“CSG 
is 
encouraged 
by 
the 
President’s 
Commission 
on 
Carbon 
Neutrality 
and 
its joining of the Climate 
Change Coalition. We hope the 
University continues to take 
meaningful steps to reduce our 
carbon footprint.”
The Board of Regents then 
unanimously 
approved 
the 
construction of a new University 
in-patient 
hospital 
next 
to 
the 
Frankel 
Cardiovascular 
Center. The hospital has an 
estimated cost of $920 million, 
will be 12-stories tall and will 
house 264 private rooms. It is 
expected to open in the fall of 
2024.
Regent Shauna Ryder Diggs 
(D) said the new hospital will 
help Michigan Medicine treat 
all patients to the best of their 
ability with new technology. 
She said the planning process 
took around two and a half 
years.
“The 
team 
at 
Michigan 
Medicine has taken great care 
to consider the needs of both 
patients and families, both now 
and in the future,” Diggs said. 
“This new hospital will enable 
healthcare providers to quickly 
respond to complex cases with 
the highest level of patient 

safety, infection control and 
the delivery of state-of-the-art 
treatments.” 
T. Anthony Denton, senior 
vice 
president 
and 
chief 
operating officer of Michigan 
Medicine, then spoke about the 
hospital. He said a big reason 
the University needs to build 
a new hospital is to make sure 
there are enough resources and 
employees for all patients. 
“The challenge is access 
and capacity,” Denton said. 
“It’s been a running story for 
a while, but I would suggest to 
you that it’s a good challenge. 
It demonstrates that we are a 
provider of choice … being busy 
means that we are providing 
a service to our community. 
However, it does create access 
constraints for people who 
want to get into our hospital 
who can’t.”
Denton 
concluded 
by 
saying Michigan Medicine is 
dedicated 
to 
environmental 
sustainability. He said part of 
the reason the hospital costs 
so much is because they tried 
to make it as environmentally 
friendly as possible. 
“We 
have 
been 
very 
committed to environmental 
sustainability for decades at 
Michigan Medicine,” Denton 
said. “We believe that it is so 
important to take care of our 
home and serve the community 

… we believe that investment 
in the future will give us the 
innovation, it will give us 
the access, it will give us the 
capacity that we need to serve 
our future.” 
Public 
commenters 
at 
the 
meeting 
addressed 
issues relating to pedestrian 
safety, wrongful child abuse 
convictions and funding for 
STEM programs, among other 
concerns. 
Multiple 
commenters 
expressed concern about the 
lawsuit against Black Girls 
Code, a summer coding program 
at Wayne State University. 
In 
February, 
University 
of 
Michigan-Flint professor Mark 
Perry filed a claim against 
Wayne State alleging the school 
violates Title IX by holding a 
summer workshop aimed solely 
at girls. In response, Williams 
and about 15 other National 
Action 
Network 
members 
demonstrated outside the home 
of University President Mark 
Schlissel to call for Perry’s 
firing. 
Charles 
Williams 
II, 
president 
of 
the 
Michigan 
chapter of NAN, addressed the 
Regents about Perry’s claim 
and representation in STEM 
fields. Williams pointed out the 
lack of racial diversity in the 
University’s STEM programs 
and urged the University to 

take immediate action against 
Perry. 
“If you begin to investigate 
the 
graduate 
programs 
in 
STEM and in other disciplines, 
you will see rarely African 
Americans admitted into your 
programs,” 
Williams 
said. 
“We know the University of 
Michigan 
fought 
hard 
for 
affirmative action … but what 
we don’t know is if their 
commitment is sincere. Where 
is the University of Michigan’s 
footing in Detroit?”
Josh Mack, University alum 
and NAN member, emphasized 
Williams’s points and shared 
his own experience at the 
University as a doctoral student 
in the early 1970s. Mack said 
he faced social and economic 
challenges as a black student 
and added that he hoped the 
University 
would 
continue 
supporting STEM programs, 
including those that reach out 
to minority groups. 
“Our Constitution of the 
United States is designed to 
make our country a more 
perfect union,” Mack said. 
“With the STEM program, 
if we continue to support the 
STEM program and the Bridge 
program 
and 
the 
(Women 
in Science and Engineering) 
program, it continues to make 
the University of Michigan 
a 
more 
perfect 
learning 

institution.”
Community 
members 
involved with Torn Family, 
an organization dedicated to 
overturning false convictions 
of Shaken Baby Syndrome, 
addressed the Regents about 
cases related to University 
hospitals. 
Douglas 
Smith, 
a 
retired 
professor of pathology at the 
University and a board member 
of Torn Family, called on the 
University to hold a formal 
discussion about wrongful child 
abuse convictions in an academic 
and scientific setting. Smith 
said although LSA and the Law 
School held a day-long conference 
a few years ago to address the 
issue of Shaken Baby Syndrome, 
representatives from the Medical 
School refused to participate. 
“The courtroom is a terrible 
place to have a scientific or 
medical debate,” Smith said. 
“We need to have academic 
platforms for debate. But as 
long these faculties refuse 
to acknowledge that there is 
something to debate, it won’t 
happen … This Board would 
be doing a great service for 
the education of doctors and 
the safety of families if this 
debate were to happen.”

