“I would hope that they would realize that they have not 
been transparent,” Yeager said. “They have not considered 
anyone they say that they’re considering in these plans and 
… I would like to see (the University) reassess their insistence 
that everyone be in person because saying everything’s in 
person when we’re all (individually) switching to remote is 
just ridiculous.”
At the start of the Fall 2020 semester, GEO went on strike 
for two weeks in response to the University’s reopening 
plans amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Yeager later told The 
Daily in an email that the organization’s members do not 
plan to go on strike right now and would rather continue 
teaching, but in a safer manner.
“Graduate students come to this university in part 
because we want to teach, which is what we’re currently 
doing right now, even if we’re doing so virtually,” Yaeger 

wrote. “So GEO’s current focus is not a job action, but 
supporting graduate students who are teaching, no matter 
what modality they choose.”
Yeager said in order for GEO to go on strike, a majority of 
members currently employed by the University as Graduate 
Student Instructors or Graduate Student Staff Assistants 
would need to vote to do so. 
LSA junior Annie Mintun, speaker of the Central Student 
Government assembly, said at the press conference that 
she sees the e-pivot as an opportunity for students to have 
access to learning during an uncertain semester. Mintun, 
who is currently quarantining due to a COVID-19 exposure, 
said the e-pivot would be one of the only ways she could 
participate in her classes. 
“The only confidence I had that I would actually be able 
to actually participate this (week) was when I heard that 
instructors were coming together to provide online options 
for students like me who are in quarantine,” Mintun said. “I 
hope that the University will not punish these instructors 
who are taking it upon themselves to try and protect their 

students.” 
Valle said while there have been no documented cases of 
retaliation against faculty members who decided to e-pivot, 
there have been emails from faculty discouraging remote 
instruction. Valle also said if COVID-19 conditions continue 
to deteriorate, there is potential for the e-pivot to extend 
beyond two weeks. 
“The decision to make this a two week e-pivot was made 
democratically, rising out of faculty concern,” Valle said. “If 
we are in largely a similar situation two weeks from now, 
I imagine similar democratic processes might extend the 
e-pivot.” 
University President Mark Schlissel and University 
Provost Susan Collins also sent an email to the U-M 
community Monday — two days before the start of the 
semester — reiterating the University’s commitment to an 
in-person start on Jan. 5 and reminding students to continue 
masking indoors and self-report the mandated COVID-19 
booster shots. 
“We expect these first few weeks of the semester to be 

challenging and ask everyone to care for yourselves and for 
one another by staying safe and practicing kindness during 
what will be a stressful time for many,” Schlissel and Collins 
wrote. “Cases are very likely to increase, regardless of 
decisions we make about in-person work or classes.”
In reference to Schlissel and Collins’ email, Silke-Maria 
Weineck, professor of comparative literature and German 
studies, told The Daily that the two narratives of taking care 
of each other while also teaching in person do not seem to 
coincide, and many faculty members will choose to prioritize 
their health and safety over in-person classes.
“We got an email from Schlissel (on Wednesday) that 
said, ‘please be kind to each other, support each other, do 
what’s good for you, but also teach in person,” Weineck 
said. “It seems these two directives are incompatible. And I 
think many of us will choose to take the second part of the 

The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
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4 — Wednesday, January 12, 2022 

