Opinion
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
4A — Wednesday, April 11, 2018

The 
Michigan 
Daily 
Editorial 
Board 
believes 
the 
Race 
and 
Ethnicity 
class requirement should be 
expanded to all of the schools 
for students in undergraduate 
programs at the University of 
Michigan. As it is currently 
only required in LSA, the Ford 
School of Public Policy and the 
School of Art & Design, this 
requirement should be for all 
students regardless of school 
and major. As of now, some 
schools within the University 
have their own requirements 
into 
which 
a 
Race 
and 
Ethnicity requirement could 
fit. For example, the College 
of 
Engineering 
 
requires 
16 credits of “intellectual 
breadth.” 
Requirements 
like these could be ample 
opportunities into which a 
Race and Ethnicity course 
could be fit into. Another 
way these courses could be 
implemented 
within 
each 
school would be for each 
college 
to 
create 
a 
Race 
and Ethnicity course which 
related to specific fields of 
study, which would allow 
students to understand how 
diversity can and does impact 
their future field.
The components of the 
requirement listed on the 
LSA website are also vague 
as it pertains to the structure 
of 
Race 
and 
Ethnicity 
courses. While the University 
mentions that, “Every course 
satisfying 
the 
requirement 
must devote substantial, but 
not 
necessarily 
exclusive, 
attention 
to 
the 
required 
content,” it does not define 
what could be considered 
“substantial.” 
This, 
along 
with the extent of classes 
which fulfill the requirement, 
provides 
too 
much 
room 

for 
vague 
connections 
to 
race 
and 
ethnicity 
rather 
than a structured focus. As 
the University focuses on 
its 
Diversity, 
Equity 
and 
Inclusion plan, we would hope 
that additional focus could be 
placed on strengthening this 
specific classroom experience.

In 
order 
to 
address 
concerns that students have 
with the current Race and 
Ethnicity requirement, the 
University 
should 
revise 
courses with the actual goals 
of the requirement as their 
focus. Currently, it appears 
as if the actual topics of race 
and ethnicity are an ancillary 
component of many courses 
given 
the 
label. 
Courses 
need to be crafted with the 
requirement in mind for it to 
actually serve its purpose.
There are certain elements 
that could be implemented in 
Race and Ethnicity courses 
which could cultivate fruitful 
discussion 
and 
awareness. 
Namely, 
a 
move 
towards 
smaller, 
discussion-based 
classes, 
rather 
than 
large 
lectures, 
would 
be 
more 
conducive 
to 
having 
deep 
conversations truly centered 
around race and ethnicity. 
Many of the classes that count 
for the requirement are larger 

classes, 
including 
History 
101: What is History? and 
Anthrcul 
101: 
Introduction 
to Anthropology. While these 
classes 
are 
important 
to 
majors and may have a race 
and ethnicity component to 
them, the large class size 
is not an effective method 
for 
having 
critical 
and 
introspective discussions.
Race and ethnicity topics 
from the past and the present 
should be the centerpiece 
of 
courses 
fulfilling 
the 
requirement, 
particularly, 
issues prevalent on campus. 
We feel that these issues could 
be best addressed through a 
possible one-credit required 
mini-course 
for 
freshmen 
that focuses on race and 
ethnicity on campus and in 
the lives of everyday students. 
Starting discussions of this 
kind early on in students’ 
college experience is key to 
promoting a campus climate 
all students feel welcome and 
safe in.
As the University campus 
functions as a place to grow 
in our intellectual niches, it is 
also a place to think critically 
about issues that inherently 
affect us outside of our majors. 
The 
Race 
and 
Ethnicity 
requirement, has not lived 
to its potential in fostering 
dialogue and awareness of 
pressing racial issues. As it 
stands now, it is more of a 
box to check off, instead of a 
course to think outside of the 
box. 
However, 
redesigning 
the structure and criteria of 
race and ethnicity could have 
profound effects in starting 
difficult conversations and 
shedding light on the topics 
we far too often gloss over. 

Emma Chang
Joel Danilewitz
Samantha Goldstein
Elena Hubbell
Emily Huhman
Tara Jayaram

Jeremy Kaplan
Sarah Khan
Lucas Maiman
Magdalena Mihaylova
Ellery Rosenzweig

Jason Rowland
Anu Roy-Chaudhury
Alex Satola
Ali Safawi
 Ashley Zhang
Sam Weinberger

DAYTON HARE
Managing Editor

420 Maynard St. 
Ann Arbor, MI 48109
 tothedaily@michigandaily.com

Edited and managed by students at the University of Michigan since 1890.

