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The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Friday, October 21, 2016 — 3A
Nursing school for Flint
Several University of Michigan
regents and chief executives
broke into cheers after the
creation
of
a
new
nursing
school to the Flint campus was
unaminously approved by the
Regents during the meeting.
Flint
Chancellor
Susan
Borrego told the board that
more than 19 percent of the
UM-Flint student body studies
nursing or pre-nursing, and the
current department has trained
more than 3,000 nurses and
nurse practitioners. The school’s
proposal took nearly three years
to finalize, with input from
governing faculty, the School of
Health Professions and Studies
and various advisory boards.
Borrego said the school will
create new opportunities and
specialties for students, while
keeping the Flint campus on
pace with changes in science,
technology and health care.
“This reflects the importance
of the field, which is one of the
fastest growing occupations in
the state,” Borrego said.
The nursing school would be
the fifth school within the Flint
system, and the first additional
unit
created
since
1997.
A
University press release noted the
new school will create programs
and partnerships with more
than 700 local organizations
in an effort to strengthen ties
between the University and its
surrounding community.
Regent Michael Behm (D), a
Flint native and current litigator
in the city, said he thought would
be beneficial to the community.
Behm is involved in Flint through
serving on the Board of Trustees
of the Flint Institute of Arts, as
well as by being a Big Brother
through the Big Brothers/Big
Sisters mentorship program in
the city and as a founding member
of the Flint Youth Initiative.
“As a lifetime member and
citizen of Genesee county, I really
support this program,” Behm
said.
Regent Denise Ilitch (D) said
the school’s creation was all the
more important for Flint’s amid
the city’s water crisis, which has
resulted inchildren and adults
in the city suffering from lead
poisoning.
“This is phenomenal and very,
very exciting,” she said. “For the
community … nurses do God’s
work.”
Record funding for research,
endowment and donations to
new centers
S. Jack Hu, the University’s
vice
president
for
research,
announced University research
funding rose to a record volume
of $1.39 billion in fiscal year
2012, marking a 7.2 percent
increase in the last year. Much
of the increase in funding,
according to a University press
release, comes from growth in
contracts with federal agencies
like the Department for Health
and Human Services and the
Department of Defense.
“The growing investment in
U-M research is a measure of
the continuing confidence of our
sponsors in the value that our
faculty and students bring to
society,” Hu said in a University
press release.
Executive
officers
also
highlighted
donations
to
research
initiatives,
most
notably a $10.75 million gift from
alumni Frances and Kenneth
Eisenberg to develop treatments
at the Depression Center. The
research hub, housed within the
University Health System, is the
first ever multidisciplinary effort
to bring together the research,
education
and
treatment
of
depressive and bipolar illnesses.
University
President
Mark
Schlissel thanked the Eisenberg
family and said the center’s work
is pivotal to addressing access
to mental health services on
campus.
“This generous gift will help
the center develop personalized
treatments,” he said. “This gift
will help … fight depression and
its associated stigmas.”
As
a
supplement
to
the
donation, the board voted to
award a professorship named
after the Eisenberg family to
Psychiatry
Prof.
Srijan
Sen,
whom Schlissel called a “world-
class expert on the biology of
stress and depression.”
Regent Katherine White (D)
also presented figures of the
University’s endowment in the
fiscal year 2016. Distributions to
the general fund exceeded $300
million for the first time, and the
total value of the endowment
reached $9.7 billion at the end of
the summer.
REGENTS
From Page 1A
classes alongside Stevenson at
Renaissance High School. Though
Chrzan lauded it as “the top
magnet school in the city,” he said
even Renaissance lacked teaching
materials that students consider
to be crucial in a 21st-century
education.
“Every
foreign
language
classroom
has
a
computer
lab,” Chrzan said. “If we were
lucky, half of the computers (at
Renaissance) worked. Even the
top school in the district was
facing slight disadvantages.”
