LAURA KASISCHKE

ALLAN SEAGER COLLEGIATE PROFESSOR 
OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE 

a poetry reading from

new 
and 
selected 
poems

December 5, 4:10 p.m. 
Rackham Amphitheatre 

A public lecture and reception

For more information call 734.615.6667

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Tuesday, December 5, 2017 — 3

feature of the recent tax reform 
bills and has been met with both 
criticism and praise, from the 
left and right, respectively. While 
Camp sees the reduction as 
opening the possibility for more 
economic growth and attracting 
business, Barr believes there are 
much more direct ways to raise 
wages and boost the economy.

“I think for this tax bill, these 

ideas that we need more growth in 
the economy was really a priority,” 
Camp said. “And the second was, 
‘How do we align ourselves with 
the rest of the world in terms of 
international tax policy?’”

“This bill, if you say the basic 

goal is helping the middle class 
or working-class people, there 
are much more direct ways to 
do that,” Barr said. “You could 
expand earned income credit, you 
could not do some of the other 
provisions that have to do with 
eliminating health coverage, you 
could lower the rates at the bottom 
and increase them at the top.”

Though Law student Shay 

Moyal does not necessarily agree 
with the reform bills, he said there 
are parts of it he still needs to 
learn more about.

“I have a lot of feelings about 

the tax bill and I still need to learn 
it. I believe it’s probably more 
aggressive than I think it should 
be, but everyone has (their) own 
opinion,” Moyal said. “I know 
something they missed a lot was 
the international aspect.”

Following the Congressional 

Budget Office, which is recognized 
for doing nonpartisan analysis on 

legislation, reported there would 
be a $1.4 trillion increase in the 
deficit — and Camp said there has 
not been as much talk about the 
possibility of raising the deficit as 
there has been in the past.

“In 2010, I would say the deficit 

was just a white-hot issue,” Camp 
said. “Clearly, that has subsided 
significantly and there could be 
another reason for that, but in 
this last presidential election, we 
didn’t really (touch) on the deficit 
at all from either side.”

Public Policy senior Connor 

Priest said he had heard many 
of the points made by the panel 
already and does not support the 
reform bills. 

“I think what they had to say 

was inciteful, but overall just 
echoes 
common, 
mainstream 

things you hear about tax reform 
if you read up on it,” Priest said. 
“I think it’s (the bill’s) absolutely 
horrible. I think it’s the most 
horrendous piece of legislation 
that has come to the floor of 
Congress in years.”

Both the House bill and the 

Senate bill were rushed to the 
floor, in a manner neither Barr 

nor Camp agreed with. Senate 
Democrats took to social media to 
show the handwritten provisions 
written in, despite being illegible.

Schlissel 
introduced 
the 

concerns of many in higher 
education regarding the House 
bill, 
which 
would 
end 
tax 

deductions 
for 
student 
loan 

interest and tax tuition waivers for 
graduate students, and moderated 
Barr’s. 

Graduate 
students 
have 

expressed 
concern 
over 
the 

taxation of tuition waivers PhD 
candidates earn through teaching 
and research.

“We 
use 
the 
federal 

government to support lots of 
activities in the economy that we 
think are important. It’s hard to 
imagine a part of the economy 
that’s 
more 
important 
than 

investing in our human capital, 
in our students and young people 
to get their education,” Barr said. 
“There’s always room for maybe 
a simplification of that … but 
if I were making the choices, I 
would be doubling down on the 
tax support we provide to our 
students, not reducing it.”

TAX
From Page 1

cooperation between the two 
groups.

“This is more of a collaborative 

effort,” he said.

The two groups perform tests 

on two robotic arms manufactured 
by KUKA, a supplier of robotic 
hardware, in the Autonomous 
Robotic Lab. In these tests, they 
place a pile of bean bags or laundry 
in front of the robot and transmit 
the appropriate information so 
that it can find the desired object.

This task is momentous for 

robots, according to Berenson. He 
explained it is difficult for robots to 
respond to complex assortments of 
several objects.

“It turns out it’s much more 

complicated,” 
he 
said. 
“The 

reason is that when the object is 
by itself, you just kind of identify 
it. But when it’s in a pile or a stack, 
you have to actually move other 
objects out of the way first. You 
have to basically be able to reason 

about what you do when you 
can’t really see everything in the 
environment.”

Venkataraman compared how 

challenging these actions are for 
robots to how inherent they are for 
humans.

“What we feel as humans is so 

intuitive,” he said. “It’s like this 
is not even a task, it’s so easy. But 
looking at it from the perspective 
of a robot, this is a very complicated 
task. When (a robot) looks at an 
image, you need to isolate that this 
is there, then you need to make a 
plan. All of these are parameters 
you need to change.”

