“We realize that it is deeply
complicated to ask to divest
completely from fossil fuels cold
turkey, so we’re just asking for no
more from here.”
Student
groups
and
CSG
have lobbied the University to
divest from fossil fuel companies.
While the University Board of
Regents voted in December against
investing $50 million in a company
with ties to oil and gas production,
members of the Climate Action
Movement released a statement on
Jan. 13 urging Michigan to divest its
existing $1 billion invested in fossil
fuel companies.
Engineering sophomore Carla
Voigt, liaison to the ABTS, said
the legislation will send a loud and
clear message to administrators
that students are concerned about
climate change and want to see
schools take action to reduce their
environmental footprint.
“There was a divestment passage
in the University of Michigan’s
CSG a few years ago, and that went
worldwide, these can also have the
possibility of doing that,” Voigt said.
“If we take a stance on something
and the entire Big Ten is agreeing
on this, there’s a potential to have an
impact. Especially if the legislation
that they take back is able to be built
upon in each of the schools.”
The delegation is bringing two
newly created positions, government
relations
chair
and
deputy
government relations chair, to learn
the best practices for lobbying local,
state and federal representatives
on behalf of the University of
Michigan’s student body.
LSA senior Tyler Ziel became
government
relations
chair
in
November 2019 and said he wants
to learn how other students have
successfully lobbied their state and
federal governments.
“Since we started this year, I’ll
get a better understanding of how
specifically student advocacy works,
and the roadblocks that come with
it,” Ziel said.
Since becoming the liaison to
ABTS in June 2019, Voigt has helped
the Association make an impact
on U-M students. The Association
launched a week of action in
November across the Big Ten to
advocate for the reauthorization
of the Aim Higher Act, a federal
program working to make higher
education more affordable.
Voigt, along with CSG, organized
a Diag Day last semester to raise
awareness for the AHA and handed
out postcards students could send
to their federal representatives
encouraging them to reauthorize
AHA.
He had a unique sense of
humor, adored by students
and colleagues alike, and a
deeply caring nature. Baptista
said Epstein’s office door was
always open, welcoming in
students and colleagues.
“He would go down to the
mezzanine level and pester
graduate students, of course
in a positive way, asking them
‘what are you up to?’” Baptista
said. “And this is their refuge,
and every other faculty would
respect that space, that it’s
theirs, but Sam would just
barge in. And he was always
very welcome, because he
really cared.”
Richard
Lewis,
current
Weinberg Institute director,
remembers
his
first
job
interview at the University in
2000, where Epstein was one
of the first professors Lewis
met. Lewis immediately knew
Epstein would be someone
he’d want to work alongside,
and notes Epstein’s integral
role in setting a positive
climate in the department.
“He was like a beacon on
campus, both for linguistics
and the campus as a whole,”
Lewis said. “A beacon for
humanity. I’ve never met
anybody who was such a
dedicated scholar, and such a
warm, gentle human being.”
Acrisio
Pires,
former
mentee
of
Epstein
and
current
linguistics
professor,
expressed
how
Epstein’s
work,
primarily
in theoretical syntax, was a
catalyst for establishing new
groundwork
in
cognitive
science and linguistics.
“He worked in a framework
called
minimalist
syntax,”
Pires said. “One of the goals of
this framework is to actually
look at what has been done,
and what’s still being done
in linguistics and say, ‘Look,
we can do better theories,
we can do theories that are
much
more
unifying
and
that are really built upon the
most foundational aspects of
what could represent human
knowledge of language. “
However,
Pires
said
Epstein
proved
science
and
personality
were
not
mutually
exclusive
in
the
learning process. Epstein was
a humorous professor who
engaged
curious
students
in introductory classes and
always
remembered
their
names despite large class
sizes.
“People got this sense of him
being a very caring person,
and very committed to helping
them and contributing to their
intellectual development — to
their scientific development
— as people who are doing
research and contributing to
science,” Pires said. “But he
didn’t leave the personal side
out. He was able to clearly
convey to people that he cared
about them as people, that was
a very important thing which
made a huge difference.”
One of these students was
2018 University alum Claire
Butz, a close family friend
to the Epsteins, who met his
daughter
in
kindergarten.