For DPS students, the journey
from city to the University is often
not an easy one because of factors
such as the neighborhood the
school is located in, availability
of
materials,
infrastructural
problems and even the salaries
of its teachers. Chrzan and
Stevenson, as well as other
students interviewed who have
traversed
that
path,
said
it
requires immense amounts of
determination on behalf of the
students to want to receive a
higher level of education.
Erica Sanders, director of
Undergraduate
Admissions
at
the University, is a DPS alum.
She acknowledged there has
been a decline in DPS enrollment
at the University, attributing it
to the local effects in the city of
the 2008 economic downturn.
However, she noted that the
University takes into account the
varied availability of pre-college
programming — like the computer
programming
class
Stevenson
found he was lacking — when
offering admission to students.
“Michigan is doing everything
we can to encourage and attract
the students who have challenged
themselves by taking advantage
of the educational opportunities
available to them in the context
of their home high schools, and
providing
academic
support
where we realize opportunities
may not be as abundant,” Sanders
said.
Upon arriving at the University,
Chrzan
and
Stevenson
both
noticed DPS had not adequately
prepared them for the college
application process, or the caliber
of education on campus.
“Coming
from
a
family
where I’m one of the first to go
through the process of applying
to numerous schools, there was a
large learning gap that my school
didn’t necessarily help me fill
in terms of the things I need to
know and be ready for such as
how to fill out the FAFSA … and
there was a large learning curve
at the beginning of my senior year
(of high school) of things that I
actually need to have to complete
a college application,” Chrzan
said.
Stevenson said he noted
certain requirements for the
Engineering
college,
like
computer programming classes,
were out of reach. Additionally, he
noticed significant discrepancies
in applicant placement test scores
in math between him and his
peers.
“There were certain classes
that
we
just
didn’t
have,”
Stevenson said. “I noticed that
the kids that came from Detroit
Public
Schools
—
they
are
typically in the lower maths. We
were either taking pre-calc or calc
1. … It felt unfair because a lot of
(other students) already knew
how to program and it was our
first time so it made learning a lot
more difficult.”
Many students, including
Stevenson, have charged that
coming
from
a
low-income
district puts Detroit students
at
a
disadvantage
regarding
both
academic
success
and
mental health. In 2011, the
U.S. Department of Education
reported that “many high-poverty
schools receive less than their fair
share of state and local funding,
leaving students in high-poverty
schools with fewer resources
than schools attended by their
wealthier peers.” Citing new
school-level spending and teacher
salaries, former U.S. Secretary
of Education Arne Duncan said
in the 2011 press release that
educational red tape is stopping
the students from receiving the
aid they need.
“Educators across the country
understand
that
low-income
students
need
extra
support
and resources to succeed, but in
far too many places policies for
assigning teachers and allocating
resources are perpetuating the
problem rather than solving it,”
Duncan said.
For
both
Chrzan
and
Stevenson, a specific pressure in
the college application process
began when they got to high
school — the quickly arriving
ACT.
The average ACT score of
the entering 2016 class at the
University is between a 30 and
a 34. According to the Michigan
Department of Education, the
average score for the state of
Michigan in 2015 was 19.9. The
average score at Renaissance
High School was 20.9, the highest
average ACT score in DPS for
2015.
Stevenson said many students
are discouraged from trying their
best and attempting to get to a
school like the University because
if a student receives any score
above the average, it is considered
exemplary by DPS standards even
though it isn’t by the University’s
standards, creating a culture
aiming for the average instead of
encouraging students to excel.
“I looked at the average ACT
at U of M in 2014 and said, ‘OK,
that’s what I need to reach,’ ”
Stevenson said. “Then you have
all the staff and teachers, since
typically the students never get
anything near that, they say, ‘OK,
guys, just shoot for a 21. Shoot for
that. At least get that.’ They’re
telling us to aim so low because
they don’t expect much out of us
so people like me who were trying
to go for 30s, they think, ‘Oh,
they’re not really expecting me
to do well anyways.’ Mentally, it
wears on you.”