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From Page 1

Wellman also expressed his commitment 
to the faculty mentorship process. 
“But it’s also important to realize we do 
not discard people the first time they make 
mistakes, but rather we attempt to correct the 
problems,” Wellman continued. “In this case, 
the system we put in place to mentor a new 
faculty member to address identified concerns 
worked.”
In an email on June 24, 2021, a Georgia 
Tech faculty member stressed the importance 
of getting Genkin to sign Georgia Tech’s offer 
letter for a tenure-track faculty position.
“Michigan is also trying to make things 
better for him and we should not give them 
unlimited time to work on him to stay,” the 
faculty member wrote to DeMillo. 
On August 9, 2021, Genkin wrote in an 
email to a Georgia Tech administrator that he 
was “being pushed to resign UM” and that he 
“had his lab packed up.” 
Genkin’s email in which he said that he was 
“being pushed to resign.”
Wellman said that he did not push Genkin 
to resign. 
“As I said, we made clear to him that he 
needed to correct the problematic behavior,” 
Wellman said. “We provided advice and 
mentoring about how to improve as a research 
advisor, including how to eliminate all the 
problematic behavior, how to reduce the stress 
that he was perceived as imposing on students. 
And we also introduced vigilant monitoring of 
his lab and paid attention to the well-being of 
students.”
Angel Rodriguez was an undergraduate 
researcher in a cybersecurity lab when 
Genkin joined UMich in 2018. According to 
Rodriguez, Genkin was intriguing: young and 
eccentric with a flashy research history. 
“He basically disrupted the whole security 
field,” Rodriguez said in an interview with 
The Daily. 
A few months after arriving at UMich, 
Genkin allegedly approached Rodriguez 
about working for him in exchange for a spot 
in the PhD program. 
“I knew that I had a harder chance of 
getting into the PhD program because I didn’t 
have the grades for it,” Rodriguez said. “He 
told me that he could basically guarantee that 
I’d get in.”
Rodriguez said he was enthusiastic about 
his “trial run” working for Genkin during the 
summer of 2019. But by the end of the summer, 
Rodriguez had reported Genkin to OIE twice. 
Genkin’s alleged bullying began with 
inappropriate comments. Rodriguez said he 
witnessed Genkin insult the speaking skills 
of non-native English speakers. Genkin 
allegedly called Rodriguez, an African 
American man, a “monkey” and allegedly 
made frequent comments about his weight. 
Once, Rodriguez said he watched Genkin 
keep a student feeling ill in the lab until 
the student started crying. In an interview 
with The Daily, Rodriguez said he filed his 
complaint with OIE because of this alleged 
incident. 
“I think that was the straw that really 
pushed me to report,” Rodriguez said to The 
Daily. “ (The student) really was afraid of 
leaving early because if (Genkin) saw … he 

would go into the office and then criticize 
(them) and belittle (them).”
On July 20, 2019, Rodriguez sent an 
anonymous email to OIE, a copy of which 
was obtained by The Daily. He asked about 
protections of students who report about the 
behavior of professors. 
“I have witnessed concerning actions from 
a faculty members that have made myself and 
others uncomfortable,” Rodriguez wrote. 
“Myself and others have refrained from 
reporting them because of the risks imposed 
on the students and faculty working directly 
or indirectly under them.”
Rodriguez’s anonymous email to then-OIE.
Elizabeth Seney, then-Senior Associate 
Director of then-OIE & Interim Title IX 
Coordinator, wrote back that the University’s 
policy “prohibits retaliation against an 
individual for reporting or otherwise sharing 
information about concerns of discrimination, 
including discriminatory harassment, on 
the basis of any protected class identified in 
the University’s Nondiscrimination Policy 
Notice.” 
Seney’s reply to Rodriguez’s anonymous 
email.
Nine days after that, Rodriguez responded 
with a detailed anonymous complaint about 
Genkin’s alleged behavior. 
“Daniel will frequently insult, belittle, and 
generally not be conscious of the negative 
effects his words and actions have on the 
feelings of wellbeing, safety, and respect, of 
his peers and underlings,” Rodriguez wrote to 
Seney. “I respect his work, but I do not respect 
the hostile work environment he has created.”
Seney replied, thanking him and writing 
that OIE would address the concerns which 
fall within OIE’s scope. 
Filing the anonymous complaint did 
not seem to improve Rodriguez’s working 
conditions, Rodriguez said. Genkin persisted 
in making “unreasonable” demands on 
Rodriguez’s work hours and research output, 
Rodriguez told The Daily. On August 12, 2019, 
Genkin questioned the 80 hours Rodriguez 
reported working over a two-week period in a 
message on Slack reviewed by The Daily. 

