After his only opposition 

dropped 
out 
on 
Sunday, 

University 
of 
Michigan 

Regent Ron Weiser (R) is 
expected to be approved as 
the 
Michigan 
Republican 

Party chairman in February. 
With 
Weiser 
soon 
to 

balance positions in both 
the University and the state 
GOP, accusations of conflict 
of interest and defenses have 
risen from members of both 
parties.

Weiser unseated former 

Regent Laurence Deitch (D) 
last November to bring the 
current partisan count in the 

regency to a 5-3 Democrat 
majority. He had already run 
for a seat in 2014 but lost the 
election.

Weiser said his largest 

priority for the regency is to 
serve the students.

“I care deeply about the 

University, 
I 
care 
deeply 

about what its mission is, 
and I care deeply about its 
customers,” Weiser said. “Its 
customers are the students. 
We have to make sure that 
we’re serving well, providing 
… 
the 
highest 
quality 

education and opportunities 
for students at the lowest 
possible costs.”

Weiser 
announced 
his 

campaign for Michigan GOP 

Jeanne 
Theoharis, 
a 

Brooklyn 
College 
political 

science 
professor 
and 

American 
culture 
Ph.D. 

alum from the University of 
Michigan, spoke to a crowd 
of approximately 30 people 
Wednesday evening in Tisch 
Hall on the role of Rosa Parks 
in the modern-day iterations 
of the civil rights movements 
like Black Lives Matter. 

Theoharis 
was 
invited 

to speak at the University 
as part of the bicentennial 
celebration’s 
themed 

semester 
initiative, 
which 

strives to explore the origins 
of the University of Michigan 
and its role in the state, 
country 
and 
world. 
This 

semester’s theme — Making 
Michigan — in part focuses on 
the history of the University’s 
political activism.

The talk was based on 

the findings and research 
published in Theoharis’s most 
recent book, “The Rebellious 
Life of Mrs. Rosa Parks,” 
which was awarded the 2014 
NAACP Image Award and the 
2013 Letitia Woods Brown 
Award from the Association 
of Black Women Historians.

Rosa Parks’ story and her 

rise as a leader in the civil 
rights movement often begins 
on a December evening in 
1955 when she refused to give 
up her bus seat to a white 

man, propelling the civil 
rights movement into action.

This 
simple 
narrative 

is the one that is often 
taught. However, according 
to Theoharis, it is missing 
key 
elements 
of 
Parks’s 

life. 
Theoharis’ 
historical 

account is one she believes 
is crucial to understanding 
and recognizing that Parks 
dedicated her life to civil 
rights activism.

“Rosa Parks is everywhere, 

yet most of what we know 
about her is wrong,” she said 
to the crowd. “I wrote this 
book as a response to this 
fable. We need to grapple 

with her actual life and 
legacy.”

Part 
of 
Theoharis’s 

confrontation with Parks’s 
role 
in 
the 
civil 
rights 

movement 
was 
filling 
in 

the historic gaps that often 
forget the roles of political 
organizing.

Theoharis 
began 
her 

talk with a broad history 
of Parks, beginning with 
an explanation that Parks’s 
activism began long before 
her stance on the bus.

In elementary school, a 

white boy pushed Parks. She 
pushed the boy back, drawing 
a reaction from the boy’s 

mother. The boy’s mother 
threatened Parks, but instead 
of resigning to the mother’s 
threat, Parks responded.

“I 
didn’t 
want 
to 
be 

pushed,” Parks said to the 
boy’s 
mother. 
Theoharis 

referenced 
this 
quote 

throughout 
the 
talk, 

emphasizing 
Parks’s 

commitment 
to 
rebellion 

from an early age and her 
feisty side.

By 
emphasizing 
that 

Parks’s 
commitment 
to 

change began long before the 
bus standoff, Theoharis made 
the point that enacting social 

As the University of Michigan 

begins 
its 
bicentennial 

celebration, organizers aim to 
convey the powerful impact 
its past and present students 
have had on society through a 
year of events, planned by the 
Bicentennial Office. 

