offers the greatest possible 
safeguards to Michigan’s waters 
while 
maintaining 
critical 

connections to ensure Michigan 
residents 
have 
the 
energy 

resources they need,” Gov. Rick 
Snyder wrote in a press release. 
“The historic agreement will 
result in eliminating nearly 
every risk of an oil leak in the 
Straits 
and 
provide 
added 

protections to the Great Lakes. 
It also will allow for multiple 
utilities to be housed and 
protected, better connecting 
our 
peninsulas, 
improving 

energy security and supporting 
economic 
development. 
The 

taxpayers of Michigan will 
benefit greatly from this project 
but won’t have to pay for it.”

According 
to 
the 
press 

release, the agreement will 
demand Enbridge follow certain 
safety 
measures 
to 
reduce 

risk during construction. The 
measures 
include 
shutting 

down the pipelines when waves 
are high, providing a new radar 
system, maintaining $1.8 billion 
in available funds in case of an 
oil spill and installing cameras 
in the Straits to prohibit ships 
from dropping their anchors 
atop a pipeline.

Both Enbridge and Snyder’s 

administration claim the deal 
is an environmental victory 
because it decommissions the 
existing controversial Line 5 
pipelines and expands safety 
measures for the new tunnel. 
However, critics are wary of 
the environmental implications 
of constructing a tunnel in 
the Straits of Mackinac and 
concerned about the risk of an 
oil spill in the process.

The Straits’ pivotal location is 

a main cause of concern. A spill 
could potentially affect two of 
the five Great Lakes, the largest 
group of lakes on Earth by area. 
The Great Lakes collectively 
house over 20 percent of the 
global supply of surface fresh 
water.

University 
of 
Michigan 

researcher 
Dave 

Schwab 
modeled 
how 
a 

potential oil spill in the Straits 
of Mackinac would impact the 
Great Lakes ecology, wildlife 
and coasts.

“I believe an oil spill from 

Line 5 in the Straits could cause 
severe environmental economic 
and cultural damage over a wide 
area because of the unique water 
flow conditions in the Straits,” 
Schwab said. 

Schwab 
foresees 
at 
least 

three sets of environmental 
implications for the construction 
of the tunnel, beyond the risk 
of an oil spill: the immediate 
effects of the drilling on the 
north and south shores of the 
Straits, 
potential 
geological 

impact on the subsurface in the 
Straits and long-term impact 
to the atmosphere from the 
continued use of any fossil fuels, 
which Line 5 transports.

Schwab said the tunnel would 

eventually be an improvement 
on the existing pipelines, but 
nonetheless extends the lifetime 
of oil transport through the 
Great Lakes.

“The tunnel project would 

eventually result in a lower 
likelihood of an oil spill from 
the Line 5 pipeline, but it 
would prolong the period of 
risk for a spill from the current 
pipeline until the tunnel was 
approved, 
constructed 
and 

made operational, which could 
easily take more than 10 years,” 
Schwab said.

LSA junior Cameron Leitz, 

president 
of 
the 
Program 

in 
the 
Environment 
Club, 

is also concerned about the 
construction of the project, 
fearing it could result in an oil 
spill.

“I’m concerned because this 

plan could create an oil spill in 
the Great Lakes,” Leitz said. 
“The Great Lakes are pristine 
bodies of water that are used 
for recreation and drinking 
water. Freshwater is becoming 
more scarce and it is becoming 
increasingly 
important 

to 
protect 
our 
freshwater 

resources.”

Both 
Leitz 
and 
Schwab 

believe Line 5 should be shut 
down permanently.

“I personally don’t believe 

that the benefits Line 5 provides 
to the people of Michigan are 
anywhere near sufficient to 
justify the risk of an oil spill 
from the pipeline,” Schwab said.

The 
agreement 
between 

Snyder’s 
administration 
and 

Enbridge 
is 
contentious, 

with 
midterm 
elections 
on 

the 
horizon. 
Democratic 

gubernatorial 
candidate 

Gretchen Whitmer has said she 
will shut down Line 5 if elected, 
while Republican gubernatorial 
candidate Bill Schuette has 
endorsed Snyder’s plan.

Leitz 
heavily 
considers 

the environmental policy of 
candidates when voting.