Since the educational culture
children are subjected to affects
their education immensely, the
Detroit Federation of Teachers
took to the streets to garner
attention
surrounding
the
physical deterioration of DPS
schools. In January, teachers
staged multiple “sickouts” —- a
form of protest where teachers
call in sick in large numbers so
that school is cancelled — to
draw attention to the working
conditions they operate in.
While the DFT used physical
marches and sickouts to draw
attention from the city, photos
of classrooms with moldy and
cracked walls, missing tiles and
a lack of insulated windows were
also shared on Twitter to further
raise awareness.
Chrzan
said
he
saw
the
infrastructural issues in DPS
as an injustice to the children
in the district, who deserve an
equal opportunity as anyone in a
public school district to receive an
education.
“What’s going on in a lot of
DPS schools is criminal, in my
opinion,” Chrzan said. “These are
things that children should not
have to deal with at the one place
that should be safe for them.”
Along with the infrastructure
issues,
teachers
have
also
protesting their wages. According
to the Michigan Department of
Education, the average salary of
DPS teachers, which is $5,095 per
pupil, was ranked 462 out of 581
school districts.
The cry for better wages did
not come as a surprise to Marion
Berger,
program
coordinator
for Semester in Detroit at the
University, who said she saw the
effect of low salaries for DPS
teachers through her mother’s
career as a teacher in the district
for 30 years.
“I remember her taking cuts
and her salary diminishing every
year even though she had been
working more and more years in
DPS,” Berger said.
Stevenson said DPS teachers
have
more
responsibilities
than
those
in
high-income
neighborhoods
and
therefore
deserve compensation for their
work.
“Not only do they overall not
make enough money, on top of that,
they have to deal with students
from lower-income families so a
lot of (students) aren’t motivated
to aspire to do something greater,”
Stevenson said. “Some students,
their biggest accomplishment is
graduating high school. You have
a lot of rowdy students at times
and that’s a lot of extra work that
most teachers don’t even have to
deal with.”
Responses
from
the
government to the protests have
been varied. In a May speech
in Flint, Gov. Rick Snyder (R)
condemned the sickouts, saying,
“That’s not a constructive act
with respect to getting legislation
through.”
Several
Republican
members of the state legislature
have stated similar sentiments in
response to the protest.
This past June, before the
sickouts,
Gov.
Rick
Snyder
signed into law a $617 million
state aid package for DPS. The
package called for paying off $467
million in debt accumulated by
DPS and allocated an additional
$150
million
to
create
the
new
Detroit
Public
Schools
Community District, as well as
pay for transitional costs and new
programs. Under the structure
of the aid package, two school
districts will essentially exist —
one to hold the debt, and one to
function as a school district day
to day.
During a press conference,
Snyder
said
the
package
“promises a brighter future for all
of Detroit’s children.”
However,
Democrats
and
Detroiters have opposed the bill,
saying it lacked components like
the creation of a Detroit Education
Commission,
an
organization
that would have authority over
both public and charter schools
in the city. This commission was
seen as crucial by Democrats and
Detroiters in negotiations over
the aid package.
In November, as a result of
the new law, Detroiters will elect
a new school board for DPSCD
who will take office in January
and will then hire a permanent
superintendent.
In an interview with The
Michigan Daily, Steven Wasko,
DPS
executive
director
of
academic enrollment, said he sees
the future of DPSCD as bright and
positive.
“We have nothing but hope
that we are heading in a positive
direction and we do have a fresh
start in that we have local control,”
Wasko said. “Frankly, being in the
district, being in schools, being in
the classrooms every single day,
there is a very hopeful attitude ...
on the part of all.”
When asked what they believe
the future holds for the students
of DPSCD, both Stevenson and
Chrzan said they had faith
students wouldn’t let a lacking
educational environment keep
them from succeeding.
