As students leave campus at
a rapid pace in accordance with
University of Michigan guidelines,
some are worrying about the last-
minute move-out costs as well as
services from the University they
have already paid for but will no
longer be able to use.
University Housing sent an email
on Friday announcing that students
who move out of the campus dorms
by March 25 will receive a refund
of $1,200. A petition calling on
the school to cover the costs of
“unplanned
travel
and
moving
expenses” had more than 1,700
signatures as of Wednesday night.
While the Friday email entails
how to receive the refund, the
question of refunds for student
meal plans remained unanswered.
However, Steve Mangan, senior
director of MDining, wrote in an
email to The Daily that the refund
University Housing is offering for
$1,200 includes the unlimited meal
plan.
“All students living in Campus
Housing, who have moved out and
left campus, have been offered a
$1200 refund for their Housing and
Dining plan for the Winter semester,”
Managan wrote. “Due to the variety
of options for off-campus meal plans,
refunds for students with Optional
Meal Plans are being evaluated
and we will be reaching out to each
Optional Meal Plan holder in the
near future.”
Students planning on receiving
the
University
Housing
refund
should not expect to receive an
additional refund from MDining.
The email from University Housing
states the refund will come from the
University Housing contract, which
includes a meal plan selection.
LSA freshman Ari Richardson
lived in East Quad Residence Hall,
which reported a case of COVID-
19 among one of its cooks last week.
Richardson said she was unaware
the
University
Housing
refund
included the meal plan, adding that
MDining should have given options
to students regarding their meal plan
due to the different circumstances of
student housing.
Since
summer
2019,
Porter
Hughes,
LSA
freshman
and
co-founder of Students for Bernie
at the University of Michigan, has
spent hours knocking on doors,
phone banking and offering rides
to and from local polling stations
in support of the presidential
campaign of Sen. Bernie Sanders,
I-Vt.
Hughes also helped organize
Sanders’s rally in Ann Arbor in
March. The event featured the
senator and U.S. Rep. Alexandria
Ocasio-Cortez, D-NY.
“I’ve been working on the
campaign since August, but I
started my training over the
summer in July,” Hughes said.
“Students for Bernie at UMich
was started in September and has
been working for the campaign
since then as well. We worked
to promote Bernie on campus by
holding events such as canvasses,
phone banks and the rally with
Bernie and AOC.”
Other
campus
organizations
supporting
political
campaigns
— whether in support of national,
state or local politicians — have also
put in effort in trying to get their
candidates elected by connecting
to voters face-to-face.
But now traditional methods of
campaign mobilization have been
either upended or called off due to
the recent outbreaks of COVID-19,
a pandemic sweeping the U.S. and
the rest of the world.
In the U.S., the number of
individuals testing positive for
COVID-19 has risen to more than
59,000 cases and more than 300
deaths as of Wednesday, making
the U.S. third highest in number
of confirmed cases, as of Sunday.
More than 158 million Americans
are
now
mandated
by
state
governments to stay at home in
an effort to slow the spread of the
disease.
In Michigan, the number of
cases has spiked to more than 2,000
across the state as of Wednesday.
michigandaily.com
Ann Arbor, Michigan
Thursday, March 26, 2020
ONE HUNDRED AND TWENTY-NINE YEARS OF EDITORIAL FREEDOM
Political campaigns adapt to coronavirus:
‘It’s a completely different kind of strategy’
DESIGN BY CAITLIN MARTENS
JASMIN LEE
Daily Staff Reporter
See CAMPAIGNS, Page 3
GOT A NEWS TIP?
Call 734-418-4115 or e-mail
news@michigandaily.com and let us know.
INDEX
Vol. CXXIX, No. 92
©2020 The Michigan Daily
N E W S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
O P I N I O N . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
A R T S . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
michigandaily.com
For more stories and coverage, visit
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GOVERNMENT
Political activist Dr. Abdul
El-Sayed said the outbreak
of coronavirus proves the
need for Medicare for All
in an online Ford School of
Public Policy discussion on
Wednesday.
Health care — particularly
Medicare for All and how
to pay for it — has been a
major issue throughout the
Democratic
presidential
primary.
Activist talks Medicare
for All via BlueJeans
KARA WARNKE
For The Daily
El-Sayed
discusses
health care
‘U’ refund includes some meal plans, not all
MDining still considering reimbursement for certain options, leaving students confused
JULIA FORREST
Daily Staff Reporter
DESIGN BY JONATHAN WALSH
See MDINING, Page 3
Student organizers
adjust voter outreach
methods in response to
COVID-19 outbreak
See POLICY, Page 2