ALEXA ST. JOHN
Editor in Chief
 ANU ROY-CHAUDHURY AND 
ASHLEY ZHANG
Editorial Page Editors

Unsigned editorials reflect the official position of the Daily’s Editorial Board. 
All other signed articles and illustrations represent solely the views of their authors.

EDITORIAL BOARD MEMBERS

The struggle for diversity in physics

ROBERT DALKA | COLUMN

MAGGIE MIHAYLOVA | COLUMN
I 

didn’t want to waste my last 
column on writing something 
sappy. With so many important 
issues in the world, I find it slightly 
irresponsible to solely muse on the 
self or to simply get deep. My goal 
for this column has been to provide 
my opinion on pertinent topics in a 
compelling, informed way. I want my 
voice to ring clear, loud and effective.
But as I scrolled through The 
Michigan Daily’s website for a 
lunchtime read, I found myself drawn 
to the reflective pieces that many of 
my peers had written in honor of the 
ending year or just contemplations 
on life. As nostalgia overcame me, I 
felt inspired to reflect on my own life 
and freshman year, so I sat down to 
write. I soon came to realize that 
writing passionately about a topic 
and writing passionately about 
yourself are two very different, 
contradictory things — even for a 
self-proclaimed narcissist.
Writing has always been my 
outlet. Since I was a kid, I would 
use my writing skills to persuade, 
move and entertain people. For 
example, I saved a lot of money on 
buying presents by writing songs or 
poems for my parents’ birthdays. In 
high school, I joined poetry club, the 
school newspaper and the literary 
magazine. I was constantly thinking, 
talking and writing, but always with 
careful calculation. I would agonize 
over words — tinkering and toying 
with language until I was sure I 
wanted to expose my work to an 
audience. I never let my words stand 
alone. I always stated a disclaimer 
before a reading. And I never, ever, 
wrote explicitly about myself — only 
characters with similar features.
A lesson I’ve learned in college 
is that vulnerability usually comes 

with hurt. To show real emotion, to 
allow yourself that honesty, will lead 
to pain. However, it is what comes in 
the fallout that is beautiful. There is 
a common conception that through 
suffering one produces the best art, 
and I can’t argue with that. I am 
grateful for my life and how smooth 
it has been for me, but my proudest 
creative works don’t come from a 
sunny summer afternoon or the 
smell of birthday cake, they come 
from a hospital waiting room or the 
floor of a public bathroom.
My freshman year has been 
contradictory — a combination of 
both exploding joy and forceful 
sadness. 
I 
often 
experienced 
isolation and togetherness within 
the same day. I felt impassioned in 
one class and resigned in another. 
I balanced finding myself with 
finding someone for me. In this 
constant limbo, I struggled to 
gain footing, and I seldom didn’t 
stumble. It wasn’t until a couple 
weeks ago that I realized that by 
stifling these feelings, by masking 
their intensity, I was doing a 
disservice to myself as a writer and 
human being.
I have always feared expressing 
my emotions liberally, without 
the guise of character or fiction. 
Because of this, not only did 
my writing suffer, but so did 
my relationships. I lacked the 
vulnerability to bear my soul 
to the world because of fear 
of 
judgment, 
inferiority 
and 
rejection, and in turn, I faced 
miscommunications, 
missed 
chances and made mistakes.
So recently, in the name of my 
newfound “college maturity,” I 
started being more emotionally 
honest, and what I have discovered 

is that if what you write or say is 
what you feel, regardless of quality, 
it will touch someone. We are all 
disordered spirits, yearning for 
validation while craving solace. We 
all feel hurt with the same intensity 
as we feel love. And yet, we shy 
away from expressing the depth of 
the everyday — the commonplace.
On the exterior, our daily lives 
follow the same simple pattern: We 
wake up, we go to work or school 
and go to bed. It is the moments 
within this simple pattern that 
fulfill us as humans — and it takes 
words to illuminate this truth. 
Writing provides us with the soul of 
existence. Life in words is a shared 
glance in a dark room, the hum of 
bass in your favorite song and the 
first snowfall of April. Life in words 
is touching someone you love, the 
pumping of legs on a bike and the 
smell of pine trees on a Sunday 
morning walk. But life in words is 
also a drunken argument, an IV in 
your left wrist and a Frank Ocean 
album on repeat.
Art and writing, in particular, 
remind us of the intensity of 
simplicity. I have been guilty of 
spending my life in phases of 
boredom or just going through the 
motions. My writing and my life 
have been predictable, organized 
and neat. It took me 18 years and a 
few bouts of pain to finally realize 
the beauty in existence, both from 
hurt and happiness. And as I finish 
off what ended up being a sappy 
column, I’m nervous for its reception. 
To quell that anxiety? I think I’ll go 
write a poem.

