ALEC COHEN/Daily

LSA students Kellee Byard and Rebekah Gere get samples at the farmers 
market on Ingalls Mall Thursday.

FRESH!

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Friday, October 13, 2017 — 3
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(which didn’t bother me) … I 
thought that the idea of someone 
not wanting to work with me was 
absurd, but I realized that there 
are many people I will encounter 
that will question my ability 
comprehend and function.”

“Students 
are 
not 
only 

concerned about potentially 
missing class … but it’s a safety 
issue”

While Whiteus did not let that 

event hurt her mental health 
— she said it actually made her 
stronger — the issue of students 
feeling unable to go to class 
because of depression or fears 
that their safety is at risk is a 
major worry of Esrold Nurse, 
assistant 
dean 
of 
academic 

affairs.

One 
of 
Nurse’s 
main 

responsibilities 
is 
to 
send 

emails to professors on behalf of 
students who need to miss class 
for whatever reason. Usually, he 
said, this is because of illness or 
the death of a family member. 
However, he also sends out 
emails on behalf of students who 
feel unable to go to class due to 
fears of racism or discrimination.

“We’ve always had situations, 

the way I see them, that affect 
students’ ability to perform, to 
do the things they came here to 
do, which is to get a degree and 
to be educated,” Nurse said. “My 
role as assistant dean is to ensure 
that students are able to do that 
without outside distractions or 
things that might happen. So 
this is in that vein. The recent 
incidences have clearly affected 
some of the students in a way 
that detracts from that mission of 
focusing on the work they have to 
do to get their degree.”

Nurse, a Black man, has been 

in his current position since 1995. 
The events of the last semester 
are not new to him, but they are 
still serious.

“This is really ratcheted up a 

level, because students are not 
only concerned about potentially 
missing class … but it’s a safety 
issue,” he said. “Whether this 
place is safe for me to walk 
around at night or during the day 
and so on. So to that extent, it’s 
really a big issue.”

The executive board of the 

Black Student Union, which did 
not respond to interview requests 
for this article, tweeted about 
Nurse’s service last week.

Nurse said he was glad the BSU 

publicized his service, though he 
did not ask them to do so. He just 
wants everyone to be able to feel 
safe and accepted on campus.

“I’ve sent quite a few (of these 

emails),” Nurse said. “I don’t have 
an exact number in mind, but … 
it’s not excessive. In that context, 
it’s part of the responsibility I 
feel I take personally … The least 
I can do is notify the instructor 
of the difficulties they’re having 
and I think that’s appropriate.”

“These organizations have 

opened their doors for dialogue 
and advice, and essentially 
have become a safe space.”

Coping with racism does not 

have a one-size-fits-all solution, 
though. While some students 
feel they need to stay home to 
focus on self-care, others like 
Whiteus are taking advantage of 
communities around campus.

“My outlet for dealing with 

these things is mainly connecting 
with my peers. … I talk with 
those who experience the same 
injustices I do and those who 
don’t so they will know the ways 
in which their privilege can be 
beneficial,” she wrote. “I am on 
the E-Board for NAACP and I 

attend BSU meetings. Both of 
these 
organizations 
and 
the 

people in them are wonderful 
and they work hard to make 
the community one that is not 
only inclusive but safe. These 
organizations have opened their 
doors for dialogue and advice, 
and essentially have become a 
safe space.”

James 
also 
hailed 
the 

importance of safe spaces, saying 
a support system is crucial when 
someone’s 
identity 
is 
under 

attack. 
She 
helped 
organize 

mental health discussions in 
DAAS and also with the BSU, 
though she said both events were 
mostly student-led.

“In both places we talked about 

what do you do to relieve tension 
and pressure,” James said. “The 
things ranged from calling your 
parents to just talk with them 
about some stories they can share 
to give some inspiration and hope 
to people saying, ‘I go to a Dojo 
and take out the frustration,’ to 
other people saying they journal. 
There’s just a wide variety of 
possibilities and that was helpful, 
I think.”

