The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Wednesday, March 14, 2018 — 3A

CAMERON HUNT /Daily

LSA sophomore Emily Levy discusses her personal struggles with mental illness at SpeakABLE, to spread awareness for mental illness and 
disabilities at the Gallery in Hatcher Tuesday. 

SPECIAL PRESENTATION
STRATEGIC ENGAGEMENTS: UCLA DEPRESSION 
GRAND CHALLENGE & RESILIENCE PEER NETWORK
SPEAKER: ELIZABETH GONG-GUY, PHD

Wednesday, March 14, 3:00 - 4:00 p.m.
Rackham Auditorium

The steady rise in mental health service offerings has continued to exert pressure on CAPS services 
campus-wide. In this talk, Dr. Elizableth Gong-Guy of UCLA’s Resilience Peer Network will address how 
strategic engagements have helped train and engage students to support the delivery of robust evidence-
based internet cognitive behavioral therapy for students screened for mild-to-moderate depression and 
anxiety. Dr. Gong-Guy will provide a preliminary overview of our findings, and describes our successes in 
bringing a scalable screening, early intervention, treatment, and resilience-building program embedded in 
research to our students.

This special presentation is part of the U-M Depression on College Campuses Conference, 
and is free and open to the public. For more information about the overall conference: 
www.depressioncenter.org/docc

SPE AK ABLE

Insel, a neuroscientist, also served 
as the director of the National 
Institute of Mental Health for 13 
years.

Insel 
emphasized 
how 

prevalent depression is on college 
campuses, 
especially 
within 

the larger microcosm of ever-
evolving university life.

“We are constantly trying to 

figure out what kind of world we’re 
living in,” he said. “Our ever-
changing 
political, 
economic, 

scientific and cultural society 
has an influence on the kind of 
problem we’re trying to solve. 
How do you address depression? 
Or school violence? Students these 
days are claiming to be from the 
‘school shooting generation.’ New 
tariffs may produce profounding 
change within economic society. 
Basically, there is a changing 
ecosystem of campus life.”

14 months ago, the World 

Health Organization declared the 
number one cause of disability 
for medical illness in the world 
is clinical depression. Moreover, 
according 
to 
a 
2013 
survey 

conducted 
by 
the 
American 

Psychological Association about 
a third of college students have 
experienced depression within 
the past year and had difficulty 
functioning because of it.

“Students 
within 
the 
21st 

century come to college with 
more issues,” Insel said. “About 
30 percent of kids have been 
medicated since middle school. 
It seems that students are more 
willing to seek help, to talk about 

issues, and have seemed to reduce 
the stigma surrounding mental 
health.”

However, Insel warned though 

we have progressed by means of 
talking about mental health, we 
may have progressed at such a fast 
rate we cannot seem to combat 
mental health through services at 
quite the same pace.

“But while all of this is 

changing, supply has not kept up 
with demand,” he said. “Only one-
half of counseling centers have 
any source of accreditation, and 
only 13 percent have a full-time 
person available for students. 
Thirty-one percent of campuses 
essentially 
have 
no 
services 

whatsoever.”

Many believe the problem to 

be an increasing disconnection 
within society due to an increased 
connectivity 
through 
social 

media and technology. College 
students are the “iGen,” the 
first generation to grow up on 
smartphones. Adolescents have 
lower rates of teen pregnancy 
and 
auto-accidents. 
However, 

they also have lower rates of 
possession of driver’s licenses. 
All we need to do if we want to 
connect to our peers is just merely 
sit in our bedroom.

“It most certainly affects how 

people interact face to face,” Insel 
said. “Kids no longer know how 
to interact; the shock they have 
when they leave home and end 
up in the dormitory environment 
or they actually have to live with 
somebody who is not just an 
avatar or a virtual friend.”

no prior knowledge to tell the 
difference,” he said.

Anthony is one of the 28.8 

percent of Michigan residents 
who own a gun — but his anti-
control views are being called 
into question in the wake of 
the Parkland shooting, one of 
the worst mass shootings in 
the country’s history. Now, 
as students across Michigan 
prepare to walk out of class 
Wednesday in remembrance 
of the Parkland victims, state 
lawmakers 
are 
considering 

two gun control measures. One 
would arm certain teachers 
and the other would allow 
authorities to confiscate guns 
from 
people 
who 
exhibit 

symptoms of mental illness.

State Rep. Jim Runestad, 

R-Waterford, 
is 
drafting 

legislation that would permit 
school 
districts 
to 
give 

specially-trained 
teachers 

access 
to 
guns 
stored 
in 

locked, undisclosed locations. 
President Trump has recently 
endorsed the idea of arming 
teachers.

In a statement, Runestad 

said keeping children safe in 
school means having “adequate 
defenses.”