Jianping 
Fu, 
associate 
professor 
of 
mechanical 
engineering, led the team that 
has worked on the project since 
2015. He said his team was able 
to generate embryoids with 
about 5 to 10 percent efficiency 
a few years ago, while the new 
technology is about 95 percent 
efficient.
Yi Zheng, a post-doctoral 
research fellow in Fu’s lab, said 
he felt encouraged by all the 
attention the research received.
“I published quite a few 
research papers before, but 

none of them generated so 
many interests and attentions 
from 
both 
academia 
and 
the public,” Zheng said in 
an email to The Daily. “It is 
very interesting to read about 
other’s comments from totally 
different perspectives. I feel 
quite proud that my research is 
found useful and important by 
the top scientists in the field, all 
my hard work finally pays off.”
LSA 
junior 
Gillian 
Rubenstein said she read the 
paper after finding a link to it 
in a newsletter from Nature. 
Rubenstein, who is interested 
in gender and health, said 
she’s excited for the possible 
implications the research has 

and the fact it’s emerged in the 
reproductive field.
“(Stem cell research) doesnt 
seem like, so far, it’s gotten 
into the reproductive field, so 
I thought it was really exciting 
that potentially we could create 
embryos out of stem cells,” 
Rubenstein said.
Fu said the new technology 
could 
aid 
scientists 
in 
learning 
more 
about 
what 
he calls the “black box of 
human 
development.” 
This 
is the first few weeks after a 
sperm fertilizes an egg and 
the embryo implants into the 
wall of the uterus, called the 
preimplantation stage.
“During this period, many 

miscarriages can happen and 
serious birth defects can form 
as well,” Fu said. “I think we are 
very excited and very hopeful 
that this system … has generated 
a 
reliable, 
experimental 
platform 
for 
answering 
fundamental questions about 
human development.”
Scientists have a good idea 
of what happens for the nine 
months of pregnancy, but have 
had 
trouble 
understanding 
the 
preimplantation 
stage 
because 
the 
embryo 
isn’t 
easily accessible during this 
period. The 1984 Warnock 
rule has also made it difficult 
to research preimplantation 
— the Warnock rule, also 

known as the 14-day rule, bars 
researchers 
from 
studying 
human embryos beyond 14 
days of development for ethical 
reasons.
Fu said there are no ethical 
guidelines for embryoids yet. 
He hopes embryoids aren’t 
subjected to the 14-day rule 
because they do not contain 
certain cell types, so they 
are unable to develop into a 
baby. The lab has followed 
the 14-day rule so far by only 
culturing the embryoids for 
four days, Fu said.

Six 
months 
after 
a 
previous 
Climate 
Strike 
in 
March 
culminated 
in 
10 
demonstrators 
being 
arrested after a nearly eight-
hour sit-in at the Fleming 
Administration 
Building, 
another protest is planned for 
Friday. The demonstration 
will begin at 11 a.m. on 
the Ingalls Mall outside of 
Rackham Auditorium.
Naina 
Agrawal-Hardin, 
press liaison for Washtenaw 
County 
Climate 
Strike 
and a junior at Washtenaw 
International High School, 
applauded AAPS for allowing 

students to leave class.
“While AAPS can’t legally 
encourage students to leave 
class, 
as 
organizers 
we 
are happy to see that our 
work has pushed AAPS to 
acknowledge our movement 
and the right of all students 
to be part of this historic 
moment fighting for their 
futures,” 
Agrawal-Hardin 
told The Daily. “We hope 
that in future we can work 
even more closely with AAPS 
towards 
transformative 
action on climate justice.”
Comsa said administrators 
would 
work 
to 
maintain 
order.
“In all cases, students are 
supervised, 
whether 
they 
choose to participate or not,” 