CAPS has been important 

in helping Black students work 
through the racism on campus, 
too. The BSU organized an 
event with CAPS last Thursday 
to help raise awareness of their 
resources and talk about coping 
strategies. According to Kelly, 
CAPS is working to make itself 
available to students beyond its 
normal counseling services.

“I have gone to be a presence 

at protests,” she said. “I’ve gone 
to town halls. I’ve done specified 
outreaches so students know 
we are here. … That seems to 
provide some sense of comfort to 
students.”

Although 
she 
didn’t 
have 

exact numbers, Kelly also said 
there has been an increase in the 

number of students using CAPS’s 
services.

Another way students are 

coping with the frustration of 
the last month is by protesting. 
Groups have protested the C.C. 
Little Science Building and bus 
station on two occasions and 
many minority students and 
allies joined Dana Greene when 
he knelt on the Diag for nearly 24 
hours.

A Black LSA sophomore who 

wished to remain anonymous 
because of her position as a 
diversity peer educator in U-M 
Housing said protests are how 
she channels her energy.

“It 
hasn’t 
gotten 
to 
the 

point where it’s been super 
jeopardizing in terms of being 
able to get up in the morning, but 
it definitely takes a toll on one 
mentally,” she said. “Protesting 
has been a way to relieve some 
of those emotions that I’ve been 
feeling. To just sort of express 
myself … It really helps to make 
a bolder statement that these 
issues are happening.”

Ultimately, every student has 

a different way of coping with 
the emotional toll of the issues. 
But the sophomore emphasized 
the most important thing is for 
any marginalized students is 
to remember why they’re at the 
University in the first place.

“After a while, I think we 

all sort of strive to look beyond 
what’s going on and think about 
our ultimate goal, which is to 
graduate,” she said. “All these 
little, little obstacles and stupid 
comments and incidents that 
are happening on campus are 
hurdles but we have to keep 
pushing forward and not let it get 
to us, in a way … ultimately, if you 
get so distracted by these events 
that you can’t study for a test and 
you fail, then they’ve done their 
job. So don’t let that happen.”

MENTAL HEALTH
From Page 1

Project 
Manager 
Adan 

Hussain, who emphasized the 
importance of creating a space 
to welcome these students on 
campus in an interview with 
the University Record.

“What 
we’ve 
done 
is 

centralized 
a 
lot 
of 
first-

generation efforts,” Hussain, 
who was also a first-generation 
student, said. “It was really 
important to us to have a 
dedicated 
space 
because 
it 

creates a welcoming area and 
shows our commitment that 
we truly want these students 
here.” 

In an email interview with 

The Daily, LSA senior Hunter 
Zhao, 
president 
of 
First-

Generation College Students @ 
Michigan, said he felt like an 
imposter after first realizing 
many of his peers came from 
highly 
educated 
families. 

Unable 
to 
identify 
with 

their past travel or research 
experiences, 
Zhao 
said 
he 

initially struggled to come to 
terms with his own unique 
reality at the University.

“Beyond academics, I felt so 

out of place at the University 
of Michigan; it didn’t matter 
how many friends I could 
make on campus, I felt like 
a 
complete 
imposter,” 
he 

wrote. “These feelings were so 
pervasive during my first year 
at Michigan, but I had no idea 
how to make sense of my own 
experience. After a structured 

study group in my [organic 
chemistry] class, I told one 
of my classmates that I was 
the first in my family to go to 
college. ‘You’re so brave,’ she 
said. And somehow those words 
clicked in my mind. There had 
to be others; I began looking up 
other students at Michigan who 
were the first to go to college.”

However, after Zhao joined 

the First-Generation College 
Students organization, he said 
he finally found a community 
where he belonged, in which he 
learned the vocabulary to better 
understand, and even challenge, 
his 
experience 
on 
campus. 