“Climate change and other 

environmental 
problems 
are 

some of the most important 
problems 
facing 
the 
world, 

so I heavily consider each 
candidates’ 
stance 
on 

environmental 
policy,” 
Leitz 

said. “Individual actions are 
great 
for 
helping 
to 
solve 

climate change, but changing 
environmental policy is the only 
way to have a bigger impact on 
solving these problems.”

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Wednesday, October 17 2018 — 3A

students 
in 
engineering 
are 

sometimes incapable of producing 
original solutions without some 
form of guidelines for their work.

“If you show them solutions 

that might work, it’s very hard for 
them to come up with new things 
that don’t include those solutions,” 
White said. “A task that I tried 
with students with ADHD was 
to show them examples and say, 
‘Don’t use these examples’ and, 
in fact, they were able to create 
high-quality product labels for 
an imaginary company, and they 
were able to come up with these 
and not use the elements that were 
shown in the examples.”

As a result of her study, White 

concluded 
that 
individuals 

with ADHD are more creative 
when it comes to innovative 
problem-solving. Arash Zaghi, an 
associate professor of civil and 
environmental engineering at the 
University of Connecticut, was 
not involved with the study, but 
has done research on students 
with ADHD in the past. He said 
curiosity 
is 
“domain-specific” 

and cannot be given a blanket 
definition. However, he said the 
intense focus many students with 
ADHD put into work they have a 
keen interest in allows them to 
produce original and complex 
thought.

“When they (individuals with 

ADHD) hyperfocus on something, 
and they have an interest in 
something, the amount of work 
that they can do is just mind 
boggling,” Zaghi said.

James Kaufman, a professor 

of educational psychology at the 
University of Connecticut, also 
mentioned how creativity varies 
by discipline, but is ultimately, 
“the ability to develop something 

that is both new and that is task-
appropriate.”

Kaufman classified creativity 

in four distinct ways: mini-c 
(personal 
insights), 
little-c 

(everyday 
creativity), 
pro-c 

(expert level) and big-c (creative 
genius). Kaufman said the kind of 
creativity exhibited by students 
with ADHD is often undervalued 
because it encourages others to be 
open to newness, which is scary 
for those who are accustomed to 
rhythm and order.

“Creative people are more 

likely to take risks, be open to 
new ideas, defy authority and 
seek challenges, which pays off 
big-time in the long run, but in 
general we’re not great as a society 
at looking at long-term benefits,” 
Kaufman wrote in an email. “Most 
people want a small, measured 
amount of creativity that solves 
small, existing problems.”

Public 
Policy 
junior 
Lena 

Dreves, who has ADHD, said she 
often struggles with disappointing 
parents and teachers because her 
creativity manifests itself in ways 
many perceive to be daydreaming 
and forgetful thinking.

“Walking home from school, 

instead of thinking ‘I need to 
pay rent’ or ‘I need to do that 
homework tonight,’ I’m thinking 
of some historical moment in 
history and how the philosophy of 
a certain leader really affected this 
generation,” Dreves said. “Yes, it’s 
daydreaming and I get that, but 
at the same time, it’s a beautiful 
break for the mind.”

White also said neurodiverse 

perspectives are often seen solely 
as impairments rather than useful 
assets in fields that may actually 
benefit from unique modes of 
thinking.

“I don’t want to say there’s no 

impairment with ADHD, because 
of course it’s going to be something 
where people are having trouble 

focusing and paying attention,” 
White said. “But I want to 
underscore that it’s a different way 
of thinking that, in some contexts 
and for some types of problems, is 
definitely an advantage.”

According to Zaghi, including 

the perspectives and viewpoints 
of students with ADHD is often 
challenging in the short-term, 
but can have long-lasting benefits. 
He said while students with 
ADHD may have some difficulties 
completing certain tasks during 
a 
project, 
their 
ideas 
often 

complement those of students 
without ADHD and enhance the 
overall product.

“We need diverse types of 

skills,” Zaghi said. “Some of the 
students are very task-oriented, 
they 
are 
very 
comfortable 

adhering 
to 
process 
and 

presenting a very refined, polished 
product. We cannot only, for 
example, say ‘ADHD students, 
because they have these creative 
ideas, can produce the best 
product.’ They need to work to get 
there. That’s why we need to have 
a neurodiverse group of students.”