Dale 
McConachie, 
an 

Engineering 
Ph.D. 
student 

working with Berenson’s team, 
noted the difficulty is enhanced by 
the fact objects like bean bags or 
pieces of laundry are deformable. 
They’re harder for a robot to 
manipulate than something hard 
and rigid.

“Math 
is 
really 
good 
at 

describing where something hard 
and rigid is, and if I move my head, 
where does it go?” he said. “We 

can do that to some extent with 
deformable objects, but it gets 
very computationally messy very 
quickly. There’s an infinite number 
of 
dimensions 
for 
something 

soft and squishy, so how do you 
describe that efficiently? Do you 
even need to?”

However, to advance robots 

so they can succeed in a human 
environment, overcoming these 
challenges is necessary. Human 
homes, hospitals and a variety 
of other places are uncertain, 
sometimes hectic environments. 
Brent Griffin, an assistant research 
scientist 
in 
the 
Department 

of Electrical Engineering and 
Computer Science, also works 
on the team and discussed the 
unforeseeability 
in 
human 

environments and the importance 
of trying to develop a robot that 
can solve many kinds of problems.

“Robotics has a lot of success 

in industry because there’s a lot of 
predictability and certainty,” he 
said. “We can spend a lot of time 
tuning or preparing a robot for 
this specific problem. The thing 

that we’re trying to get towards 
is getting to the point where you 
can have a general applications 
robot and be fairly robust to a lot 
of uncertainty in the environment, 
because that’s really what is more 
difficult about operating in human 
environments.”

Griffin noted the robotics field 

has developed the appropriate 
hardware for achieving this goal. 
He has recently been working 
with a mobile robot named Fetch. 
According to Griffin, Fetch is just 
as physically capable as the robots 
in movies, but the software used to 
make it function isn’t yet up to par.

Ultimately, according to the 

researchers, their goal is to make 
robots commonplace in the lives 
of humans, specifically the elderly 
and 
people 
with 
disabilities. 

Berenson believes their research 
can be applied to almost any real-
world scenario.

“Just anywhere you encounter 

a complicated arrangement where 
you have to find the object in that 
arrangement is where you can 
apply this kind of work,” he said.

ROBOTS
From Page 1

These characteristics are what 
make these drugs so dangerous, 
especially when nearly a quarter 
of a billion opioid prescriptions 
were written in 2013, according 
to the Centers for Disease Control 
and Prevention. According to 
Michigan State Police and a Kaiser 
Family 
Foundation 
analysis, 

more 
Michiganders 
die 
from 

opioid abuse than firearms or car 
accidents. With the increased 
availability, deaths due to drug 
overdoses involving opioids are 
increasing — taking over 90 
American lives a day.

The teach-out will offer an 

in-depth look at the problem 
and these concerns, showing the 
multiple causes and results of the 
epidemic, as well as ways the public 
can help fight this growing plague.

“Participants will have the 

opportunity to understand the 
current epidemic by exploring the 
topic from multiple perspectives,” 
Devaney said. “Before participants 

identify and propose new solutions 
to the crisis, they will learn about 
the build up to the crisis, the role 
of pharmacies, the role of the 
medical community, the role of 
the pharmaceutical industry and 
the role of families. Learners will 
understand how we got here, 
stigma and what it means for the 
crisis to be declared a national 
health emergency.”

Jay Lee, a general surgery 

resident at Michigan Medicine and 
part of the faculty participating 
in the session, is also part 
of the research team at the 
Michigan Opioid Prescribing and 
Engagement Network, in which he 
has investigated physicians’ role in 
the epidemic.

“In 2001, physicians embarked 

on a well-intentioned campaign 
to improve pain management for 
patients,” Lee said. “At the same 
time, pharmaceutical companies 
began 
aggressively 
marketing 

prescription opioids. The situation 
was further exacerbated by a 
study (Addiction Rare in Patients 
Treated with Narcotics), which, 
when taken out of context, seemed 

to suggest that becoming addicted 
to prescription opioids was very 
rare.”

Lee is also a researcher in 

many opioid studies that aim to 
understand the number of opioids 
needed after surgery, a factor in 
the growing amount of opioid 
dependence. 

“This information is critical to 

making opioid prescribing safer,” 
he said. “Prior to these studies, 
physicians could only guess about 
how much opioid a patient would 
need after surgery. This led to 
misuse of these medications and 
an abundance of leftover opioid 
pills in the community, which 
frequently end up in the hands of 
people with opioid addiction.”