He noted the University has 
been incredibly generous in 
supporting 
first-generation 

students and connecting them 
with a multitude of career 
opportunities.

“One 
of 
the 
biggest 

challenges that first-gens face is 
recognizing their own identity 
as a source of empowerment; 
our organization has received 
countless 
requests 
from 

industries 
like 
Google, 

Goldman Sachs and even the 
Detroit Pistons, who all have 
been interested in working 
with first-generation college 
students,” he wrote.

LSA junior Jazmine Mercado, 

executive board member of 
First-Generation 
College 

Students, 
said 
she 
believes 

the 
new 
First-Generation 

Gateway will serve as a space 
for students to come together 
and feel comfortable discussing 
their shared experiences.

“I think the First-Generation 

Gateway is long overdue and 

first-generation students need 
a place they can feel safe and 
content working in,” she said. 
“I think the Gateway will 
provide this to them and help 
them grow overall. Hopefully 
this Gateway will create a space 
where, in the future, first-
generation students can feel 
they can go and have a place 
to study, talk with faculty or 
simply hang out.”

Zhao 
further 
emphasized 

Mercado’s sentiment, saying 
Hussain has been a valuable 
resource in the creation of such 
a space for first-generation 
students.

“Adan Hussain, the First 

Generation project manager, 
is incredibly well informed on 
all the valuable resources that 
first-gens can tap into while 
they are a student at Michigan,” 
Zhao 
wrote. 
“Rather 
than 

gauging the success of the 
Gateway based on the number 
of students who visit it each 
month, I will know whether 
it was successful based on the 
friendships that form there 
throughout the year.”

In the wake of the numerous 

bias 
incidents 
that 
have 

occurred 
on 
campus, 
Zhao 

noted he perceives a failure of 
the University to recruit first-
generation students and ensure 
their safety on campus. He 
said in order to fully address 
the needs of first-generation 
students, the University must 
address the intersectionality 
of 
this 
group 
with 
other 

marginalized 
groups 
on 

campus.

“The 
University’s 
failure 

to properly respond to racist 
incidents such as the slurs 
found at West Quad represent 
the 
university’s 
failure 
to 

the 
first-gen 
student 
body. 

The exclusion of out-of-state 
students from the Go Blue 
Guarantee 
represents 
the 

exclusion 
of 
first-generation 

college students. Barriers faced 
by undocumented / DACAmented 
students on campus represents 
barriers faced by first-gens as 
well. To address the needs of 
first-gen students, the university 
must address the needs of LGBTQ 
students, students of color, low-
income students, etc.”

Mercado also lamented the 

University’s failure to provide 
adequate 
resources 
for 
first-

generation 
students 
before 

they submit their applications. 
Furthermore, 
she 
believes 

the University should provide 
better statistics regarding first-
generation students on campus.

“I 
believe 
the 
University 

should be doing a much better job 
in reaching out to first-generation 
students,” 
she 
said. 
“Most 

students that I know that are 
first-generation don’t know that a 
lot of resources exists on campus 
for them. The University should 
be putting out more information 
and being more proactive in the 
way they give resources out. Also, 
I think the University should be 
doing a better job at trying to get 
more first-generation students 
to apply here and giving them 
funds when need be. Statistics 
on first-generation students are 
not widely available to students 
which 
I 
think 
should 
be 

changed.”

GATEWAY
From Page 1

year with two years of MBA 
education at the Business 
School. Upon conferral, both 
degrees will be awarded.

Bruce Mueller, associate 

dean of academic affairs at 
the College of Pharmacy, said 
the program, sourced from 
student demand, took about 
a year to craft and finalize. 
He said he spoke with many 
students interested in the 
program, and sees the dual 
degree as a way to make 
University 
students 
more 

marketable in the workforce 
after graduation.

“If (students) could learn 

about logistics and some of the 
things associated with business 
school along with a clinical 
pharmacy degree, they would 
have a unique set of skills that 
others wouldn’t have,” Mueller 
said.