Maggie Mihaylova can be reached 

at mmihaylo@umich.edu.

F

or much of its history, physics 
has been dominated by white 
men. 
Most 
well-known 
constants and equations are named 
after them, and when someone says 
“physicist,” what usually comes to 
mind is a white man. The stereotype 
is deeply rooted in the homogenous 
history of academia, but as our 
country and institutions become 
more diverse, shouldn’t the world of 
physics follow?
Sadly, this has not been the case. 
According to the 2016 population 
estimates based on the 2010 U.S. 
census, 17.8 percent of the population 
identifies as Hispanic or Latino 
and 13.3 percent of the population 
identifies 
as 
Black 
or 
African 
American. However, according to 
statistics from the American Institute 
of Physics, only about 3.9 percent of 
the bachelor’s degrees in physics were 
awarded to African Americans and 
only 7.6 percent to Hispanics.
To better understand the issue, 
I interviewed Brian Beckford, a 
presidential postdoctoral fellow here 
at the University of Michigan, to 
learn more about his own experience 
as a physicist of color, and an active 
advocate for diversity in STEM. 
His research concerns nuclear and 
particle physics.
When 
Beckford 
started 
as 
an 
undergraduate 
at 
Florida 
International University, he was 
initially interested in philosophy. 
Eventually, 
philosophy 
became 
limited in the answers it could 
provide him for the types of questions 
he had about how the universe works, 
and Beckford decided to switch his 
major to physics.
FIU boasts one of the most 
diverse student bodies in the country, 
but Beckford still found himself an 
outsider after switching majors.
“My friends and I joked that I 
was the best Black student in physics 
because I was the only Black student 
in the physics department at the 
time,” Beckford said.
While 
Beckford 
notes 
the 
department 
was 
never 
actively 
discriminatory, the idea of promoting 
diversity was never talked about. 
It was not seen as a priority of the 
department at the time.
Due to the fact that the traditional 
social and professional spheres of 
physics have not always strived to 
be inclusive, those who have been 
left on the outskirts have managed 
by creating their own spaces in 
which they could feel welcome in a 
community. The National Society of 
Black Physicists was formed in 1977, 
and since its inception has worked 
toward improving the experiences 
of Black physicists. Each year, 
NSBP hosts a national conference 
celebrating 
accomplishments 
by 
Black physicists from every field 
of physics. Beckford first attended 
this conference early in his graduate 
studies and goes back each year as his 

schedule allows.
“My faculty advisor at FIU 
and really good friend to this day, 
Professor Joerg Reinhold, German 
by descent, directed me towards the 
NSBP conference,” Beckford said. 
“(The conference) gave me some 
hope that there is a chance, and there 
is a space for physicists of color. I 
realized there would be a place for me 
in the field.”
Though 
conferences 
such 
as the NSBP meeting are well 
advertised 
at 
historically 
Black 
colleges and universities, they are 
not as talked about at institutions 
that are historically white. Helping 
to increase awareness of these 
kinds of opportunities is one way 
institutions such as ours can create 
a more welcoming, supportive 
environment for people from all 
different backgrounds.
“This year I am trying to 
encourage the department that we 
can attend the conference as a source 
of recruiting a more diverse group of 
students into the graduate program,” 
Beckford said.
In addition to his work as a 
researcher, as the department’s 
diversity, 
equity 
and 
inclusion 
committee chair, Beckford devotes as 
much time as he can to finding new 
ways the department can be more 
inclusive by bringing his experience 
as a project manager for the American 
Physical Society Bridge Program.
Many of Beckford’s proposed 
changes and improvements are 
focused on the recruitment of 
graduate 
students, 
including 
short-term projects, such as the 
new 
recruitment 
brochure. 
It 
highlights the inclusive ideals of 
the department. It is small, but 
represents 
an 
important 
step 
toward 
much-needed 
change. 
Long-term projects are in the 
works, but will take more time, 
as they require more cooperation 
and 
coordination 
among 
the 
department before these changes 
are seen as necessary in order to 
create a stronger, more diverse 
physics program at the University.
I was also curious about what 
Beckford thought could be done 
to increase representation among 
undergraduate students.
“Stronger discussions of career 
opportunities after an undergrad 
degree would be a great way to bring 
more diversity into the undergrad 
program,” he said. “Particularly 
among first-generation students and 
students of color, there is a feeling of 
a need to give back, not only to their 
community, but to their family that 
might be sacrificing a lot for them to 
be there.”
I agree with Beckford, and a 
physics degree is really what you 
make it. You can put it to use many 
different ways. You can work in 
industry, research the frontiers of 
science in academia, affect social 

