Following
the
reception,
LSA
junior
Ayah
Kutmah,
MRAP
Vice
President
of
External
Affairs,
delivered
the opening remarks, using
statistics
to
highlight
the
extent of the refugee crisis.
According to Kutmah, the
current refugee crisis is the
worst in modern history, and
the U.S. has limited the number
of refugees to the lowest since
the
U.S.
standardized
the
refugee-accepting
process
following the Refugee Act
of 1980. In light of current
policies
around
refugees
and asylum seekers, Kutmah
expressed the ability of stories
to spur social change.
“The power of stories is
often glossed over, but it is
undeniable
how
essential
they are in creating social
norms
and
attitudes
that
move generations and give
the
leaders,
the
activists,
the policymakers, the social
workers,
the
artists,
the
teachers, and the students
(what’s) needed to galvanize
international
attention
and
work to create institutions
and policies that will welcome
refugees,” Kutmah said.
The event then premiered
“Blurred Canvas: Displacement
at Michigan,” a film created
by
LSA
sophomore
Basil
Alsubee and LSA sophomore
Colin
Lucero-Dixon
about
displaced
members
of
the
University
community.
The
film featured interviews with
Soto, Engineering sophomore
Israa Ali and LSA junior Dim
Mang and showcased tidbits
of their daily lives, such as Ali
teaching her friend to play the
ukulele and Mang leading a
student organization event.
Alsubee said the film was
directed
with
interview
format to allow the individuals
showcased to tell their own
story.
“The idea was to represent
all
these
narratives,
their
complicated
identities,
backgrounds,
stories,
because of how nuanced and
complicated this issue is on
a global scale,” Alsubee said.
“There’s a lot of heroizing or
victimizing people for a certain
purpose. Our goal in doing this
was to present an opportunity
for the individuals themselves
to speak.”
Soto spoke about journalists’
lack of safety in Mexico and
expressed how he feels the
U.S. immigration system needs
reform, while Mang discussed
how her understanding of
her birth country Burma has
become less idyllic as she
learns more about its history.
Ali
talked
about
breaking
barriers as an Arab female in
aerospace
engineering,
and
how this discipline has made
her consider herself a citizen
of the world.
After the film, the event
transitioned to a discussion
headed by panelists Mang, LSA
sophomore Sumaya Tabbah,
Hadji
Bakara,
assistant
professor of English language
and
literature
and
Ruby
Robinson, managing attorney
at Michigan Immigrant Rights
Center.
Robinson
discussed
the
importance of recordkeeping
from
a
legal
standpoint,
voicing his role as an attorney
is to tell his clients’ stories in
hopes of the court granting
them
relief.
To
withstand
cross-examination
and
maintain credibility, Robinson
explained clients need records
to
present
an
accurate,
consistent and corroborated
account.
“Being able to keep some
type of record is critical in
many areas of law… as there is
a very high burden of proof for
clients seeking different types
of relief in the United States,”
Robinson said.
Tabbah said she has an
interest in oral history, which
began when she interviewed
Flint residents on the city’s
economic decline last summer.
The “Blurred Canvases” film
and photo exhibit was her
next project, and she voiced
the importance of showing the
people behind statistics.
Business sophomore Bryan
Sauer is concentrating in finance
and has already secured his
internship
for
the
summer
of 2020 through off-campus
recruitment this semester. Sauer
said he spent months reviewing
technical accounting questions,
problem sets and interview
questions, skills he has not
been exposed to yet through his
academic classes in the Business
School.
“I started preparing for my
interviews right after Christmas
because the interview process
does have a very large technical
portion to it,” Sauer said. “So you
have to learn a whole bunch of
accounting and finance concepts
that they’ll ask you about very in
depth in the interview that you
haven’t learned yet in class.”
Sauer was excited to receive
his job offer, but he said the
process to get it wasn’t without
its difficulties.
“It
was
definitely
really
overwhelming at first,” Sauer
said. “I was kind of mad that
(the banks) moved it up on us
because that’s six fewer months
to prepare for the interviews and
get those technical questions
down than you would normally
have. In the end I kind of liked it
because I already have my offer
so I know where I’m working in
15 months. So there are pros and
cons but it was definitely very
overwhelming and not fun at
first.”
Business sophomore Anthony
Coffie II is also in the midst of
recruitment while balancing two
jobs, 15 credits, participation
in the Michigan Interactive
Investments club and exploring
other extracurricular hobbies.
“Tomorrow I’ll be in New York
City for an interview,” Coffie
said. “And I have assignments
due tomorrow … I recognize
that it is valuable to learn how to
overcome these struggles … I’m
trying to keep that in mind.”
Coffie said his investment
club,
Michigan
Interactive
Investments,
significantly
prepared
him
for
his
recruitment.