The College of Pharmacy, 

in addition to the recent MBA 
program, has two other dual 
degree routes: one with the 
School of Public Health and 
another 
with 
the 
Medical 

School.

Pharmacy student Mason 

Benjamin 
is 
currently 

deliberating between the MBA 
and the MPH program. He 
said he’s interested in helping 
developing 
countries 
with 

inadequate care for diseases like 
malaria, and he has changed his 
original career path thanks to 
the dual degree programs in the 
College of Pharmacy.

“The 
University 
of 

Michigan, 
as 
far 
as 
the 

College of Pharmacy program 
goes, has an extraordinarily 
strong 
clinical 
program, 

which is what draws most of 
its applicants to the school,” 
he said. “But the University 
of Michigan also has a lot 
of emphasis on developing 
leadership capabilities in its 
applicants — so originally 
I went to pharmacy school 
thinking I wanted to practice 
clinical pharmacy, but then 
as I started to see some of 

the problems in the health 
care system currently … I got 
passionate about wanting to 
change that.”

Pharmacy 
student 
Rona 

Jin said dual degrees in the 
Business 
School 
and 
the 

School 
of 
Public 
Health 

can 
bring 
new 
pharmacy 

backgrounds into the world 
of “Big Pharma,” or sprawling 
pharmaceutical 
companies 

often 
accused 
of 
price 

gouging.

“If more PharmD students 

are in more business roles 
than 
just 
PharmD, 
they 

would be able to bring the 
perspective of a human aspect 
rather 
than 
the 
business 

aspect of plain numbers,” Jin 
said. “I feel like it balances out 
the issues we have right now 
with Big Pharma (who are) 
just concerned about their 
bottom line.”

Brad 
Killaly, 
associate 

dean for Full-Time and Global 
MBA Programs at the Business 
School, said understanding both 
the clinical and business sides of 
health care is necessary for the 
future success of both fields.

“It’s a complementarity that 

allows many of our students 
either in the Dental School or in 
the School of Pharmacology … a 
chance to both be the clinician 
or be the expert in the health 
care field that they need to be and 
also appreciate the complexities 
of the business of health care in 
order for them to become better 
clinicians,” Killaly said.

Benjamin said both the new 

MBA program and the Public 
Health 
dual 
degrees 
allow 

students to look at pharmacology 
with a wider scope and can give 
students the tools to work with 
societies and cultures.

“It opens up additional career 

trajectories,” 
Benjamin 
said. 

“Instead of focusing on direct 
patient care such as someone in 
a community pharmacy such as 
Walgreens or CVS or working in 
a hospital where you’re making 
decisions around medication 
therapy for the patient … 
these degrees would open 
up your possibility to treat 
populations 
instead 
of 

people.”

PHARMACY
From Page 1

The department offers majors 

in women’s studies and gender 
and health, in addition to three 
minors: 
gender 
and 
health; 

gender, race and nation; lesbian, 
gay, bisexual, transgender, queer 
and sexuality studies. According 
to Ceballo, there are 72 women’s 
studies majors, 65 gender and 
health majors and 113 students 
declared in the gender and health 
minor — the largest of the three. 
Ceballo noted these numbers 
change daily.

The department was the first in 

the country to offer joint doctoral 
degrees with other disciplinary 
departments 
— 
specifically, 

English, history and psychology.

As part of the women’s studies 

curriculum, 
undergraduate 

majors must complete 33 credits.

Specifically, they must take 

Women’s Studies 330, which 
Mendoza currently teaches.

He 
explained 
the 
course 

examines 
different 
types 
of 

feminist 
theory, 
including 

psychoanalytic, 
Marxist 
and 

transnational, 
among 
others. 

Central to the course, he wrote, is 
discussion of intersectionality.

