Housing 
is 
an 
ongoing 
issue that continues to affect 
stakeholders in the Ann Arbor 
community. For students, it 
means pressure to sign leases 
in early fall, perhaps without 
a full understanding of their 
responsibilities 
as 
a 
tenant. 
The steady growth of student 
enrollment, an average 2.21 
percent in the past two years, 
exacerbates the issue.
Individuals such as Peter Allen, 
professor at the Ross School of 
Business and Taubman College 
of 
Architecture 
and 
Urban 
Planning, believe that students 
are an integral part to building a 
solution. In Allen’s business class, 
Real Estate Essentials, students 
are given the opportunity to 
do so. And together with the 
students from his class, in August 
Allen proposed the creation 
of a student-led development 
accelerator 
to 
address 
the 
housing crisis. 
Real Estate Essentials has 
always included a hands-on 
component. But recently, he 
has built a proposal to include 
the 
University, 
local 
non-
profits and public agencies in a 
development accelerator group. 
In a presentation to the Business 
School Dean Scott DeRue and 

Taubman Dean Jonathan Massey 
in late August, Allen presented 
the development accelerator as 
a joint effort and highlighted 
the role of his accomplished 
students as potential advisory 
team members. He identified 
four critical issues in Ann 
Arbor housing: sustainability, 
affordability, mobility and better 
neighborhoods. 
Allen believes that these issues 
can be addressed by transitioning 
publicly owned surface parking 
lots in the downtown area 
to 
become 
minimal 
public 
underground parking, introduce 
mixed-use developments with 
integrated affordable housing and 
encouraging public landowners 
not to sell but to become long-
term partners in development. 
Allen and other stakeholders 
are expecting a response from 
the deans in the coming weeks. 
Housing pressures aren’t only 
affecting students or Ann Arbor 
residents. Last November, about 
4,300 residents in the broader 
Washtenaw County area applied 
for 600 spots on the Ann Arbor 
Housing Commission’s housing 
choice voucher waitlist, which 
opened for five days for the first 
time since 2012. 

The Michigan Daily sat down 
with E. Royster Harper, vice 
president for Student Life at The 
University of Michigan, Friday 
afternoon to discuss the Sexually 
transmitted 
infection 
testing 
policy controversy, the recent 
climate 
strike, 
fraternity 
and 
sorority life housing complications 
with the transition to winter 
recruitment 
and 
Harper’s 
announced retirement from the 
University.
The Michigan Daily: After 
backlash from the University 
community, 
University 
Health 
Services reversed its policy so STI 
exams are once again covered by 

tuition through the health service 
fee. From your perspective, why 
did the University change the 
policy?
E. Royster Harper: I know it’s 
hard for students to believe, but 
when students give us feedback, 
and we hear it, that causes us 
to reconsider what it is we’ve 
done, and we’re quick to do that. 
So here’s our concern: We have 
two legitimate competing needs, 
keep costs of attendance down 
and make sure the students are 
getting the health care that they 
need. Part of the decision to keep 
the cost down was that insurance 
that most students have, were 
already paying for it. So the folks 
that were benefiting the most from 
the health service fee were the 
insurance companies because we 
were paying for stuff they would 
pay for. But students said, “Look, if 

there’s any chance that my parents 
are going to know (about STI 
examinations), then I’m going to 
be less likely to get the services.” 
We didn’t want anything to get 
in the way of students getting the 
healthcare they need. What wasn’t 
comforting 
enough, 
students 
didn’t believe it, whatever the 
rationale was, it was clear to us 
that some students would choose 
not to get tested. Our commitment 
is to make sure that our students 
are getting good health care. So 
once that was clear to us, we just 
said, “Okay, this is not the right 
decision for us”. So what students 
did is they helped us understand 
the impact in a way that we had 
not understood it before. That’s 
why we changed our minds.
TMD: 
Why 
did 
student 
activism work in this case?
Harper: I think usually when 

the University makes a decision, 
there are multiple things that they 
are trying to get accomplished. In 
this case, money and making sure 
the students get good health care, 
that it didn’t have a chilling impact. 
Students are seldom protesting 
about things that don’t matter. But 
lots of things matter. So what the 
University is weighing is when we 
consider everything, where do we 
need to be? Sometimes what we 
decide is, we can’t change. This is 
not one of those, because when we 
put everything together, it makes 
sense to change. I do think that 
sometimes all of us think if I just 
raised my voice, or I just protest, 
what I want, will occur. But when 
you are in a leadership role, you’re 
always weighing a lot of points of 
views and a lot of different facts. 