Dreves said another challenge 

she faces is others’ unwillingness 
to legitimize ADHD and see it as 
a real disorder that can have both 
positive and negative effects. With 
the growing use of medication 
such as Adderall and Ritalin 
among 
non-ADHD 
students, 

Dreves said she often has to 
justify her condition to herself and 
actively create her own sense of 
self-esteem.

“It’s forced me to find self-

esteem 
and 
self-value 
inside 

myself,” Dreves said. “That sounds 
really cheesy, but at the same time, 
it’s really real. Because if I put my 
worth on what everyone around 
me is expecting, then it gets 
crushed every time. And I think 
that’s definitely positive.”

ADHD
From Page 1A
PIPELINE
From Page 1A

the Commission will create 

and oversee. The Youth Council 
will be “composed of youths 
residing in Washtenaw County 
between the ages of 16 and 21.” 
It is unclear if this includes 
temporary University students.

Ann Arbor resident Susan 

Priller, 
who 
identified 

herself as a legal secretary 
at Hooper Hathaway, where 
Taylor practices law, hoped 
city officials would begin to 
aggressively work on the issue.

“I would prefer to think 

that my city officials were 
merely ignorant of the harms of 
aggressive policing rather than 
they were engaging in a wanted, 
egregious disregard of what 
this community has clearly 
asked for,” Priller said. “I would 
hope that they exit their bubble 
of white privilege and that 

they would stop congratulating 
themselves on how liberal they 
are and engage in the hard work 
of anti-racism.”

Priller then handed signed 

copies of the book “The End 
of Policing” by Alex Vitale, 
sociology professor at Brooklyn 
College, to Taylor and City 
Administrator 
Howard 

Lazarus.

The 
Police 
Officers 

Association 
of 

Michigan addressed a letter to 
Taylor dated Sept. 27 requesting 
the task force’s proposal not be 
passed. 

“The preamble of the task 

force proposed ordinance is 
a deplorable rant filled with 
bias and prejudice against law 
enforcement,” the letter signed 
by General Counsel Frank Guido 
read. “To state that the City 
of Ann Arbor ‘acknowledges 
that law enforcement, across 
the nation, have historically 
defended and enforced racism 

and segregation’ is nothing less 
than a direct attack on Ann 
Arbor police officers.”

The 
letter 
also 
stated 

the 
ordinance 
lacks 
moral 

justification and legal grounds.

Much of the discussion of 

the proposal centered around 
whether complainants should 
be able to file their complaints 
about the AAPD anonymously. 
City 
Councilmember 
Sumi 

Kailasapathy, D-Ward 1, served 
as a non-voting member of 
the task force. She wanted the 
option for anonymity to protect 
residents 
from 
potential 

revictimization, 
which 
was 

included in the passed proposal.

“You should always have 

an 
option 
of 
anonymity,” 

Kailasapathy said. “We keep 
saying we don’t want this 
commission to fail, so if you 
don’t want it to fail, you can’t 
expect people to come and 
do it according to our terms 
which come from a vantage 

point of privilege. The ultimate 
(viewpoint) of this is going to 
be people who are afraid that 
they could be re-victimized as a 
result of this.”

City 
Councilmember 

Graydon Krapohl, D-Ward 4, 
also served as a non-voting 
member of the task force but 
was not present at Monday’s 
meeting.

Another issue raised was 

whether 
AAPD 
should 
be 

informed of or play a role in 
investigating complaints. The 
task force’s proposal would 
have allowed the commission to 
investigate complaints without 
informing 
AAPD. 
Taylor 

believes 
engagement 
with 

police is necessary to create 
change.

“I 
do 
view 
engagement 

with the police about police 
practices as a necessary part 
of the commission learning 
about the practice and policy 
and an important part of that 

communication,” Taylor said. 

Kailasapathy said the task 

force’s ordinance is crucial 
to a democratic checks and 
balances system.

“I think part of having the 

ordinance is to make it clear 
… good people will always 
do things but we cannot be 
at the mercy of good things,” 
Kailasapathy said. “That’s why 
democracy needs institutions 
with checks and balances. It’s 
built into the system.”