“Children 
are 
vulnerable 

targets in our schools and 
school shootings will not be 
stopped until our schools are 
secure,” Runestad said. “By the 
time police arrive it is usually 
too late. It’s time to develop 
model protocols for the nation 

here in Michigan, whereby 
specially trained staff who 
volunteer will be able to access 
a secured firearm in event of an 
emergency.”

Under 
Runestad’s 
bill, 

volunteers would receive 80 
hours of training on gun use, 
gun safety and de-escalation 
techniques, 
as 
well 
as 

instruction on how to respond 
to an active shooter. Opening 
the 
compartments 
housing 

the guns would require the 
thumbprint of an approved 
school employee.

Public 
Policy 
junior 

Kellie Lounds, chair of the 
University’s chapter of College 
Democrats, said she disagreed 
with the idea that arming 
teachers would help combat 
gun violence.

“The solution to the epidemic 

of gun violence that our country 
is facing is not to add more 
guns to the equation,” she said. 
“By arming teachers, we would 
be putting an undue burden 
on our already overexerted 
and underpaid educators and 
making the classroom more 
dangerous than before.”

The second measure gaining 

traction 
in 
Lansing 
would 

establish a procedure for taking 
guns away from individuals that 
a judge deems to be a legitimate 
threat. Gov. Rick Snyder, R, has 
expressed support for so-called 
“red flag” legislation, a position 
that puts him at odds with 
some of his fellow Republicans, 
who reference concerns about 
possible 
violations 
of 
due 

process.

Lounds highlighted the need 

to get individuals with mental 

illness treatment, rather than 
focusing only on the role they 
play in mass shootings.

“Mental illness, while not 

the main cause of gun violence, 
is 
something 
our 
country 

should be talking more about,” 
she 
said. 
“People 
dealing 

with mental illness have been 
institutionally 
neglected 

continuously 
and 
should 

receive proper attention all the 
time, not just when politicians 
want to use them as an excuse 
to not do anything about gun 
violence. If we had more strict 
gun laws, these individuals 
wouldn’t have access to guns in 
the first place, and so we can’t 

continue to use mental illness 
as a deflection.”

At 
POLITICO’s 
Eighth 

Annual 
State 
Solutions 

Conference 
in 
Washington, 

D.C. in February, Snyder said 
it’s “worth looking at” red flag 
laws, commenting, “We need to 
have a thoughtful dialogue.”

Lounds 
said 
the 
state 

government 
and 
federal 

government 
are 
“severely 

lacking” 
in 
legislation 
that 

would be effective in decreasing 
gun violence.

“From our perspective, one 

facet of ideal gun regulation 
would be the banning of semi-
automatic 
and 
automatic 

weapons; guns meant largely 
for military activity have no 
place in domestic life,” she 
said. “We should also have 
universal background checks 
for 
individuals 
wishing 
to 

purchase a firearm as well as 
banning the purchase of bump 
stocks. Finally, as some states 
and retailers are starting to do, 
the minimum age to purchase a 
firearm should be raised.”

The 
University’s 
chapter 

of College Republicans did 
not respond to request for 
comment.

After 
the 
shooting 
at 

Marjory 
Stoneman 
Douglas 

High School in Parkland, Fla., 

major retailers including Dick’s 
Sporting Goods and Walmart 
raised the minimum age to 
purchase a gun at their stores 
to 21. A Michigan teen recently 
filed a lawsuit against Dick’s 
Sporting Goods after the chain 
refused to sell him a firearm 
at its store in Troy. The teen 
is suing on the grounds of age 
discrimination.

Anthony disagreed with the 

stores’ decision to raise the 
minimum age to buy a gun. 

productive, 
which 
is 
the 

principal motivation for the 
center.

“The principal avenue to 

improve social media in my 
mind was to update the quality 
of public discourse so that it 
isn’t as corrosive and divisive 
as it has become,” Finholt 
said. “We’ve known, for over 
25 years in some cases, a 
number of simple strategies 
that can be applied to make 
online 
conversations 
more 

sociable and less antagonistic, 
and it’s just a question of 
promoting those strategies and 
compelling the social media 
platform to adopt them.”

University 
alum 
Garlin 

Gilchrist, executive director 
of 
the 
program, 
intends 

to make Finholt’s dream a 
reality. He is from Detroit 
and has worked for Microsoft 
along with serving as one of 
Barack Obama’s social media 
managers during the 2008 
presidential campaign.

Gilchrist 
said 
this 

experience 
showed 
him 

that making the change the 
center is aiming for is not just 
possible, but important.

“It really showed me what 

was possible really early on 
with people using a social 
network 
to 
connect 
with 

others, and it showed me the 
potential for that, and that 
is informing me today when 
I look at how information is 

spreading and all that kind 
of stuff online right now, and 
how it’s going to change in the 
future,” Gilchrist said. “So that 
foundational experience for 
me showed that it is definitely 
possible 
and 
important 
to 

understand 
how 
people 

connect, how they converse, 
and how they engage.”