She
decided
to
take
the
introductory
Linguistics
209 course when she was a
sophomore,
and
ultimately
declared cognitive science as
her major. She recalled his
skill in connecting with people
and his “utterly hilarious
and goofy” personality while
teaching.
“He
did
have
this
incredible academic legacy
and this legacy in the field
of linguistics, but he was
able to meet people where
they were at intellectually,”
Butz
said.
“The
concepts
were
challenging
but
approachable, because of who
he is. He had the emotional
and
social
intelligence
to
communicate really complex
things to people who didn’t
have his experience and his
unbelievable mind.”
Butz said his welcoming
nature and natural ability
to
create
a
meaningful
learning experience is one
of his greatest legacies at the
University.
“Anyone who knew him as a
professor will remember him
as someone who connected
deeply with his students,”
Butz said. “He was someone
who created space for every
person in the room, and kept
his door open to all students,
and who found tremendous
joy in others learning what he
loved, and being able to see
their excitement grow.”
Butz
expressed
her
gratitude to have known such
a special person, and to have
a close relationship with his
family and loved ones.
“Nothing made him happier
than seeing the people who
he loved be happy in such
a real way, and I think that
was definitely special.” Butz
said. “Anyone who knew him
laughed more, loved more,
and knows more because of
him, and has endured a great
loss.”
Epstein’s
memorial
is
Sunday at 1 p.m. on the 10th
floor of Weiser Hall.
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Friday, January 24, 2020 — 3
Student
organizations,
campus resources and local
businesses set up more than
30
booths
in
the
Central
Campus Recreational Building
on
Thursday
afternoon
to
represent different aspects of
mental, physical and emotional
health. Arranged in a circular
pattern for students to walk
through, the event aimed to
address all “360 degrees” of
wellness.
Sarah
Button,
the
assistant
director
for
marketing, sponsorship and
academic partnerships with
Recreational Sports, organized
the event. Button said she and
other Student Life partners
have wanted to host an event
encouraging a more holistic
approach to well-being.
“This is a great time in
January, being that it’s the new
year,” Button said. “You can
refocus on your health, your
well-being … so it’s kind of an
ideal scenario.”
Visitors were encouraged
to play with therapy dogs,
pot small plants, eat healthy
food
and
enter
giveaways.
Throughout
the
event,
MDining, University Credit
Union
and
Counseling
&
Psychological Services hosted
hourly
free
educational
workshops.
Engineering junior Devin
Gohel, a student manager at the
Computer Showcase, described
how the Showcase is currently
exploring fitness technology in
hopes of encouraging people to
improve their physical health.
“We’re
here
showcasing
some of the fitness technology
we offer … like demonstrating
different features, especially
the workout app on the Apple
Watch,” Gohel said.
LSA senior Caroline Baloga
worked a booth representing
the student-led campus farm.
She
said
the
organization
wants to increase access to
produce for students who live
off-campus by selling their
produce in retail locations
such as Maizie’s Kitchen and
Market and Munger Graduate
Residences.
“Our motto is that we grow
food for students, by students,”
Baloga said.
EPSTEIN
From Page 1
To adjust to the influx of
customers, the location has
hired six additional staff. The
store is staying open for an
extra three hours to reduce
lines and wait times once the
new staff are trained.
Currently,
approximately
93
percent
of
customers
at
Skymint’s
Ann
Arbor
location
are
recreational
users, according to Ransom.
However,
Skymint
has
taken
measures
to
ensure
medical users are minimally
affected by the inflated wait
times caused by crowds of
recreational users.
Ransom
said
medical
customers are permitted to
skip lines to enter the store.
Additionally, she said one of
four registers at checkout is
an “express lane” intended to
accelerate their experience.
“Recreational
customers
need a lot more assistance;
they have a lot more questions,
so one-on-one time with them
is probably triple what we
would spend on a med patient,”
Ransom said. “We want to
make sure med patients aren’t
kind of feeling that pain, so we
do what we can to expedite
their process.”
Currently, there are more
products available to medical
users than to recreational
users within the store due to
state limits on the amount of
product available to transfer
from medical to recreational
inventory.