“That is, (Women’s Studies 330) 

considers critically how feminist 
theory at its best always attends 
to the other differences that 
makes up a person’s subjecthood 
and political commitments, such 
as race, national background, 
gender 
identity, 
class 
and 

sexuality,” 
he 
wrote. 
“It’s 

required for all Women’s Studies 
majors precisely because it looks 
closely and critically at what we 
might understand as the feminist 
theory canon and the various 
methodological 
interventions 

that have emerged out of it.”

Ceballo also highlighted the 

intersectionality that arises in 
the field — the idea that how 
people experience the world is 
shaped not just by one social 
identity, but by the intersection 
of multiple, and that these will 
change in different situations and 
at different times. 

“The concept that we have 

to look at people’s multiple, 
simultaneously 
intersecting 

identities to understand people’s 
experiences in life is an important 
one that will come up, and to 
also 
understand 
how 
people 

have access to resources in our 
society,” she said.

Mary Kelley, Ruth Bordin 

collegiate professor of history, 
American culture and women’s 
studies, arrived at the University 
in 2002. Prior to joining the 
University faculty, she had been 
a history professor at Dartmouth 
College since 1977; she helped 
establish the women’s studies 
program at the college, which 

notably enrolled its first cohort 
of female students in 1972. She 
currently teaches a class at the 
University of Michigan called 
“Sex and Gender in United States 
History, 1600 to 2000.”

One 
central 
theme 
she 

introduces in her class is known as 
the equality-difference dilemma. 
It 
involves 
reconciling 
the 

emphasis upon sameness within 
the pursuit of equality, while also 
acknowledging difference.

“In 
other 
words, 
if 
you 

juxtapose equality and difference 
as a binary — equality being 
an emphasis upon ‘everyone is 
the same so therefore everyone 
should be equal’ — and you 
disregard obvious differences, 
and yet at the same time if you 
highlight difference, difference 
becomes the fulcrum for creating 
hierarchy,” she said. “So how 
do you incorporate difference 
without destroying or damaging 
the idea of equality based on 

DEPARTMENT
From Page 1

sameness?”

Kelley said in her class 

she works through this topic 
using a series of arguments. 
The 
underlying 
mantra 
to 

understand, 
she 
explained, 

is when people are equal 
they should not be treated 
differently but when people 
are different they should be 
treated equally through the 
incorporation of the difference 
in 
their 
circumstances 
— 

pregnancy leave and maternity 
leave, for example.

LSA 
senior 
Anastasia 

Pacifico is a women’s studies 
major in the Honors program; 
she is also a biology major. 
Currently she is taking Sexual 
Health and Clinical Science, 
which 
she 
said 
she 
likes 

because it incorporates both of 
her interests.

“It’s talking about sexuality 

through a medical lens, but also 
a critical feminist lens,” she 
said.

In terms of themes that recur 

in classes, Pacifico said social 
constructions are crucial, as 
well as talk of sexuality, income 
inequality and medicalization, 
among other topics. She said 
she has learned there are 
several 
different 
kinds 
of 

feminism and that people’s 
ideas of feminism differ.

“For 
example, 
white 

feminism — Ivanka Trump 
might think it’s feminist to 
have Betsy DeVos have a really 
big role in government,” she 
said. “But then when you look 
at the actual policies that 
Betsy DeVos is implementing, 
it’s bad for not just women, but 
people seeking an education 
and people from low-income 
areas, which is a feminist 
issue. So even though there is 
a woman in charge that doesn’t 
necessarily mean that it’s a 
feminist accomplishment. It’s 
all dependent on different 
perspectives.”

With regard to the gender 

and health major, Mendoza 
explained its courses look 
to incorporate a wide array 
of 
discourses 
surrounding 

aspects 
of 
health 
and 

associated topics.

“The gender and health courses 

articulates 
core 
feminist 
and 

interdisciplinary gender analysis to 
the study of varied aspects of health 
and populations, including health 
policies, 
reproductive 
justice, 

representations of the human body, 
sexual assault, disability, human 
sexuality and psychology,” he 
wrote.

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