This 
past 
fall, 
the 

Bicentennial Student Advisory 
Committee — comprised of 
36 students from all three 
University campuses — formed 
to ensure student involvement 
in the planning of bicentennial 
festivities. 
The 
committee 

serves as a sounding board 
for the Bicentennial Office’s 
events 
and 
activities 
and 

assists with student outreach 
activities.

Bailey Oland, Bicentennial 

Student 
Initiatives 

coordinator, 
emphasized 

the 
importance 
of 
getting 

students connected with the 
bicentennial planning, as she 
claimed 
most 
students 
on 

campus do not understand the 
relevance of the bicentennial 
to their own lives.

michigandaily.com
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Thursday, January 26 , 2017

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INDEX
Vol. CXXVII, No. 16
©2016 The Michigan Daily

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

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

A R T S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

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

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

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

Regent’s bid 
for MI GOP 
chair draws 
controversy 

CSG hosts first ever town hall to 
discuss mental health on campus

See WEISER, Page 3

PAUL AHN/Daily

The CSG hosted town hall adressed mental health issues on campus in the League Ballroom on Wednesday.

ADMINISTRATION

Faculty, students react to Weiser’s 
potential new role in Republican party

MATT HARMON
Daily Staff Reporter

Survey finds more than 90 percent of University students struggle with mental illness 

The 
Central 
Student 

Government 
Mental 
Health 

Climate and Resources Task 
Force 
hosted 
a 
town 
hall 

Wednesday night to share with 
the University of Michigan 

community 
the 
findings 

from three surveys that were 
administered this past fall. 
The task force — created by 
an executive order signed by 
CSG President David Schafer, 
an LSA senior, last fall — 
presented 
to 
50 
attendees 

prospective improvements to 
mental health resources and 

current campus climate.

The survey results found 

91.3 percent of students have 
dealt with a mental health 
concern on campus. At the 
event, LSA junior Jen Semaan 
expressed 
her 
surprise 
at 

the figure, and stressed how 
important the town hall was to 
the destigmatization of mental 

health resources.

“I think that mental health 

is 
really 
important,” 
she 

said. “People, especially at a 
prestigious university, should 
know about it, and it needs to 
be destigmatized. I feel almost 
relieved walking out of here 
and knowing that people are 

ANNA HARITOS
Daily Staff Reporter

See BICENTENNIAL, Page 2

Students 
contribute 
to U-M 200 
celebration

CAMPUS LIFE

Bicentennial organizers 
look to relate discussions to 
broader campus community

KAELA THEUT
Daily Staff Reporter

Visiting professor cites Rosa Parks 
as example for modern-day activists

Jeanne Theoharis presents book connecting Parks and Black Lives Matter movement

ERIN DOHERTY
Daily Staff Reporter

Rocky road

The Michigan men’s 

basketball team is beginning 

the toughest stretch of its 

season with a matchup 

against Indiana at Crisler 
Center on Thursday night.

» Page 8

michigandaily.com

For more stories and coverage, visit

See TOWN HALL, Page 3

A resolution proposing the 

adoption of a $5 student fee 
to support the Leadership 
Engagement Scholarship was 
introduced during Tuesday’s 
Central Student Government’s 
meeting.

The Leadership Engagement 

Scholarship was created last 
October in partnership with 
the Office of Student Life to 
boost student extracurricular 
involvement and reduce cost 
barriers for student leaders 
on campus. It was announced 
at last October’s Board of 
Regents meeting, with CSG 
President David Schafer, an 
LSA senior, introducing the 
fund as a way to compensate 
student 
leaders 
for 
their 

unpaid time commitments and 
offer them financial support.

“A 
5-year, 
$5/semester 

student fee in support of 
the Leadership Engagement 
Scholarship will bring in more 
than $2 million for student 
leadership involvement and 
support over the course of 
the 5-year life of the fee,” the 

See CSG, Page 3

CSG body 
considers 
$5 fee for
scholarship 

STUDENT GOVERNMENT

Resolution sparks debate 
about effects the fee 
would have on tuition

RHEA CHEETI
Daily Staff Reporter

ARNOLD ZHOU/Daily

The University Symphony Orchestra presents The Planets at Hill Auditorium on Wednesday. 

THE PL ANETS

See AUTHOR, Page 3