“Although DPS has had its
struggles, I still feel like there
are a lot of gifted and talented
students that live in Detroit
and that may be going to DPS,”
Stevenson said. “I think that in
a sense, those students that still
can push to do their best and
overcome obstacles … that says a
lot about those students.”
“For all of its troubles, there
are still amazing teachers and
students here, and regardless of
the conditions, from the motto of
the city itself ‘From the ashes, it
will rise again,’ ” Chrzan said. “I
very much believe that over the
next five or 10 years, there will
at least be the same amount if
not more students coming from
DPSCD to schools like Michigan
… because I think district is only
going to go up from here.”
DETROIT
From Page 1A
dinner, and Margo (Schlanger) and
I were the only females,” Auwers
said. “In ITS, we’ve been having
these discussions about why there
aren’t more women in tech. And
I think there are a lot more now;
they’re still kind of working their
way up. We have to get them to
higher positions, where they could
be doing stuff like this.”
Don Welch, the University’s
chief information security officer,
introduced the first panel with the
theme that would run throughout
the entire day: the compromise
citizens
make
between
civil
liberties and cyber security.
“Security is hard,” Welsh said.
“It is something that we are going
to constantly have to battle with.
… I keep thinking that maybe
we’ve hit bottom, but nope, we’ve
got a ways to go. There are very
few ways we can get more secure
without giving up something. One
of the things we generally have
to trade off for more security is
privacy. A society has to decide
what’s the right trade-off.”
During the panel, “Hacking and
Securing the Internet of Things,”
the panelists discussed the surge
of “smart devices” and their
susceptibility to hacks. Panelist
Sol Bermann, the privacy officer
and IT Policy and Assurance
strategist at the University, cited
a New York Times article that
reported a nearly 70-percent
increase
in
Internet-of-things
devices worldwide, which allow
for greater internetworking of
physical devices and software.
“We’re going to have an omni-
connected,
Internet-of-things
world,” Bermann said.
Panelist
Matthew
Garrett,
the principal security software
engineer at CoreOS, noted the
negative realities of a world
so
intensely
linked
through
technology, pointing to the loss of
privacy as an example.
“We’ve seen active attacks on
celebrities’ email accounts … that
contain information about them,”
Garrett said. “If you were able to
compromise a celebrity in order to
obtain a video feed, that could be
a very financially lucrative thing
for people with loose morals to
engage in. But it’s important to
remember that not all attacks
are driven by financial concern.
There are plenty of people on the
Internet who are just bored.”
CYBER
From Page 1A
“What’s going
on in a lot of
DPS schools is
criminal.”
“If we were
lucky, half of
the computers
worked.”
the stigma surrounding abortion
and create a safe space for women,
to hold the event.
Public
Policy
junior
Ella
Webb, co-president of Students
for
Choice,
emphasized
the
importance
of
creating
an
environment where individuals
could share stories.
“I think especially in the current
political and social climate; it’s just
really important to recognize that
these are stories of real people,
that these aren’t statistics,” Webb
said.
Wednesday,
in
the
final
presidential debate, abortion was
discussed by both Republican
nominee
Donald
Trump
and
Democratic
nominee
Hillary
Clinton. Clinton said she was
committed to defending a woman’s
right to choose, while Trump took
a pro-life stance, stating he does
not support partial birth abortions.
LSA
junior
Alison
Alkire
echoed Webb’s statements and
said holding an event like this
where people could speak openly
is key to creating a productive
dialogue.
“The space is vital,” Akire said.
“Whether or not people speak,
it’s important to have a reserved
physical space for women who
have had abortions to come and
talk about that.”
Webb and Public Policy junior
Ashley
Wilson,
Students
for
Choice treasurer, acknowledged
this year’s event had a lower
attendance rate than the prior.
Wilson, however, said she hopes
members of the community come
to the speak out next year and seek
out their resources.
“We continue to hold this event
just to create a space on campus
that says ‘You’re welcome here,
you’re welcome to share and
you’re just welcome to listen,’ ”
Wilson said.
CHOICE
From Page 1A
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