Lee explained the teach-out 

will help integrate the public in the 
solution of the crisis.

“These will help people better 

understand 
the 
tremendous 

dangers of these medications, 
how to use them safely and how to 
dispose of leftover medications,” 
he said.

Rebecca 
Haffajee, 
an 

assistant professor of health and 

management policy, is also part of 
the teach-out’s faculty.

Haffajee said many policies 

have been put into place, like drug-
monitoring programs and pain 
clinic regulations, but more are still 
needed for stronger effects.

“We 
are 
still 
evaluating 

numerous policies, as well as 
piloting new ones, to tackle this 
crisis head-on without generating 
other public health unintended 
consequences — like reducing 
access 
to 
appropriate 
opioid 

prescribing 
or 
encouraging 

substitution 
from 
prescription 

opioids to illicit sources,” she said.

The teach-out will allow a 

platform 
for 
conversation 
on 

this topic and provoke some new 
thoughts in the public.

“We are aiming to reach 

diverse audiences through this 
teach-out, to provide views on 
the crisis from experts of varying 
fields 
and 
perspectives,” 
she 

said. 
“Since 
almost 
everyone 

has 
been 
personally 
affected 

by the opioid crisis, we all have 
something to contribute in terms 
of brainstorming solutions.”

TEACH-IN
From Page 1

of classes and subjects, Ilyas said 
he would like to see it become 
more accessible to undergraduate 
students by incorporating more 
connections to internships and jobs 
for the undergraduate level.

“It was a public health graduate 

program, so a lot of the internships 
and opportunities the school offers 
are for graduate students still,” 
he said. “They’re trying to shift 
it more to give opportunities to 
undergraduate students as well. It’s 
in the process, so I hope to see more 
of that next year.”

Harper also noted the need for 

an improvement in undergraduate 
internship 
opportunities. 
He 

explained while the school is 
currently exploring both domestic 
and global possibilities with which 
to connect students, the newness 
of the program is proving to be an 
obstacle in this area that has yet to 
be fully overcome.

“Since the School of Public Health 

has previously only worked with 
master’s and doctoral students, we 
haven’t had the resources to really 
identify and support undergraduate 
internships,” 
Harper 
said. 
“It 

would be great if we could start to 
see funding for internships. Right 
now, we don’t have the money in 
the budget.”

Harper said the school does have 

an individual from the Office for 
Student Engagement and Practice 
dedicated to working on exploring 
and expanding new internship 
opportunities.

Going forward, Harper hopes 

the school will be able to identify 
more internships for students 
and find ways to communicate 
those opportunities effectively. He 
said the school hopes to see more 
resources dedicated to supporting 
internship funding to help offset 
potential 
costs, 
especially 
for 

students interested in international 
internships, 
thereby 
increasing 

accessibility.

Reynolds, Ilyas and Harper all 

talked about professors and faculty 
as one of the main strengths of the 
program. The professors for the 
new undergraduate program are 
the same as those who teach the 
graduate program.

“We 
have 
amazing 
faculty 

teaching the classes,” Harper said. 
“They do a great job of bringing 
public health into the classroom. 
They bring examples of the work 
they’re doing out of the real world. 
To have a professor that not only 
talks about a particular public 
health intervention, but is actually 
doing this around the globe, that’s a 
unique experience you don’t always 
get to see.”

Because they all have hands-on 

experience in the field, Ilyas said, 
his professors have also been able 
to help give him direction by acting 
almost as mentors, discussing 
how they became involved with 
the work they do today and giving 
advice to students.

Reynolds added the diversity 

of 
professors’ 
backgrounds 

strengthens the diversity of classes. 
As they are all experts in their 
various fields, she said, they are 
able to teach and communicate very 

effectively about the topic. Reynolds 
said this wide range of classes has 
been helping her narrow her track 
as she explores different options.

“Even if I can’t physically take a 

class, I know that they exist,” she 
said. “There are some graduate 
student courses open to undergrads 
if we’re interested … some things 
you wouldn’t even think about, but 
you would want to know later in 
your career. You can take a class 
on obesity, a class on cancer, a class 
on biopathology. Every little niche 
is covered, so you have a lot of 
options.”

Emily Youatt, the managing 

director 
of 
the 
Office 
of 

Undergraduate Education at the 
School of Public Health, said 
students’ positive response to the 
Public Health faculty is not one-
sided. She said faculty, in turn, love 
being able to learn from interactions 
with undergraduate students and 
hear the new ideas they bring to 
public health.

