The
University
of
Michigan
Board of Regents voted last month
to extend Winter Break for the
2023-2024 academic year by one
week to promote student and staff
mental health. Since the University
announced
the
change
to
the
academic calendar, students and staff
alike have expressed their support of
the policy.
In accordance with the new policy,
the winter 2024 term will begin on
Jan. 10 and final examinations will
start on Apr. 25 and end on May 2.
Commencement activities will move
from the end of April to May 3-5.
In a University Record article,
University Provost Laurie McCauley
said the idea to lengthen Winter
Break came as a result of suggestions
from U-M community members.
“The feedback we’ve heard from
students, faculty and staff around
well-being gave us pause and led us
to wonder if there was more we could
do with the academic calendar to
address these concerns,” McCauley
said.
In
an
interview
with
The
Michigan Daily, Dr. Robert Ernst,
chief health officer and executive
director
of
University
Health
Services, said he was indirectly
involved with the process to extend
the break between semesters. Ernst
serves on the Well-Being Collective,
an organization of administrative
groups seeking to improve the well-
being and mental health of students
on campus. Ernst said a working
group within the Collective that
focuses on examining University
policies helped suggest the extended
Winter Break to administration.
“I thought (it) was really great
that the executive leadership and
the academic affairs partners, who
have been really strong in this Well-
being Collective work, reconsidered
the policy and decided to make a
move,” he said. “(The policy) will
really reduce the stress for many as
(students and faculty are) trying (to)
restart for the winter semester next
year.”
LSA senior Noah Zimmerman,
Central
Student
Government
president,
told
The
Daily
that
he, alongside LSA senior Jackie
Hillman,
CSG
Vice
President,
advocated for a longer Winter Break
to support student mental health in
meetings with U-M administration.
Zimmerman said he and Hillman
are in full support of the change
to lengthen the break between
semesters.
“This has really been something
that (CSG has) talked about with
the provost and especially with
(former University President Mary
Sue Coleman) right before she left,”
Zimmerman said. “I think it really
gives students the opportunity to
relax more (and) get prepared.”
Zimmerman said he had heard
positive support for the suggestion to
lengthen Winter Break from mental
health focused student organizations.
Because the announcement for the
new policy came just before Spring
Break, Zimmerman said he has
not not yet received direct student
feedback about the new change.
According to Zimmerman, CSG
officers regularly meet with student
organizations which focus on mental
health to discuss how to support
students on campus and collaborate
on ideas for how to address mental
health
concerns.
Among
these
student groups is Wolverine Support
Network, a club dedicated to mental
health advocacy and facilitating free
peer-to-peer support groups.
LSA senior Izzy Steinberg serves
as WSN’s executive director and as a
member of the Well-being Collective.
Steinberg spoke with The Daily about
the positive community response for
extending Winter Break,
“(Extending Winter Break is)
something that felt like it didn’t even
need to be said,” Steinberg said. “It
was just a change that I think lots of
students on campus want.”
Though Steinberg will graduate
this year, she highlighted how
the change will be beneficial for
returning and incoming students.
“I can imagine that having like an
extra week with my family and my
friends at home would just be really
nice to do things that are positive
for my mental health and well-being
like spending time with loved ones,”
Steinberg said.
On Monday, the Department of
Student Life announced that the
University will now provide six free
mental health counseling sessions to
students every year they are enrolled.
The new program is a part of the
University’s partnership with Uwill,
a teletherapy service connected with
mental health care providers across
the country.
Anthropology
lecturer
Leigh
Stuckey also spoke with The Daily
about her support for the academic
calendar change. As a parent of
two kids who attend public school
and preschool school in Ann Arbor,
Stuckey said returning to work at
the University after Winter Break a
week before her children go back to
school presented many difficulties.
Stuckey said she is looking forward to
the extended break so she can evade
these difficulties.
“Starting off the semester with
a full week when I don’t have
childcare for my children, but need
to be not only preparing for my
classes, but teaching them has been
a really challenging thing over the
past few years,” Stuckey said. “I’m
really excited to see that change
particularly to accommodate the
really difficult work-life balance of
being a parent and being a faculty
member.”
Rackham student Sangita Saha,
an international student from India,
told The Daily she agrees with
Stuckey that making Winter Break
longer will allow students and staff to
spend more time with their families.