“It would be a much more
difficult process for me had I
not been accepted into a club
called
Michigan
Interactive
Investments,
MII,”
Coffie
said. “That club has been very
finance-focused, very markets-
focused. These are things that,
if a student hasn’t been exposed
to it prior to college or prior to
being in a basic finance course, it
would be hard for them to really
understand what’s going on and
how to apply that to real life
situations.”
Business senior Scarlett Ong,
president of Impact Investing
Group, discussed how student
organizations
can
alleviate
stress by offering members a
comfortable space to explore
their budding career interests.
Ong said the culture fostered
within a club can be influential
in
reducing
stress
brought
about
from
the
accelerated
recruitment process.
“With regards to this whole
accelerated
(recruitment)
process, clubs definitely help
students navigate that area,”
Ong said. “I think it really
depends on the culture that the
club is creating and how they
are approaching the situation
to support students rather than
adding more anxiety to the
whole accelerated process.”
Sauer came to accept the
stress of recruitment as part of
his daily life — he said the time
commitment and demands of
networking eventually became
routine.
“I was taking 18 credits first
semester so it (recruitment)
was a full workload,” Sauer
said. “People say doing that
technical prep is a full-time job
on top of it because every single
moment of free time you have
it’s lingering in the back of your
mind, ‘I should be doing prep for
recruiting right now, I shouldn’t
be hanging out with my friends.’”
Coffie also mentioned how
recruiting often feels as if it stops
students from having a more
traditional college experience. .
“I don’t get to spend that much
time hanging out, like I feel a
young college kid is supposed to
be doing, because I am looking
forward to my career,” Coffie
said. “But the sacrifice is an
investment that we have to make
… Students are spending so much
time recruiting and doing this
recruiting prep that they are not
studying as much, not enjoying
life and the college experience
as much”
Julie
Kaplan,
embedded
Counseling and Psychological
Services
counselor
in
the
Business School, said students
who are unsure of their career
path typically experience more
stress throughout this process.
“The students that I talk
to
who
are
recruiting
for
investment banking and finance,
or who aren’t sure what they
want to do, I think those students
might be even more stressed
out,” Kaplan said. “The students
who aren’t sure and were hoping
to have this summer to figure it
out, but now feel like they have
to make a decision, or maybe
they should recruit just in case
they decide they want to do it — I
think that’s been really hard.”
In a December press release,
JPMorgan
Chase
announced
they
terminated
the
early
recruitment
process
after
considering it may detract from
a
business
student’s
ability
to maintain a holistic college
experience.
“...
JPMorgan
Chase
has
been recruiting, interviewing
and
extending
early
offers
to sophomores for roles they
would not fill until the following
summer,”
the
press
release
read.
“This
high-pressure
environment distracts students
from learning and does not allow
them enough time to focus on
what’s most important: simply
put, being a college student ...
going forward, we will no longer
be extending early offers for
summer interns.”
Coffie does not believe the
burden of added stress from
early recruitment is the most
dangerous aspect of the process.
To him, accelerated recruitment
potentially
harms
young,
impressionable undergraduates
eager to figure out their career
by pushing them into business
fields prematurely.
“A lot of people are pursuing
things and they don’t quite
know why they are doing it,
but they want to have that
label, that reputation and that
respect,” Coffie said. “Being so
young, people don’t realize that
the name isn’t everything … I
think people unfortunately are
prematurely thrown into this
without having spent the time to
reflect on themselves and really
establish themselves in college
yet.”
“But a scholarship really is to
prepare you and position you for a
new set of processes.”
Gilchrist
discussed
his
background, noting his experience
attending
the
College
of
Engineering at the University,
working for Microsoft and, after
creating the first wave of social
media networking for the Obama
campaign, finding his way into
politics.
Gilchrist also encouraged the
scholars to remain persistent in the
face of failure. He discussed how
after his loss in the 2017 election
for Detroit city clerk, he initially
felt defeated. But he continued
forward,
eventually
becoming
lieutenant governor.
“My story is one of those that
everything in life — the wins you
get, the L’s you take — they all
prepare you for the next thing in
your path,” Gilchrist said.
Gilchrist finished his address by
reassuring scholars that he sees a
potential in all of them to improve
both the state of Michigan and the
country as a whole.
In an interview with The Daily
after the event, LSA senior Mia
Choe echoed Gilchrist’s message
of
scholarship
opportunities
preparing students for the future.
She is a research assistant at Detroit
Medical Center and plans to attend
medical school.
“From freshman year to senior
year, I’ve really seen the program
evolve,
like
the
mentorship
programs and just the different
events — it was just nice knowing
that I had a community of people
who came from a similar situation
that I did,” Choe said.
Gilchrist told The Daily after the
event that he personally relates to
many of these scholars.