Ransom
said
Skymint is working toward
increasing
its
recreational
inventory
because
their
growing
facility
received
licensure to grow marijuana
for
recreational
use.That
product
can
be
shipped
directly to the store. However,
Ransom said the company
aims to continue to serve
both medical and recreational
users in the long run.
“I think most people, once
rec comes on, pretty much
go only rec, but we’re trying
to continue to serve med, so
eventually I see our inventory
being
split
fifty-fifty,
and
hopefully we’ll be able to
serve the same exact skews
and products to both med and
rec,” Ransom said.
The layout of the Skymint
store, with product displayed
in cases on the floor and
on the walls, is meant to
encourage new recreational
users to browse and learn
about products at their leisure,
Ransom
said.
Customers
can
find
informational
signage next to each product
explaining how they work
and what to expect. She said
that this sets the store apart
from most other dispensaries,
where product is typically
kept behind the register.
LSA
sophomore
Gabriel
Ferguson, a medical marijuana
user,
said
his
experience
was positively impacted by
interactions with staff and
recommends
Skymint
to
recreational users.
“(The staff is) very friendly,
they talked with me for like
an hour about picking out the
best stuff,” Ferguson said.
“It’s the kind of place that you
would want to chill in. It’s very
homey. I came out of there and
talked for like an hour about
the experience I had, because
it was the coolest dispensary
I’ve been in.”
Ransom said the company
has
submitted
applications
for
recreational
licensure
at all its locations within
municipalities
that
have
opted in to recreational sales.
However,
the
applications
have yet to be approved at any
location outside Ann Arbor.
Supporters
of
marijuana
legalization
point
to
recreational
availability
as
a step forward in terms of
safety and destigmatization of
marijuana use. Jeff Radway,
Green Peak Innovations CEO,
echoed this sentiment in a
news release.
“This is a historic moment
for our company, but more
importantly, it’s another step
towards destigmatizing and
legitimizing
our
industry,”
Radway
said.
“We
are
thrilled to offer patients and
recreational consumers a full
range of premium marijuana
products through a safe and
secure supply chain.”
Eighty percent of Skymint’s
inventory is grown by Green
Peak Innovations, with the
remaining
amount
sourced
from
other
businesses.
Ferguson
viewed
this
as
an attractive feature of the
dispensary.
“It’s all homegrown, so you
don’t have to worry about
what’s in it,” Ferguson said.
“It’s not a GMO weed with
who-knows-what inside … it’s
‘healthy weed.’”
Ransom believes knowing
the source of the marijuana
is a crucial factor that sets
recreational marijuana sold
in dispensaries apart from the
black market.
“This offers clean, clean
product,” Ransom said. “They
know where it’s grown, they
know how it’s been processed,
it’s all been tested, it’s safe. It’s
nothing but beneficial really.”
MARIJUANA
From Page 1
CSG
From Page 1
Read more at
MichiganDaily.com
LSA senior Yara El-Tawil,
Egyptian Students Association
representative,
shared
the
process of making bookmarks
decorated with hieroglyphics.
She said this is a part of her
culture’s history.
“Culture night is a night of a
unity of a bunch of cultures to
come together and showcase
something about themselves
that they’re really proud of,”
El-Tawil said. “It’s a night of
appreciation of everyone else.”
Murad
Ali,
a
graduate
student
at
the
University
of Texas at Dallas, said he
traveled to Ann Arbor to attend
the event.
“Paani is the reason we’re
here,” Ali said. “It’s pretty cool
to see the different cultures,
different perspectives, and the
different dresses. … So it’s cool
that they’re putting their name
out there by combining all
the cultures and introducing
themselves to all these cultures
and ethnicities.”
Himmati said she believes the
event helps attendees contest
negative media representation
of their countries and cultures.
“The reason culture night
came to be was because modern
media usually portrays a lot
of the countries that are going
to be showcased at this event
solely as victims of political
warfare,” Himmati said. “We
wanted to have a celebration
where we could showcase more
than that.”
According
to
Himmati,
Paani ultimately hopes to bring
together
different
cultural
communities toward positive
change.