michigandaily.com
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Monday, September 30, 2019

ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-NINE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM

Two professors involved in 
the intersection of artificial 
intelligence and mental health 
shared 
their 
work 
Friday 
evening at the Ann Arbor 
District Library in partnership 
with 
the 
University 
of 
Michigan’s AI Laboratory. 
Emily 
Mower 
Provost, 
associate 
professor 
of 
computer science and electrical 
engineering, 
and 
Melvin 
McInnis, professor of bipolar 
disorder and depression, are 
working together to develop 
computational 
methods 
for 
measuring 
mood 
symptom 
severity in bipolar disorder. 
McInnis is the director of the 
Heinz 
C. 
Prechter 
Bipolar 
Research Program, and Provost 
is a member. 
The panelists first discussed 
why they were involved in 
the project. Provost, who was 
always interested in human 
behavior and improving people’s 
lives 
through 
engineering, 
said she was excited to work 
at the intersection of human-
robot interaction and effective 

computing. 
“It gives me an opportunity 
not only to try to create new and 
really innovative algorithms, 
but when you put a human-
centered swing into AI, then 
you also have the opportunity 
to really join engineering and 

science,” Provost said. “To me, it 
seemed like a really interesting 
opportunity to do something 
meaningful to do engineering 
that had an impact on people’s 
lives. … We specialized and 
started working in emotion 
recognition, where the goal 

was to take in speech and try 
to quantify ambiguity that’s 
associated with how people 
express emotions, which was 
exciting.” 

BUSINESS
AI Laboratory presents panel on 
tech use in mental health research

Heinz. C. Prechter Bipolar Reserach Program explains intersection of human-robot interactions

SONIA LEE
Daily Staff Reporter

About 200 people gathered 
at the Campus Farm for the 8th 
Annual Harvest Festival, with 
live musician performances, farm 
tours, free food, pumpkin painting 
and 
many 
other 
sustainable 
activities. 
MDining was a sponsor of the 
Harvest Festival. Concord and 
empire apples were on the table 
as well as a concoction of barley 
with vegetables and many other 
ingredients from the campus farm. 
Pumpkin painting was the 
main activity that attracted many 
students and Ann Arbor residents. 
The pumpkins were donated to 
Harvest Festival by Slow Farms, 
an organic farm in Ann Arbor that 
handpicks all of its harvest. 

‘U’ Campus 
Farm holds 
8th annual
fall festival 

CAMPUS LIFE

MDining, UMBees spread 
environmental awareness 
at outdoor Harvest event

JASMIN LEE 
For the Daily

ALEC COHEN/Daily
Emily Mower Provost, associate prof. of computer science, shares her experience with emotion recognition at an event 
on artificial intelligence, personalized technology and mental health at the Ann Arbor District Library Friday evening. 

Rutgers run out
A week after a season-
altering loss, Michigan 
bounced back with a 52-0 
win over the Scarlet Knights.

 » Page 1B

The Ross School of Business 
hosted 
the 
Michigan 
Sport 
Business Conference last Friday. 
Established in 2012 when two 
Michigan students realized the 
potential for the sports business 
market in Ann Arbor, MSBC has 
become the largest undergraduate-
run sports business conference in 
the nation.
With 800 students, industry 
professionals, 
professors 
and 
faculty 
in 
attendance, 
the 
conference was composed of 
panels, such as “The Business of 
eSports” and “Managing Your 
Career in Sports,” as well as 
networking breaks and individual 
speeches. 

Largest student-run 
convention in industry 
hosts leading experts

NIKKI KIM
Daily Staff Reporter

Professor aims 
for student-led 
program to fix 
housing crisis 

Faculty member proposes joint 
effort for development in Ann Arbor

VP Harper discusses recent climate 
strike, STI testing and retirement

Administrator says ‘It has been such an honor...the gift for 20 years has been to me’

KATHERINA SOURINE
Daily Staff Reporter
RUCHITA IYER/Daily
E. Royster Harper, vice president of Student Life, speaks on student activism and University healthcare at the Fleming Administration Building Friday afternoon. 

GOT A NEWS TIP?
Call 734-418-4115 or e-mail 
news@michigandaily.com and let us know.

INDEX
Vol. CXXIX, No. 1
©2019 The Michigan Daily

N E WS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2

O PI N I O N . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

CROSSWORD................6

M I C . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

A R T S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

S P O R T S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 B
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Conference 
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RACHEL CUNNINGHAM, 
CLAIRE HAO & PARNIA 
MAZHAR
Daily News Editor & Daily Staff 
Reporters

See ROYSTER, Page 2A