Later that week, Rodriguez said he went 
to Genkin’s office to ask him to approve his 
timecard. Rodriguez said that Genkin showed 
him what he claimed to be an unapproved 
lock on his door. Rodriguez said he cautioned 
Genkin against doing things he shouldn’t be. 
“If you tell anyone about it, I’ll get in trouble, 
and I’ll hang you,” Genkin allegedly replied, 
according to the second OIE complaint 
Rodriguez later filed.
“I look back on it now and I still feel like I 
under-reacted to a lot because of how much I 
had on my plate at the time,” Rodriguez told 
The Daily.
On Nov. 4, 2019, Rodriguez sent a message 
to graduate students about a new concern: 
Genkin was allegedly encouraging colleagues 
to falsify data before a fast-approaching 
academic paper deadline. Copies of this chat 
were obtained by The Daily.
With Rodriguez’s approval, Bernhard 
wrote to Noble about this pressure to falsify 
data. Three other graduate students, four 
faculty members and one administrator were 
cc’d on this email, obtained by The Daily. 
Rodriguez responded in the email chain 
that Genkin often pressured others to bend 

the rules. He wrote of the “numerous times” 
Genkin pressured him and his colleagues to 
circumvent “the safety committee … to cut 
costs and save time.” 
On Dec. 10, 2019, Rodriguez replied to the 
previously anonymous complaint to Seney 
by claiming it as his own. He included new 
allegations against Genkin in his reply. 
Rodriguez’s email to Seney in which 
he identified himself as the author of the 
anonymous OIE complaint.
“I kept feeling a deep fear that I was 
burning bridges I may need during or after 
my undergraduate career,” Rodriguez wrote 
in his email to Seney. “The news of this report 
reached Daniel, and I strongly believe he 
knows it was me. I fear for retaliation.”
Five days later, on Dec. 15, Rodriguez 
decided not to apply to the PhD program. 
Five days after that, on Dec. 20, Genkin 
submitted an application to a tenure-track 
faculty position in Georgia Tech’s School of 
Cybersecurity and Privacy. 
By April 2019, Bernhard was becoming 
wary of Genkin’s alleged behavior in the 
student office space he shared with Genkin’s 
advisees. He met with then-CSE chair Brian 
Noble to discuss this on April 19, 2019.
“The first meeting, I felt good,” Bernhard 
said in an interview with The Daily. “I sort of 
laid out…my concerns about the department 
were not just Daniel-based. It felt good to have 
someone who seemed at the time like they 
were listening.”
After that meeting, Genkin allegedly 
followed Bernhard out to his car to find out 
what information had been shared with Noble. 
“I couldn’t tell at the time if it was just total 
lack of awareness of social norms or … like, ‘I’m 
going to physically intimidate you and follow 
you around until you tell me what you’ve been 
telling other people’,” Bernhard said. 
Bernhard later initiated email chains, 
obtained by The Daily, with multiple graduate 
students and faculty members to discuss 
concerns about Genkin in Sep. 2019. 
One of Bernhard’s emails regarding his 
concerns about Genkin’s alleged behavior.
Genkin’s 
alleged 
conduct 
severely 
disrupted the graduate student workplace, 
according to Bernhard’s email chains. In 
one instance, he allegedly used the shared 
graduate student office to drill into his Segway 
battery, filling the space with noxious fumes, 
Bernhard wrote in the emails. 
In another instance, Bernhard wrote in 
the emails that he witnessed Genkin yell at 
a graduate student until they cried. When 
Bernhard spoke with Genkin about this, 
Genkin allegedly replied that, “I can either go 
in there and scream at (the student) until (they 
cry) and then (they’ll) do the thing, or I can just 
do it myself.” (Italics in original text)
In the same conversation, Bernhard wrote 
in the emails that Genkin allegedly said, “The 
only thing that gets professors fired is sexual 
impropriety and academic dishonesty.”
In early Sept. 2019, Bernhard heard rumors 
of Rodriguez’s OIE complaint.
“He’s been asking people if they want to go 
hunting for rats, apparently,” Bernhard wrote 
in a message to a peer obtained by The Daily. 
Over the next four months, Bernhard 
repeatedly met with Noble and other CSE 
faculty. Bernhard said that they consistently 
declined to take substantive action to address 
student concerns.

