W

hen I first
a r r i v e d
to
cam-

pus as a freshman, I was
brimming with a sense
of
conflicting
excite-

ment and agitation. As
an international student
from Canada, most of my
knowledge of the Ameri-
can college experience
came from “Pitch Per-
fect” and online forums
like Reddit and College
Confidential.
While
I

was looking forward to
making friends and so-
cializing, I also carried
with me a little anxiety
about where I would fit
in. Football was never
a part of my life before
college and the thought
of living alone away from
home scared me. Luck-
ily, after a semester of
exploring Ann Arbor res-
taurants and bonding, I
found a group of people I
love and made memories
that I could cherish for a
lifetime. It seemed all of
my preoccupations dissi-
pated into worries I once
knew.

However, the class of

2024 may not be as lucky
as I was. To contain the
spread
of
COVID-19,

most University social spaces and facili-
ties were closed, drastically reducing op-
portunities for freshmen to form their
own communities. Students can no longer
meet for lunch in South Quad dining hall,
or study for classes together in the Shap-
iro Undergraduate Library. Consequently,
some parents began to petition for the
University to reopen dining halls and im-
plement further in-person instruction to
improve the University’s students’ mental
well-being. As someone who deeply sym-
pathizes with the freshmen’s situations, I
reached out to a few of these parents and
invited them to share their stories.

Nanci Bramson, the mother of an LSA

freshman, expressed her concerns to me
about the aforementioned challenges ex-
actly. She explained that the lack of COV-
ID-catered social spaces or programming
in such isolating times is problematic for
students trying to make their way.

“(The University is) not giving any op-

portunities to these 18- and 19-year-olds
to socialize, and instead they are just pe-
nalizing them,” Bramson complained.
“And the only ways they can socialize are
absolutely dangerous.”

She reprimanded the University for

not treating students as human beings
with social needs and the lack of avail-
able socially-distanced programs such as
book clubs, study groups and game nights.
Bramson pointed to another large public
university, the University of Pittsburgh,
which has established shelter pods within
residences to help students better transi-
tion into campus communities in a public
health-informed manner.

“The University is really failing them.

It’s just taking their money for nothing,”
Bramson said. “There could’ve been social
opportunities. (The University) should’ve
engaged their RAs more, help(ing) them
create relationships with the kids.”

And while Bramson acknowledges the

lack of support residential staff received
from the University in the beginning of
the school year, she also laments their
lack of involvement in freshmen’s tran-
sition. Indeed, in early September, more
than 100 residential advisers went on

strike, demanding increased COVID-19
safety measures and accessible testing. As
a result, most RAs were not able to pro-
vide students with guidance during the
time when many new students needed it
the most. According to Bramson, both of
her daughter’s two RAs quit: one within
the first week of school and one at the be-
ginning of the stay-in-place order. The ab-
sence of RAs and lack of community-wide
engagement has created another barrier
for freshmen to socialize safely.

Robert Liu, the father of another LSA

freshman, also shared the stories of his
daughter’s social difficulties. While he un-
derstands the University’s preference for
online modes of instruction, he considers
in-person interactions and public dining
spaces crucial to the college experience.
He told me that he thinks the University
is doing a satisfying job in containing the
virus, and feels hopeful about the reopen-
ing of dining halls in the future. But Liu is
afraid that since the class of 2024 are the
first generation of people born after 9/11,
these students may be more susceptible to
mental health issues.

“I was just hoping that nobody looks

down upon this freshmen class as snow-
flakes or over-sensitive people,” Liu ex-
plained. “Any mental health issue is jus-
tifiable.”

However, while parents like Bramson

believed that the administration had com-
pletely failed its students in both physical
and mental health, Neil Cadman is appre-
ciative of the University’s caution. Cad-
man, whose daughter is a freshman living
in East Quad Residence Hall, told me that
his daughter has had an amazing experi-
ence in dorms. Though Cadman’s daugh-
ter has rarely interacted with her RA, she
was able to form a small group of close
friends in her marching band via Zoom
over the summer, and maintained these
relationships throughout the semester.

“I know that there are so many kids

who are having such difficult social is-
sues, but our daughter has really accli-
mated through the band and (from) hav-
ing a roommate she really likes,” Cadman
explained. “The stars really fell into align-
ment for her.”