“These are all so rich and
beautiful, and culture night is
supposed to be a celebration
of that cultural empowerment,
so that all the different orgs
on campus can be at a unified
front,” Himmati said. “We
can not only learn to honor
the generations of love and
pride from where we come
from, but also to take away
that victimized narrative and
highlight the diversity of all
of us.”
can be a little awkward or
confusing, you know, who’s
your boss … And while those
offices worked very closely
together,
the
analysis
was they were going to
streamline the reporting
relationship to the office.”
OIE
has
undergone
a
number
of
additional
operational
changes
in
the
past
year.
Tamiko
Strickman
became
the
director of OIE on Jan.
6
and
Elizabeth
Seney
was appointed Title IX
coordinator
over
the
summer.
This is not the first time
a University employee has
faced sexual misconduct
allegations, nor is it the
first time OIE has faced
criticism.
In October 2018, The Daily
released an investigation
into OIE’s process when a
student filed a complaint
alleging that her graduate
student instructor sexually
assaulted her. The student
told The Daily she found
the process to be protracted
and difficult for survivors
to
navigate,
requiring
months for any substantial
action to be taken.
In the middle of this
student’s OIE investigation,
the Sixth Circuit Court of
Appeals issued a ruling
mandating
that
the
University allow students
accused of sexual assault
to directly question their
accusers
through
cross-
examination.
This
ruling
has
been
widely
criticized
by
the campus and outside
community,
with
claims
that
cross-examination
retraumatizes
survivors
when they have to face
their assaulters.
In
November
2018,
The Daily published an
investigation
into
David
Daniels,
a
well-known
Music, Theatre & Dance
professor
and
opera
singer. The Daily found
that OIE knew of several
allegations of misconduct
against Daniels as early
as March 2018 — and the
University
still
awarded
him with tenure in May
2018. One of his accusers,
Andrew Lipian, claimed the
University knew Daniels
had been assaulting him
for years and ignored the
information.
Similar
to
Philbert,
Daniels
was
placed
on
paid
leave
for
months
during the investigation.
Daniels remained on paid
leave while he underwent
the subsequent trial. The
University is still in the
process of firing Daniels.
In Fall 2019, following the
Daniels case, the University
created a faculty working
group to suggest changes
to
the
tenure
bylaws
procedure
for
faculty
dismissal
and
severance
pay. In an interview with
The
Daily,
Information
professor Kentaro Toyama,
one of the faculty members
in
the
working
group,
described how their goals
include
looking
at
how
tenure affects the process.
“Our
involvement
is
basically thinking through
what the key principles
are and the values we want
to uphold in that process
are, especially with regard
to tenure,” Toyama said.
“But (we’re) also thinking
about the responsible use
of
public
resources
for
people who do end up going
through that process.”
About a month after the
publication of The Daily’s
article on Daniels, Music,
Theatre & Dance professor
Stephen
Shipps
retired
following reporting in The
Daily documenting sexual
assault allegations against
Shipps spanning 40 years.
The Daily confirmed in
its investigation that at
least one Music, Theatre &
Dance faculty member was
aware of these allegations
prior to Shipps’ time at the
University.
In April 2019, shortly
before OIE began reporting
to Philbert, The Daily spoke
to six students about their
experiences
with
OIE’s
reporting process. These
students spoke about how
they felt unsupported. One
student told The Daily that
OIE’s
process
negatively
affected
her
well-being
and her academic work as a
student.
“Honestly the school is
supposed to support the
student, (and) that is the
biggest
problem
that
is
the most heartbreaking,”
she said. “I came here for
an education and they’re
not going to give it to me,
they’re just going to make
it worse and I have to walk
out of school with a GPA
that’s not mine because of
this and the school’s the
one that’s giving me the
problems.”
In this article, The Daily
found that less than 10
percent of OIE reports are
investigated.
In 2019, OIE received 272
reports and conducted 16
investigations.
Daily News Editor Emma
Stein can be reached at
enstein@umich.edu
OIE
From Page 1
PAANI
From Page 1
Wellness 360 hosts event,
promote student wellbeing
MDining, CAPS and Rec Sports provide hourly workshops, activities
MEGHANA LODHAVIA
For the Daily
He was someone who created space
for every person in the room, and
kept his door open to all students, and
who found tremendous joy in others
learning what he loved, and being able
to see their excitement grow.