Because Winter Break was previously
only two weeks, Saha said she had not
considered traveling home to India.
“With starting at least a week later
there is an opportunity to consider
going back home to family, which
is important for me, so important
in making sure that I’m in the right
frame of mind to work energized and
my mental health is okay,” Saha said.
Around 50 participants virtually
joined The Center for Racial Justice’s
virtual workshop to learn from
multidisciplinary artist Holly Bass
Thursday afternoon. The discussion
was part of the Racial Practice in
Workshop series called “Activating
joy with Holly Bass: Creative
practices for authentic community
building”. Bass led attendees over
zoom in an interactive discussion
through artistic activities to spark
conversations on the intersection
between activism and joy.
Dominique
Adams-Santos,
a
senior research fellow and lecturer
at the Ford School of Public Policy,
opened the event by explaining how
public policy can be used to advance
racial equity within organizations
and communities.
“We recognize the power of
public policy to bolster or undercut
our life opportunities and we see
policy analysis as a critical tool
for us to measure, reflect, and
historically examine and help us
define the way forward,” Adams-
Santos said.
Bass
then
spoke
on
the
workshop’s mission, emphasizing
the importance of enjoying and
finding joy in activism and policy
work.
“We can start infusing joyful
practices into the work we do now,
whether we’re students, whether
we are in the workplace,” Bass said.
“That’s kind of the mission and
intent of today’s session,” Bass said.
Bass started her activities by
asking the audience to “flood”
the chat of the Zoom call with
descriptions of things that brought
them joy in the past five days.
The attendees wrote a range of
responses, from nice conversations
with co-workers to seeing the
sunshine. Audience members were
then asked to act out their response
with a small on screen gesture.
Bass then prompted the audience
members to create a dance with their
gestures, resulting in movements
like hugging an imaginary cat and
stretching.
For the second activity, Bass
asked audience members to discuss
and define a list of words and
phrases,
including
“activism”,
“organizing”
and
“culture-shift
work”. Bass defined “culture-shift
work” as the work of expanding
interconnectedness
over
time
between
different
individuals
and defined activism as a public-
oriented and highly visible activity.
“(When) you think about protests
and marches, (activism) brings
awareness of an issue to a larger
public and galvanizes support,”
Bass said. “It draws the media and
public attention.”
After learning about each word,
Bass asked attendees to draw their
own versions of each phrase or
word on a piece of paper and share
what they came up with. Bass then
divided the audience members
into small groups to create poems
describing the phrases through the
five senses. The words and phrases
discussed included “joy”, “justice”,
“culture
shift”
and
“a
better
world”. One group wrote about joy,
describing it as feeling like warm
sunshine on skin.
In
an
interview
with
The
Michigan Daily after the event,
Rackham student Kayla Guillory,
who currently studies integrative
design and public policy, said
she enjoyed how the event was
structured as a workshop and
involved artistic approaches to the
subject.
“Getting to attend some more
workshop-feeling events is nice,”
Guillory said. “I like to absorb
information and think about trying
to translate things in my own
practice of policy and design.”
Guillory
also
expressed
appreciation for Bass’s perspective
as an artist and how joy can be
integrated into policy and activism
work.
“We don’t often associate (policy
work and activism) with maybe
the idea of joy, or at least I don’t,”
Guillory said. “So thinking about
how that can be integrated is both
a new and exciting notion … and
something that hopefully changes
the way that the work is sometimes
framed.”
The University of Michigan held
a symposium as part of University
President Santa Ono’s inauguration
ceremony
Tuesday
morning.
The
Inauguration
Symposium
was preceded by a student poster
session, two keynote speakers and
discussions with a faculty panel.
The symposium opened with a
poster session featuring student
projects on either of the symposium
topics, including “intersection of
race and the identity of U-M” and
“fighting climate change.” A panel
of judges evaluated the posters at the
symposium and awarded at least five
from each topic with up to $5,000 to
fund the student’s projects.
U-M Flint sophomore Alexandra
Barto
and
freshman
Marwa
Hammami traveled to Ann Arbor
for the symposium to present their
poster “A walk through history,” an
original walkthrough experience
that would highlight diversity on
campus. The pair told The Michigan
Daily they wanted to attend the
session to increase recognition for
the U-M Flint campus.
“The University of Michigan-Flint
(campus) is very underestimated,”
Hammami said. “Each campus is rich
with its history and how it started.”