Comsa wrote. “We encourage 
all 
parents/guardians 
to 
speak with their student(s) 
about the messaging related 
to 
this 
event, 
including 
anticipated student walkouts, 
and ways in which students 
can constructively and safely 
express their viewpoints.”
Comsa 
also 
clarified 
that students are not being 
required to take part in the 
walkout.
“We will respect the rights 
of all students, whether they 
choose to participate or not,” 
Comsa said. “Thus, we work 
with our student leaders and 
coordinate supervision and 
procedures to assure student 
safety on our campuses. No 
student will be required to 

participate in any student-
led 
activities, 
including 
walkouts.”
In 
contrast, 
University 
administrators 
have 
not 
made 
any 
announcements 
excusing students and staff 
from 
classes 
during 
the 
strike. LSA freshman Porter 
Hughes created a petition 
calling on the University to 
“dismiss all students, faculty, 
staff, 
employees, 
and 
all 
other associated personnel 
during this time so that all 
who wish to participate may 
without fear of punishment 
or consequence.”
“I think the University has 
a responsibility to ensure that 
civic engagement maintains 
a core part of its mission by 

not only talking the talk but 
also by walking the walk 
and allowing people to go 
and participate in the event 
without fear of retribution 
or punishment in any way, 
shape or form,” Hughes said.
Hughes said the petition is 
meant to be sent University 
President Mark Schlissel, and 
that he’s trying to get in touch 
with other administrators as 
well. The University should 
recognize how impactful the 
climate crisis is for students 
and for their futures, Hughes 
said. 
“Climate 
change 
is 
affecting us in our everyday 
lives and is going to have an 
even bigger impact in our 
near future,” Hughes said.

Foer emphasized individual 
action is truly engineered 
toward the person and is not a 
one-size-fits-all program. He 
mentioned a plan that focuses 
on a plant-based diet and 
limited travel, saying clean 
eating was much easier than 
less travel. 
“Acknowledge and accept 

who we are, acknowledge 
what our limits are,” Foer 
said. “I find it relatively easy 
to be a vegetarian. I find it 
rather difficult to control the 
number of flights I take.” 
Regardless 
of 
what 
action someone takes, Foer 
emphasized the importance 
of taking any action at all. 
He said simply accepting the 
reality of climate change isn’t 
permissible. 
“Intellectually 
accepting 
the truth isn’t virtuous in 
and of itself, and it won’t save 
us,” Foer said. “If we accept 
the fact of the reality, that 
we are destroying the planet, 
but aren’t willing to believe it, 
we are no better than those 
who denied the existence 
of 
human-caused 
climate 
change. And when the future 
distinguishes 
between 
the 
two kinds of denial, which 
will appear to be a grave error 
and which an unforgivable 
crime?” 
Perfecto then brought up 
the instance of Puerto Rico, 
the U.S. territory devastated 
by a hurricane.
“I think that more and 
more, 
because 
of 
these 

climate 
catastrophes, 

people that didn’t know, are 
knowing, and the people that 
knew, are more compelled to 
do something,” Perfecto said. 
“Do you agree that things are 
changing?” 
Foer agreed that things are 
changing, but said he worries 
Americans 
emphasize 

resilience too much after a 
natural disaster and do not 
talk about how things are 
getting worse. 
Foer ended his discussion 
by offering up the idea of 
climate change as a chance 
to start again, rather than an 
ending.
“We 
are 
so 
used 
to 
thinking of climate change as 
endings: the end of the polar 
ice cap, the end of coastal 
cities, the end of tolerable 
weather,” Foer said. “But we 
never think about it as an 
opportunity for a beginning. 
Maybe that is the ultimate 
altercation of climate change 
is not ‘we’re doomed,’ but 
‘we’re at the beginning.’” 
LSA sophomores Natalie 
Suh and Katie Kulie are fans 
of Foer’s work and were 
pleasantly surprised by the 
event. 
“I 
had 
read 
his 
book 
‘Extremely 
Loud 
and 
Incredibly 
Close’ 
in 
high 
school, and I thought it would 
be a good opportunity to see a 
New York best-selling author 
talk,” Suh said. “I didn’t know 
what to expect, really, out 
of this. It seems so different 
from ‘Extremely Loud and 
Incredibly Close.’”
Kulie 
said 
she 
likes 
how 
Foer 
tells 
a 
story, 
acknowledging the trials and 
tribulations 
without 
being 
too depressing. 
“He’s really good at framing 
things that are traditionally 
considered super negative as 
positive, but also still being 
realistic about it, which I 
think is something that is a 
struggle,” Kulie said. “You 
don’t hear stuff like that in 
the rhetoric about climate 
change these days.” 
Both Kulie and Suh said 
they plan on attending the 
Washtenaw County Climate 
Strike Friday and hope it 
will be the beginning of real 
change. 
“I hope that the University 
of 
Michigan 
officials 
are 
listening and actually see this 
as a powerful statement and 
not just, ‘Oh, the college kids 
are at it again’ and actually pay 
attention,” Suh said. “I think if 
there is more of a diverse group 
of ages and identities, it will be 
more of an impactful statement.” 

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Friday, September 20, 2019 — 3

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REGENTS
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ALEC COHEN/Daily
LSA sophomore Morgan Anderson talks to University students during Earthfest on the Diag Thursday.

E ARTHFEST

CLIMATE
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WALKOUT
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EMBRYOS
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MichiganDaily.com

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