The council also debated how 

complaints should be handled 
on the basis of whether they 
are criminal or disciplinary. 
Disciplinary 
complaints 
are 

complaints of behaviors that 
would not violate the law, 
but violate the policies and 
procedures 
of 
the 
AAPD. 

The citizen task force would 
have investigated complaints 
independently.

City 
Attorney 
Stephen 

Postema said all complaints 

should be forwarded to AAPD, 
regardless 
of 
the 
type 
of 

complaint.

Ann Arbor resident Richard 

Friedman, 
co-chair 
of 
the 

citizen-led task force and a 
professor at the University of 
Michigan Law School, said the 
commission should investigate 
matters even if a resident does 
not formally come forward 
with a complaint.

“I think this is something 

that the council can take a shot 
at and worse comes to worst, 
you get a ruling in a particular 
case that can’t happen and you 
go from there,” Friedman said.

AAPD and city employees 

are not eligible for membership 
on the commission in either 
proposal, but the task force’s 
proposal 
extended 
the 

restriction 
to 
any 
former 

employees 
of 
or 
“regular 

contractors” of the city or any 
police department.

COUNCIL
From Page 1A

using automation to help large 
industries 
like 
construction, 

waste management and real 
estate.

“We 
saw 
this 
large 

opportunity, thinking that data 
and automation is probably the 
most important technological 
trend over the next 20 years,” 
Nahigian said. “And we saw 
this large gap in that most 
venture 
dollars 
were 
going 

towards 
more 
A.I.-focused 

opportunities, meaning really 
hard-core 
technology 
and 

science problems, that are not 
widely used or adopted. We 
saw that a lot of value creation 
is happening and will continue 
to 
happen, 
as 
the 
biggest 

opportunities, in these large 
old-school 
segments 
of 
the 

economy like construction or 
real estate.”

Both 
Nahigian 
and 
Ajao 

have experience starting their 
own companies and investing 
in others. Nahigian previously 
worked at Accel Partners and 
Summit Partners and was an 
investor at Coatue Management. 
Ajao co-founded social media 
company Tuenti, which was 
bought by Telefonica, and Cabify, 
a competitor with Uber in Latin 
America that is now worth $1.4 
billion. Most recently, Ajao was 
at Workday after the company 
acquired his startup Identified, 
where he launched Workday 
Ventures, a fund focused on 
artificial intelligence. During 

this time, Ajao invested in 
several companies, including 
Nahigian’s startup Jobr, a job-
seeking and hiring app.

After 
working 
together 

on Jobr, Ajao and Nahigian 
decided to team up and found 
a venture capital fund focused 
on companies solving problems 

affecting the 99 percent — a 
term contrasted with the top 
1 percent of the wealthiest 
members of society who hold 
and control a large majority of 
resources in the U.S.

“This was four years ago, 

now almost four and a half 
years ago, and TJ and I got to 
know each other pretty well 
through my investment in Jobr,” 
Ajao said. “At the time I was 
already thinking of starting a 
new venture firm because at 
this time I had quite a lot of 
experience investing. I thought 
that there was too much A.I. 
talent in Silicon Valley that 
was being directed towards the 
same problems. And there was 
a need for a new venture firm 
to focus on solving problems 

that were most important to the 
real economy, and what we call 
problems for the 99 percent.”

Base10 
has 
already 

invested in several startups, 
including Yellow, a Brazilian 
mobility 
company 
bringing 

bicycle- 
and 
scooter-sharing 

services to Latin America to 
improve urban sustainability. 
Other companies Base10 has 
supported include The Pill Club, 
which integrates telemedicine 
and pharmaceuticals to deliver 
birth control to subscribers, 
and RoadSync, which eases 
the payment platform for the 
logistics industry.

The news came unexpectedly 

to Ajao, who is half Nigerian and 
was raised in both Nigeria and 
Spain.

“It was a surprise at first,” 

he said. “Just because I never 
really stopped to think about 
it, and assumed that with how 
many years venture capital has 
been around, there must have 
been someone before me that 
had crossed the $100 million 
dollar mark. Once I looked at 
the data, the surprise went 
away, because as you very well 
know, minorities are widely 
underrepresented 
in 
Silicon 

Valley — which is probably why 
there is an inherent bias towards 
focusing on problems for the 1 
percent versus problems for the 
99 percent.”