In one specific instance, Noble responded 
to Bernhard’s email to ask if any of Genkin’s 
behavior could be proven with something in 
writing.
Noble’s response asking if anything was in 
writing.
“The most common response from (Noble) 
was that his hands were tied,” Bernhard told 
The Daily. “Legally, (he) couldn’t do anything. 
There was nothing he could do to stop 
(Genkin) from abusing us. It’s just the system. 
It’s not really his fault, which was the one that 
really got to me.”
Bernhard recalled to The Daily that Noble 
established rules in one of these meetings that 
Genkin would have to follow going forward. 
One of these rules was that Genkin could not 
enter the shared graduate student office space.
After Genkin allegedly continued to enter 
the graduate student office space, Bernhard 
wrote to Noble. Noble responded via email to 
say that he had not yet spoken to Genkin. 
After months of meetings but little 
improvement in Genkin’s behavior, Bernhard 
told The Daily he and other graduate students 
had lost confidence in the department’s ability 
to address Genkin’s alleged bullying. 
“By this point, we were pretty upset that 
not only have we had to go through these 
fairly traumatizing experiences, but also 
that nothing was done,” Bernhard said. “The 
University as a whole didn’t seem to care.” 
Nevertheless, Rodriguez and Bernhard 
continued to make administrators aware 
of Genkin’s alleged conduct. In Feb. 2020, 
Rodriguez had individual meetings with 
Noble and Alec Gallimore, Dean of the College 
of Engineering. 
Rodriguez followed up with an email to 
Gallimore listing his recommendations to 
improve reporting to OIE. 
“Thank you for coming in and for this 
message,” Gallimore wrote in an email reply. 
“I’m also sorry. The behavior you describe has 
no place at Michigan.”
In March 2020, Bernhard forwarded then-
chair Peter Chen the previous emails between 
him, Noble, other faculty members and other 
graduate students regarding Genkin. Chen 
replied that he was “trying to get up to speed 
on this situation as fast as I can.”
In a video chat later that month, Bernhard 
said that Chen acknowledged he wasn’t sure if 
he could do anything to help the situation with 
Genkin. 
“He seemed receptive,” Bernhard said. “It 
was obvious he was in fact finding mode. I felt 
really good after my one conversation with 
(Chen). And then nothing happened as per 
usual.”
Even prior to his time at UMich, Genkin 
faced allegations of bullying.
In 2017, Genkin worked in UPenn’s 
Cryptography and Information Security 
department as a postdoctoral researcher. 
According to emails sent by a student in 
the department between Jan. 2017 and 
Sept. 2017 and obtained by The Daily, 
Genkin was allegedly “passive-aggressive,” 
“manipulative,” “disruptive,” “toxic” and an 
“intellectual bully.”
The 
UPenn 
Office 
of 
University 
Communications did not respond to repeated 
requests for comment by The Daily. Current 
CSE chair Wellman denied knowing about 
these allegations during Genkin’s hiring.
“I had heard about (the UPenn emails) 