change as a teacher or community 
leader and much more. This is what 
makes a physics degree so exciting.
Once a school succeeds in 
recruiting a diverse student base, 
the next challenge is retainment. 
According to the Office of the 
Registrar 
2016 
report, 
of 
the 
freshmen who came to the University 
in 2012, 14.1 percent of those from 
underrepresented minority groups 
have left the University without 
finishing a degree. When comparing 
this with the 8 percent from all 
other groups that have left without 
finishing a degree, one can see the 
lack of inclusion most certainly plays 
a role in the discrepancy. We must 
recognize we can make the campus 
and departments more welcoming 
for everyone.
“The hard part is we have to 
change people’s mindset, and that 
diversity and inclusion is important 
for science,” Beckford said. “It’s 
people who do the science, so it 
follows that if you want the best 
science, you get the best people from 
all groups, and not just one.”
Academia is not always known 
for its adaptability, and tradition still 
plays a major role in how institutions 
and departments run. It can be 
tough to get every decision maker on 
board, as not everyone believes that 
a change is needed at all. However, 
this way of thinking goes against 
what we are trying to do in science, 
which is to advance human thought 
and make new discoveries. So even 
though old styles of mentoring and 
teaching might have worked when 
there was one majority group, we 
need to make improvements on how 
we do things and take every new 
factor into account.
After 
my 
interview 
with 
Beckford, I began to think about 
how critical it is to be more inclusive 
in the sciences. I feel it is especially 
important in today’s political and 
social climate to ensure that science 
is a beacon of inclusivity, of higher 
thinking and unlimited possibility, 
where all are welcome to create, 
discover and succeed.
At the end of our talk, Beckford 
asked, “How many great ideas were 
lost to fear, hate, and intolerance?” 
Too many to count, I would 
imagine. As we are those who strive 
towards higher understanding, we 
must never let untapped potential 
be wasted because of the fear of 
change or the lack of willingness 
to allocate resources and time to 
undertake the challenge. We can 
spark this change, right here, right 
now, at the University.
For information on ways you 
can contribute, please contact your 
department’s Diversity, Equity and 
Inclusion committee.

Robert Dalka can be reached at 

rpdalka@umich.edu.

A stream of consciousness on the state of consciousness

FROM THE DAILY

Revamp Race and Ethnicity

I

n 2014, the University of Michigan reformed the Race and 
Ethnicity requirement after student activists pushed to include 
an intersectional approach to the classes offered under the 
requirement. Recently, the Race and Ethnicity requirement has come 
under fire by students for its perceived inability to critically address 
race and ethnicity, racism and discrimination in domestic and global 
contexts. Additional scrutiny has been placed on the requirement, 
after bias incidents, such as a blackface Snapchat, represented for 
many a lack of understanding on campus. To address the pressing 
concerns of students and the campus climate, the University should 
design specific Race and Ethnicity courses with the true goals of 
the requirement in mind, putting a focus on engaging students in 
in-depth discussions about race and ethnicity.

Courses need to 
be crafted with 
the requirement 
in mind for it to 
actually serve its 
purpose.

— Mark Zuckerberg testifying before the Senate Commerce and 
Judiciary Committees on April 10

“

NOTABLE QUOTABLE

I think it’s pretty much impossible, 
I believe, to start a company in your 
dorm room and then grow it to be at 
the scale that we’re at now without 
making some mistakes. ”