Cadman stated that one of the rea-

sons why he felt comfortable sending his
daughter to campus was because of Uni-
versity President Mark Schlissel’s back-
ground in immunology. Cadman had faith
in an administration that understands and
makes its decisions based on science.

“When my daughter moved to the dorm,

we essentially signed an agreement with the
University,” Cadman explained. “(Schlis-
sel’s medical background) was part of our
reasons for feeling comfortable sending her.
(The fact) that the leader of the university
was a medical doctor, and that he under-
stood that science has to run this.”

Yet he also acknowledged that perhaps

because his own daughter is doing better
mentally than the majority of freshmen,
he appreciated the University for placing
safety of the community as a first priority.
Indeed, though the University has exercised
a certain degree of caution in its fall reopen-
ing plan, bringing students back on campus
has also drastically increased the population
density in Ann Arbor. Along with the start of
the flu season and escalating student gath-
erings, test positivity rate in Washtenaw
County has surged from 1.7 percent on Aug.
28 to 4.1 percent on Nov. 5.

“The difference in going to a place like

Michigan is in those things that you can’t
measure,” Cadman stated. “I feel horrible,
but not enough to make the universities
all go back though, and put everybody at
risk!”

Since most of them view the Univer-

sity’s situation from a distance, each par-
ent shared a different perspective on the
policies. However, as a student who’s ex-
periencing a hybrid semester firsthand in
Ann Arbor, I share a mix of their concerns.
While it is certainly difficult to maintain a
good balance between mental health and
physical safety, I think the University has
failed us in both.

Ever since mid-September, I have re-

ceived 17 notifications of positive cases
in East Quad, where each notification in-
dicated one or more cases. I see students
who eat in indoor lounges without social
distancing, mainly because they have no-
where else to go. I know people who sus-
pected symptoms but did not get tested

because they did not
want to be isolated
in a facility that has
roaches and hallways
crowded by trash. Cre-
ating a safe space for
students to study and
socialize is the foun-
dation of our mental
health, and because of
the University’s vague
and
inconsiderate

policies, the admin-
istration has lost the
students’ trust since
the first month of the
semester.

But just like what

Bramson,
Cadman

and Liu believe, this
doesn’t
mean
we

should not hope for
better or make our
voices heard.

On Friday morning,

when I took a break
from monitoring the
election
and
typing

this piece, I received
an email from Schlis-
sel regarding the Uni-
versity’s winter 2021
plan. Though I appre-
ciated the University
for listening to student
concerns and enhanc-
ing safety measures,
the updated housing
terms, which included

limited residence and canceling of win-
ter contracts, caught me off guard. As a
result, I quickly followed up with the in-
terviewed parents again to see if their im-
mediate reactions changed their perspec-
tives. Liu told me that her daughter was
greatly upset by the news and concerned
about her work-study position.

“I feel for my daughter, her friends and

everybody at the (University of Michigan)
community,” he said. “I told her that the
University is trying to look after every-
body’s health, and (my daughter said that)
she cares more about her mental health.”

On the other hand, Bramson was scram-

bling to get her hands on available off-
campus housing options for the upcom-
ing semester. Cadman also expressed his
concern about the potential deterioration
of his daughter’s mental health at home.
However, he completely respects the Uni-
versity’s policies and puts his daughter’s
decision first.

“I actually feel worse for the class

of 2021, because those seniors are go-
ing through what the class of 2024 went
through in high school last year. And I
know how hard that is,” Cadman lament-
ed. “At least my daughter has maybe three
years of normal college.”

The University’s cautious winter plan

may put us back on track to return to nor-
mal for fall 2021, but parents’ concerns
of students’ exacerbated mental health
are not baseless. Just recently, a student
at Grace College in Indiana passed away
alone in her dorm room, with COVID-19
being one of the contributing factors
to her death. In the most recent winter
2021 plan, the University has merely in-
troduced two academic “well-being day”
breaks and an expansion of Counseling
and Psychological Services team to sup-
port student mental health. Though such
passive initiatives can relieve students’
stress and depressive feelings, they do not
actively address the source of these men-
tal health difficulties: isolation. While the
faster things return to normal the better
our college experience will be, the Uni-
versity must recognize the existing issues
at hand and resolve them individually.

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
statement

Parents, COVID-19
and pushing policy at
the ‘U’

BY LOLA YANG, STATEMENT CORRESPONDENT

ILLUSTRATION BY MAGGIE WIEBE

Wednesday, November 11, 2020 — 15