recently that some students were saying that 
there were these known allegations, but we 
never received those and I can tell you as 
someone involved in the hiring, there was 
nothing in the record about that,” Wellman 
said in an interview with The Daily.
The term “academic bullying” has been 
increasingly applied to conduct in higher 
education institutions in recent years. 
Researchers say that bullying thrives in 
research settings. 
In 2019, the Max Planck Society in 
Germany conducted a survey of workplace 
harassment of over 9,000 employees, 17.5% of 
whom said they had experienced bullying in a 
period longer than 12 months. Also in 2019, the 
science journal Nature reported that roughly 
20% of the 6,000 PhD students surveyed said 
they experienced bullying. Of those, 57% said 
they felt “unable to discuss their situation 
without fear of personal repercussions.”
In an interview with The Daily, Wellman 
said that Genkin’s alleged behavior had 
changed.
“We did not receive any reports of incidents 
or problematic behavior of this sort after 2019,” 
Wellman said. 
Bernhard told The Daily he believes that 
the remote research requirements of the 
pandemic prevented Genkin from engaging in 
further alleged bullying.
“We were all remote so it’s not like (Genkin) 
could have done the things he was doing,” 
Bernhard said. “It’s hard to say, was it even 
really a problem anymore?”
Bernhard and Rodriguez both graduated 
from U-M CSE with their respective degrees 
in the spring 2020. 
Nov. 17, 2021, Rodriguez requested a copy 
of OIE’s investigative report regarding his 
complaints, according to details obtained by 
The Daily. Rodriguez was told via email that it 
would take up to 45 days for him to receive this 
report. He has not yet received a reply.
Though Bernhard contacted Georgia 
Tech administrators July 6, 2021, Genkin had 
received his first offer letter in May. Genkin 
signed a second offer letter on June 26. 

Wellman confirmed that he spoke with 
DeMillo, the Georgia Tech interim chair, on 
July 13, 2021, as indicated in emails obtained 
by The Daily. 
“So I had a phone call with the chair of 
the department that hired him, and I guess 
what I’ll say is that we did not withhold 
any information about his situation or his 
performance at Michigan,” Wellman said. “I 
answered any questions that he had.”
Georgia Tech completed a background 
check on Genkin on May 24, 2021. The 
background check, reviewed by The Daily, 
included a standard screening of any history 
of criminal, credit, driving or substance abuse. 
Records of Georgia Tech’s background 
check as obtained by The Daily.
In response to continued concerns over his 
previous alleged behavior, Genkin wrote to 
The Daily that his current students are happy 
with his mentorship style. 
“The allegations raised are in stark contrast 
to positive feedback from students that are 
currently in my research lab,” Genkin wrote. 

DAILY

From Page 1

LSA junior Kristina Wendling – who lives off-campus 
in a 10-person house – tested positive for COVID-19 on 
Tuesday, the day before classes resumed. Wendling has 
been quarantined in her room since she has been unable 
to utilize University-provided accommodations and is 
unable to return to her permanent residence, creating an 
uncomfortable living situation with her nine roommates. 
“Usually I’ll check everyone’s class schedules and see 
when the least amount of people are around and that’s 
when I’ll plan when I’m going to go make food or when I’m 
going to take a shower, things like that,” Wendling said. 
Wendling said her roommates all attend in-person 
classes and while none have tested positive for COVID-
19 yet, she’s concerned about putting her roommates and 
other students at risk. 
“I just wish I could have gotten better help with the 
isolation housing because I’m just in a weird little bedroom 
here and I still share common spaces,” Wendling said. “So 
I’m just nervous.”
LSA senior Bella Karduck lives in an off-campus 
residence where she shares a room and multiple common 
areas with other students. After first testing positive for 
COVID-19 in December 2021, Karduck stayed in Q&I 
housing. 
When Karduck tested positive with new symptoms 
on Jan. 3, she was denied University-provided 
accommodations and was told to reach out to the Dean 
of Students Office, which encouraged her to stay in her 