“The students this fall have made 

a really positive impression on the 
faculty here, who for the most part 
had not taught undergraduates 
before and were a little timid 
about working with them,” she 
said. “The students have really 
shown themselves to be amazing 
— they’re so engaged, they’re 
so bright. They’re eager to ask 
questions that sometimes graduate 
students wouldn’t. They’re a little 
less inhibited, which makes for 
much more interesting classroom 
conversations than you might get at 
the master’s level.”

Youatt said because of this 

classroom 
interaction, 
faculty 

members are continually coming to 
her with new ideas for a class they 
would like to create and teach. She 
said a benefit of the program being 
brand new is there is always an 
opportunity to quickly incorporate 
these innovative ideas into the 
curriculum.

LSA sophomore Sydni Warner 

heard about the public health 
program from a friend in its first 
cohort. Because she was not sure 
what public health really was at 
the time, Warner attended an 
informational session to learn 
about public health as a whole and 
the 
University’s 
undergraduate 

program in particular.

“I liked the policy side of public 

health and the behind the scenes 
work that goes into it,” Warner said. 
“I think patterns of disease and 
disease is really interesting, so the 
epidemiology part especially I just 
fell in love with … I decided, ‘OK, 
this is what I want.’”

Reynolds 
also 
encouraged 

prospective students to consider the 
public health program, regardless 
of whether they’ve always had an 
interest in the field or it’s entirely 
unknown to them.

“For people that don’t know 

what public health is — either they 
haven’t heard of it or don’t know 
what it does — they should really 
look into it if they value public 
service and think they could lend 
a hand in any way,” she said. “If 
you’re interested in medicine, 
if you’re interested in politics, if 
you’re interested in biology, there’s 
a place for you in public health and 
you could find something you really 
love here.”

PUBLIC HEATH
From Page 2

Jansohn said. “I was wondering 
why they didn’t tell us to leave. 
If they didn’t tell us to leave, 
then I guess it was probably 

fine.”

South Quad resident Amin 

Tonmoy, an LSA freshman, said 
he also asked officers he saw in 
his hall.

“The 
chances 
of 
this 

happening seem pretty low, 
but it’s still pretty scary,” he 

said. “He’s hiding and the 
police are after him, so I still 
feel okay (because) the police 
are right here. Knowing if he’s 
been found or not will be very 
helpful.”

Both said they hoped for 

more 
communication 
and 

clarity on the case moving 
forward, but recognized the 
complications in securing the 
scenes.

“I don’t feel nervous going 

back to West (Quad) because 
no one told me to be nervous,” 
Jansohn said.

CRIME
From Page 1

sides. 
Councilmember 
Sumi 

Kailasapathy, D-Ward 1, urged 
the man and others like him 
to stop and think about the 
lifetime impact a development 
like this would cast upon each 
resident.

“Coming from a Third-World 

country, this really bothers 
me because this is what the 
World Bank and IMF would tell 
Third-World people … ‘You’ll 
suffer in the short run, but 

your economy is going to grow 
so much you’ll be thankful for 
us,’” said Kailasapathy, who 
was a refugee from Sri Lanka.

NIMBY, or “Not In My 

BackYard,” 
is 
a 
pejorative 

term for people who oppose 
unpleasant projects in their own 
neighborhoods but will readily 
hand other neighborhoods the 
same burden.

That 
being 
said 

Councilmember 
Chuck 

Warpehoski, 
D-Ward 
4, 

criticized opposition for not 
having a coherent alternative 
vision for what to do with the 
land.

“This 
inconsistency, 
this 

lack of a voice, I’m hearing 
many 
completely 
different 

things from even the residents 
makes me highly skeptical that 
there’s a possibility to have a 
coherent negotiating position,” 
Warpehoski said.

In the end, the motion to 

change the zoning passed, with 
Kailasapathy, Anne Bannister, 
D-Ward 1; Jane Lumm, I-Ward 
2; and Jack Eaton, D-Ward 4, 
dissenting. Mayor Chris Taylor 
praised the decision, saying it is 
a positive step toward creating 
a more walkable Ann Arbor.

“(Lower Town) is going to 

be a part of our town that will 
be changed substantially over 
the next couple of years, and 
I believe that these changes 
will ultimately be difficult but 
… I believe it will be better for 
community,” Taylor said.

Council also voted to approve 

the city’s winter 2018 deer 
management plan, which aims 
to kill 250 deer and sterilize 
does on a mass scale. The new 
plan has brought controversy 
as the city eliminated the rule 
in which a sharpshooter cannot 
shoot within a 450-foot radius 
of an occupied building or 
home.

CITY
From Page 1

These ideas that 
we need more 
growth in the 
economy was 
really a priority