 
on new Master of 
Science in Nursing 

program 

By CAMY METWALLY

Daily Staff Reporter

The University of Michigan’s 

Board of Regents has released 
its agenda for its February 
meeting this Thursday in the 
Michigan Union. This week, 
the regents will hear updates 
on several investment reports 
and construction projects, and 
will discuss other reports from 
Central Student Government 
and the University community.

Construction Projects

The plant extension report 

outlined several projects that 
are currently in the planning 
stages. The most costly of those 
projects is the construction 
of the new Biological Science 
Building, funded by LSA and 
Office of the Provost resources, 
which is estimated to cost about 
$261 million.

The BSB will house the 

Department 
of 
Molecular, 

Cellular 
and 
Developmental 

Biology and the Department 
of Ecology and Evolutionary 
Biology, both of which are 
currently in the Edward Henry 
Kraus Natural Science Building.

The new facility will connect 

to the Life Sciences Institute, 
allowing for greater and easier 

See REGENT, Page 2

RESEARCH
Study aims 
to increase 
concussion 
prevention

In first visit to Michigan, 
Sanders talks student debt

Brett Graham: 
For Sanders, 
idealism is key

Speaker examines role of 
institutions in race relations

Regents to 
hear updates
on building 
initiatives 

ADMIN
OPINION

By BRETT GRAHAM

Daily Columnist

Disco and folk music filled 

what 
little 
space 
remained 

in 
the 
Eastern 
Michigan 

University Convocation Center. 
Having spent hours outside, 
enduring 
frigid 
temperatures 

and seemingly endless line, a 
crowd of 9,000 was chomping 
at the bit. Anxious to see their 
champion, applause broke out 
every few minutes, whether it 
was the long pause that followed 
“Disco Inferno” for no apparent 
reason or the campaign aide who 
walked out to stock the podium 
with bottled water. When it was 
finally time, after more than a 
few false starts, the applause that 
welcomed Bernie Sanders to his 
first campaign stop in Michigan 
could only be described in one 
word — thunderous. Disco and 
folk music filled what little space 
remained in the Eastern Michigan 
University Convocation Center. 
Having spent hours outside, 
enduring 
frigid 
temperatures 

and seemingly endless line, a 
crowd of 9,000 was chomping 
at the bit. Anxious to see their 
champion, applause broke out 
every few minutes, whether it 
was the long pause that followed 
“Disco Inferno” for no apparent 
reason or the campaign aide who 
walked out to stock the podium 
with bottled water. When it was 
finally time, after more than a 
few false starts, the applause that 
welcomed Bernie Sanders to his 
first campaign stop in Michigan 
could only be described in one 

word — thunderous.

As I scanned the crowd, 

I 
searched 
for 
common 

denominators 
between 
the 

“Grandmas 
for 
Bernie” 
and 

the college students, the young 
woman wearing a hijab in 
the fifth row and the group of 
elderly Black women who sat 
near the aisle. White and Black, 
old and young, privileged and 
poor, people of every creed 
and sexual orientation stood 
shoulder to shoulder. Together, 
they screamed and waved signs, 
stomped their feet and lifted 
their arms above their heads 
like a gospel choir at a Sunday 
mass. Regardless of the issue he 
discussed, the support was loud 
and it was unanimous. Why? 
Because Sanders supersedes the 
labels that have dominated this 
campaign cycle with the simple 
fact that he is an idealist.

The media introduces and 

perpetuates these labels until 
they are taken as gospel by the 
average 
voter. 
Establishment 

versus outsider, big money versus 
individual 
donations, 
party 

endorsements versus appeal to 
millennials are all ways in which 
the race for the Democratic 
nomination has been framed. 
But none of them captures the 
central issue of pragmatism and 
the role it plays in our politics. 
Perhaps the best example thus far 
has been the controversy over the 
term “progressive.” In response 
to doubts raised by the Sanders 
campaign 
about 
her 
liberal 

credentials, 
Hillary 
Clinton 

fired back by branding herself as