“I wouldn’t be able to afford the
University of Michigan without
a scholarship, and many of these
Kessler Scholars wouldn’t be able
to afford to go to a school like
Michigan without a scholarship,”
Gilchrist said.
Gilchrist
reiterated
Gov.
Gretchen
Whitmer’s
plans
to
ensure higher education is a serious
option for more graduating high
school seniors, also known as
the MI Opportunity Scholarship
Program. Gilchrist also mentioned
possible plans to get more funding
for the education system.
“We’re also proposing … to help
improve and put additional money
into the foundation lounge for
helping to fund school districts,
more money for school districts,
more money for special education
and
at-risk
youth
programs,”
Gilchrist
said.
“All
these
investments in the K-12 program
will better prepare students across
the state of Michigan to have a
better educational experience, and
hopefully they’ll all want to come to
Michigan.”
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Friday, April 19, 2019 — 3
GILCHRIST
From Page 1
REFUGEES
From Page 1
MICHIGAN E NGINE E RING DESIGN E XPO
Projects on display at the Michigan Engineering Design Expo hosted across North Campus Thursday afternoon.
DANYEL THARAKAN/Daily
Read more online at
michigandaily.com
UIGHUR
From Page 1
RECRUITMENT
From Page 1
Robert
Xu,
Business
and
Engineering freshman, said he
learned more about trading from
the competition.
“The
competition
definitely
increased my interest in trading,”
Xu said. “Even though I knew the
basic premise of what it was coming
into the competition, I didn’t really
know what the industry was like.
The competition was a great way
to meet experienced professionals
who could shed some light on
that, and also connect with others
interested in the field.”
Business freshman Benen Ling
said he joined the competition
through
the
Maize
&
Blue
Endowment Fund, an investment
management club. The University
of Chicago extended an invitation to
the club, and Benen Ling gathered
a team of coders to apply to the
event. Once they were accepted to
participate in the competition, the
team began preparing.
Benen Ling said he focused
more on the financial aspect of the
competition, preparing research
for the rest of his team to implement
with coding.
“I just read a lot of research
papers,” Ling said. “The problem
with quantitative trading is those
algorithms you have to use —
nobody publishes them because
they’re
proprietary,
and
that
stuff is worth millions of dollars.
Obviously not the stuff we do, but
things along those lines are worth
a lot of money, so you have to come
up with it yourself, and most of
that involves looking at research,
looking at what’s been happening
in the field, and synthesizing for
yourself.”
Engineering
sophomore
Bhavish Gummadi said the team
worked
on
their
algorithms
extensively in preparation for the
competition.
The most extreme oppression
of Uighur Muslims is now taking
the form of their detention in
internment camps, where members
of ethnic minority groups are taken
for “extremist” behavior— which,
according to Chinese authorities,
can include using Islamic greetings
or choosing to eat halal. Detainees
in these camps include other
Muslim minorities in China, such
as ethnic Kazakhs.
Estimates from various sources
suggest that between 800,000
and 2 million people are currently
detained in China’s internment
camps.
Ann Lin, an associate professor
of Public Policy at the University
of
Michigan,
moderated
the
event. Lin began the conference
with a brief overview of China’s
repression of the Xinjiang region,
invoking the United States’ history
of its internment of Japanese
Americans
following
Japan’s
attack on Pearl Harbor during
World War II.
“I start with this piece of history
because when we talk about the
internment camps of Xinjiang, I
think it is important to say that the
Chinese government is not the only
government that has dealt with
fears of terrorism and political
unrest by imprisoning its own
citizens,” Lin said.
Nury Turkel, a former executive
director and co-founder of the
Uighur Human Rights Project and
a Washington, D.C., staff attorney,
was the first of the event’s invited
guests to speak. Turkel is a self-
identified Uighur American, and
spoke on the urgent reality of the
human rights crisis in Xinjiang.
He described the extensive
monitoring by the Chinese state
that Uighurs experience, such
as being subject to phone checks
and data scans and even scans of
groceries.
“And these are the things that
are happening in real time, this is
not a fiction, this is not a dystopian
science
fiction,”
Turkel
said,
referencing a statement made by
U.S. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla.
Chinese authorities have stated
the camps are means of counter-
terrorism,
meant
to
address
religious extremism in the Xinjiang
region. However, multiple speakers
at the conference emphasized
that incidents of terrorism or
separatism (of the XUAR from
China) attributed to Uighurs have
been almost nonexistent in the
past few decades, since China
accelerated its intense crackdown
on Uighur Muslims.
Sean
Roberts,
one
of
the
speakers at the event, is an
associate professor of the Practice
of
International
Affairs
and
director
of
the
International
Development Studies Program at
George Washington University
with a research focus on the
XUAR.
CODING
From Page 1
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michigandaily.com
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michigandaily.com