Gilchrist and the center are 

already working on strategies 
based on algorithms created 
by 
U-M 
researchers 
that 

could be used within the year. 
Gilchrist said the center was a 
response to an important set of 
questions about the way people 
receive information and how 
that is evolving.

“How 
reliable 
is 
that 

information?” 
Gilchrist 

asked. “How healthy is the 
environment? How can we 
measure the level of toxicity or 
personal attack or aggression 
in the conversation, and how 
can we use that research to 
make tools, to make a set of 
recommendations for social 
media makers, social media 
consumers, and for the social 
media platforms themselves 
so we can really make our 
experience online healthy and 
productive?”

The algorithms that have 

already been created are able to 
measure the level of aggression 
or toxicity in a particular 
conversation online, and the 
center 
intends 
on 
sharing 

this information with social 
media platform companies so 
they can make their websites 
friendlier. Finholt mentioned a 
small change made by the New 

York Times that was able to 
positively affect their platform 
and related it to what the 
center was trying to do.

“The New York Times did 

an experiment where instead 
of giving people the option 
of 
thumbs 
up 
or 
thumbs 

down, they gave them a third 
option, 
which 
was 
simply 

‘respect,’” 
Finhold 
said. 

“So you didn’t have to say 
you hated something or you 
loved something; it could be 
something 
that 
you 
didn’t 

agree with, but you liked the 
way the person had said it. And 
that simple intervention made 
a huge difference in the quality 
of the comment thread, and 
tended to extinguish some of 
the trollish behavior that you 
usually see on those comment 
threads.”

Information 
graduate 

student Samuel Carton, who is 
working on machine learning 
for the new center, said he felt 
the hate spread on these sites 
has had a serious impact on the 
issues around politics in the 
U.S.

“Societally, we have this 

huge issue on social media 
where 
informal 
political 

engagement, 
among 
other 

kinds 
of 
interaction, 
is 

really hamstrung by a lack 
of 
stability, 
and 
by 
the 

prevalence of different kinds 
of harassment,” Carton said. 
“It really contributes to some 
of the problems with politics 
in this country, and it really 
drives 
people 
apart 
when 

you can’t have a political 
discussion online without it 

devolving into various forms 
of personal insult and other 
uncivil language.”

Finholt explained how, in 

the scheme of world problems, 
this was one in which an 
average student could make a 
significant impact, which is 
one of the reasons he tackling 
this issue as a responsibility of 
the School of Information.

“One of the key things is to 

recognize that there are many 
problems in the world that it 
can seem like whatever we 
do will make no difference,” 
Finhold said. “Recycling, or 
driving my car less, or taking 
one fewer flight, it may seem 
like that’s sort of a drop in 
the 
bucket. 
But 
with 
the 

behaviors around social media, 
particularly if we were to 
create norms around passing 
around 
information, 
there 

could be within the generation 
a profound normative shift 
where that kind of behavior 
starts to be shunned, kind of 
the way we feel about smoking 
in public or getting in the 
car 
and 
without 
buckling 

the seatbelt. For a large part, 
those 
transformations 
are 

normative and have to do 
with campaigns to fix people’s 
behavior, 
sometimes 
very 

small behaviors.”

Finholt said he believed 

students could have a large 
impact on this issue by doing 
small things.

disability overlap is labels,” 
Schreibman said.

“If there’s a label, it means 

there are enough people who 
experience the same thing 
that a label had to be thought 
of,” they said. “The simple 
existence of a label meant that 
I wasn’t alone.”

Schreibman 
described 

theater as a space for people 
who are unaware of an issue 
to learn about life experiences 
that are much different from 
theirs.

“Theater 
has 
this 

opportunity for people who 
have no idea what’s going to be 
able to go for entertainment, 
but also get really crucial 
information,” they said.

Empathy goes a long way 

for many of these students, 
especially 
when 
it 
comes 

to plans after college, they 
said. 
A 
common 
theme 

among 
presenters 
was 

academic hardships due to 
their disabilities. Many have 
criticized 
the 
University’s 

diversity, equity and inclusion 
plan for overlooking rights and 
access of disabled students, 
faculty and staff.

“The University-wide plan 

only 
mentioned 
disability 

three times,” Art & Design 
sophomore 
Celeste 
Adams 

told the Daily last year. “That 
was appalling and very, very 
offensive.”

According 
to 
LSA 

sophomore Emily Levy, a lack 
of academic accomodations 
can 
affect 
employment 

possibilities, which in turn 
makes certain these struggles 
don’t end after college. 

“Here in a bigger college 

environment, others people’s 
view of you matters more than 
your own view of you,” Levy 
said. “I’ve missed out on many 
opportunities solely to my 
GPA...” 

INVALIDATE
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DISABILITIES
From Page 1A

DEPRESSION
From Page 1A

GUN CONTROL
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MichiganDaily.com

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MichiganDaily.com

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MichiganDaily.com

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