Nahigian 
emphasized 
the 

need for more diversity in the 
venture capital space, saying for 
Base10 in particular, leadership 
needed to reflect the people 
they were investing to empower. 

Improving 
diversity 
and 

inclusion would be a significant 
part of Base10’s investment in 
the real economy.

“We were setting out just to 

build and scale what we thought 
could be one of the leading 
preeminent 
venture 
capital 

funds focused on this theme,” 
Nahigian said. “Importantly, 
the theme that we’re focused on 
really focuses on diversity and 
inclusion. We’re investing in 
businesses that are going after 
real economy problems, (that) 
have a meaningful impact on 
the 99 percent. And it’s almost 
a shame that that diversity is 
not really reflected in who are 
leading and allocating capital 
within this industry.”

Business junior Devesh Modi 

is a member of the Zell Early 
Stage Fund, a venture capital 
and pre-venture capital fund at 
the Business School under the 
Zell Lurie Institute. For students 
interested 
in 
the 
venture 

capital space, ZESF provides an 
opportunity to gain experience 
investing in real early-stage 
companies. The fund is run 
by 
undergraduate 
business 

students and supervised by a 
faculty managing director.

“ZESF is primarily focused 

on giving undergraduates an 
immersive experience in the 
venture capital due diligence 
process,” Modi said. “While I 
just joined this semester, the 
class is organized into two 
main functions: education and 
deal experience. The education 
side is mixed between student 
and professor-run discussions 

on the fundamentals of due 
diligence 
and 
early-stage 

analysis … On the deal side, our 
professor, Erik Gordon, helps us 
run a full due diligence process 
on the company in question. I 
have not participated in this 
process yet, but from what I 
understand, 
this 
involves 
a 

significant amount of detailed 
research, 
expert 
interviews 

and 
class-based 
discussions 

regarding the legitimacy of the 
company. Once the process is 
completed, the students are 
able to decide whether to invest 
capital. Investments typically 
range between $20,000 and 
$200,000, depending on the size 
and potential of the company.”

Modi 
said 
ZESF 
is 
also 

working 
to 
improve 
their 

outreach efforts to improve 
diversity within the group.

“As 
an 
undergraduate, 
I 

haven’t had much experience 
with the professional venture 
capital 
world,” 
Modi 
said. 

“However, 
based 
on 
my 

experience thus far in ZESF, 
I’ve 
noticed 
that 
there’s 
a 

disproportionately high ratio 
of male to female students. The 
reasons for this vary, but a large 
reason for this has to do with 
the marketing of the club. We 
are currently making amends to 
the process by hosted diversity 
events and women-specific info-
sessions, and are continuing 
to develop our strategies to 
equalize the diversity of the 
class.”

Modi offered some advice on 

entering the startup space with 
a new idea.

“Think it through,” he said. 

“A lot of people come into the 
scene imagining how great their 
ideas will be, but fail to fully 
formulate a concrete plan of 
execution on the business. There 
are a lot of moving components 
when crafting a new company, 
and if done with the partial 
effort it just won’t work.”

On venture capital, Modi 

pointed out the difficulty of 
entering the space as a new 
graduate.

“Venture capital, on the other 

hand, is a difficult field to enter 
right after college,” Modi said. 
“Instead, I’d recommend getting 
involved with something such 
as ZESF to refine their interests 
and understand the field. After a 
few years working in an industry, 
if they’re still interested, that 
would be the time to look at 
options in venture capital.”

Ajao also had advice for 

students: 
to 
focus 
on 
real 

world problems and to apply 
technology to solve problems 
that affect the people they know.

“What I would recommend 

is to not get distracted by 
very shiny words like A.I. 
or blockchain — which are 
fantastic 
technologies,” 
Ajao 

said. “Focus on how that can be 
applied to a problem that you 
face day-to-day, and a problem 
that is extremely authentic to 
you or to your family, because 
that is where the secret sauce 
is going to come. Because at the 
end of the day, founders that are 
successful are solving problems 
that they know better than 
anyone else.”

STARTUP
From Page 1A

“A lot of people 
come into the 

scene imagining 
how great their 
ideas will be.”