apartment. 
“The response I got from The Dean of Students Office 
was ‘Omicron is mild and highly-transmissible. So you can 
clean and try the best you can so your roommates don’t get 
sick,’” Karduck said. “So I posted in the Facebook pages 
looking for a place to stay kind of out of desperation so I 
didn’t have to drive home.”
Karduck said she wishes the University offered more 
options for off-campus students who test positive for 
COVID-19 and can’t relocate to their permanent residence 
or isolate in their off-campus residences.
Resident Advisors also discussed students living in 
residence halls who struggled to obtain access to Q&I 
housing after testing positive for COVID-19, according to 
messages obtained by The Daily.
“A resident of mine came to me telling me that their 
roommate tested positive and when UHS finally got back 
to them, they told her that they had around a 300 call 
backlog and that Q&I housing is at capacity,” one message 
read. 
Another message said Hall Directors had been directed 
to inform Resident Advisors to refrain from speaking to 
the media, particularly regarding housing-related issues. A 
Resident Advisor in another residence hall confirmed the 
information in a subsequent message. 
A Resident Advisor who agreed to speak with The Daily 
on the condition of anonymity for fear of professional 
retaliation said the increase of COVID-19 cases in residence 
halls has made it difficult to continue with day-to-day RA 
duties. The Resident Advisor will be referred to as Charlie.
“It has kind of made me scared to go on duty,” Charlie 
said. “Specifically, just going to the bathroom because 

certain residents who have community bathrooms that 
have tested positive have not been taken to quarantine 
right away. One resident in particular has been (taken to 
quarantine) but it took more than 24 hours. A positive test 
was reported yesterday around 10 a.m., and they just got 
taken today at around 1 p.m.”
Charlie said their residents have elected to self-isolate 
when in close contact with a COVID-positive student 
despite University guidelines which do not require students 
with a COVID-19 booster shot who are asymptomatic to 
quarantine.
“I think that students are probably going to be suffering 
because they’re trying to be more responsible than the 
University is,” Charlie said. 
Addressing circulating rumors of limited Q&I housing, 
University spokesperson Rick Fitzgerald wrote in an email 
to The Daily about the current situation of Q&I housing.
“Q&I housing is not full,” Fitzgerald said. “Today we 
are at about 12 percent of a total capacity of more than 
400 beds. And the university is working to increase that 
overall capacity. There are delays in responding to students 
who have tested positive, but on-campus students will be 
relocated to Q&I housing as soon as possible.”
The 12% referred to Thursday morning’s update. As of 
Friday, that number was revised to 35%.
Xu also said the safety policies in the dorm were loosely 
enforced, making him feel uncomfortable. Prior to the 
winter 2022 semester, students were not required to 
wear face masks in their own residence halls, including in 
common areas. In December, the policy shifted, requiring 
all students in residence halls to wear face masks through 
at least Jan. 17, regardless of vaccination status. 

“In classes, I feel very safe because everybody wears 
masks,” Xu said. “I feel less safe in the campus housing 
because people are just not wearing masks when they 
should.”
Xu said because his roommate — who has not tested 
positive for COVID-19 — and himself are both unable to 
find alternative housing, they must coexist in their dorm 
room while wearing masks at all times except for sleeping. 
During a RHA meeting on Thursday, members 
expressed concerns regarding COVID-19 positive students 
remaining in the dorms for extended periods of time after 
receiving a positive test result.
Members of the student body have also taken to social 
media to share their difficulties with being transferred 
to Q&I housing. Some students have said their MCards 
were frozen, denying them access to dining halls. Others 
have said that Q&I housing had forgotten to prepare meals 
for students in their residency. Broekhuizen denied both 
rumors of COVID-positive students’ MCards being frozen 
and that Q&I housing is forgetting to prepare meals for 
students. 
LSA 
junior 
Isabel 
Rodriguez 
critiqued 
the 
administration’s approach to the Winter 2022 semester and 
said that it didn’t account for the stress it put on students.
 “(They’re) just kind of saying, well, like ‘You guys can 
handle it. You’re young. You won’t get sick from it because 
you’re vaccinated’, which isn’t necessarily true,” Rodriguez 
said. 

‘I FEEL DISRESPECTED
From Page 1

Read more at 
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