LSA
senior
Thea
Bultman
attended
the
poster
session
representing
Wolverine
Support
Network, a student-run organization
centered on student mental health.
WSN’s poster proposed a forum
where
non-traditional
students
can voice their opinions on campus
mental
health
resources.
The
University
announced
plans
to
expand
student
mental
health
resources through Uwill an outside
mental health service on Monday.
Bultman told The Daily she sees this
announcement as a good step for the
University to take.
“I think it’s really great that they’re
leaning into (Uwill),” Bultman said.
“(We want to) make sure that with
CAPS’s capacity, students can still
get the support they need.”
Rackham
students
Katherine
Geraghty
and
Diana
Martinez
presented their plan for reclaiming
land on the Inglewood oil field in
Los Angeles, which was created as
a part of a project for the School of
Environment
and
Sustainability.
Martinez told The Daily the pair
chose to bring the project to the
postering session due to its range of
applications.
“This project will be an initiative
that will serve not only (Los
Angeles),” Martinez said. “It would
be more of a broad thing. With the
guidelines we’re developing, it can be
applied anywhere.”
Rackham
student
Henry
Valachovic
attended
the
poster
session
as
a
representative
of
Michigan Marine Energy, a new
organization
focused
on
wave
energy, and presented plans for a
wave energy solution in Alaska.
Valachovic told The Daily he wants
to promote the use of wave energy
as an alternative to fossil fuels in
Alaska.
“Over half of all wave energy
potential in the U.S. is in the southern
coast of Alaska,” Valachovic said.
“Right now, (Alaska) relies pretty
much solely on diesel energy, one of
the highest carbon types of energy.”
U-M alum Frank H. Wu, president
of Queens College in New York, was
the event’s first keynote speaker and
gave a talk titled “The University
and its Community: Past, Present
and Future.” While discussing the
University’s past, Wu spoke about
the impact that white flight, the
migration of the white middle class
to the suburbs, had on the city of
Detroit, which had allowed blue-
collar automotive workers to retire
with a pension only prior to the
migration.
“Suburban sprawl soon crossed
8 Mile Road and that network of
interstate highways enabled families
to empty out neighborhoods even
as those highways divided some
neighborhoods,” Wu said. “There
(was) hope again, though, that
the artisans and farmers (would
return) and even the rebuilding
of the magnificent train station
downtown.”
The first panel was moderated by
Corie Pauling, president and CEO
of the U-M Alumni Association.
While discussing the future of the
University, Pauling spoke on the
incoming
Generation
Alpha,
or
children born after 2010.
“(Generation Alpha) is used to a
world of extremes, whether we’re
talking about weather, whether we’re
talking about the extreme prevalence
of school shootings,” Pauling said.
“They are used to education without
books. They learn from screens. And
lastly, they are completely dedicated
to saving the planet.”
The second keynote speaker was
Janet Napolitano, former secretary
of Homeland Security. Her session,
titled “Working Together to Tackle
the Climate Crisis,” focused on the
steps universities can take to combat
climate change. When Napolitano
was president of the University of
California, she introduced a plan
for the university to obtain a carbon
neutrality plan for 2025.
“As
we’ve
now
discovered,
however, achieving true carbon
neutrality is virtually impossible
without purchasing carbon offsets
and carbon offsets themselves are
nearly
impossible
to
measure,”
Napolitano said. “So we need to be
real about this.”
Napolitano also spoke on the
importance
of
universities
in
combating climate change due to
their ability to make rapid changes as
large institutions.
“Universities
can
take
risks
in ways small businesses can’t,”
Napolitano said. “(The students)
want to say ‘I’m going to try this new
mode of operation.’”
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
News
Presidential inauguration hosts symposium on DEI, climate change
ADMINISTRATION
UMich campus expresses support for extended winter break
Artist Holly Bass hosts leads workshop on activism and joy
The University hosted keynote speakers and student organizations during the Inauguration Symposium
U-M community members discuss benefits of the University’s decision to extend
Winter Break for the 2023-2024 academic year
The Center for Racial Justice hosts artist Holly Bass for an interactive workshop on the
intersections of activism, joy and art
ADMINISTRATION
GOVERNMENT
Wednesday, March 15, 2023 — 3
JOANNA CHAIT
Daily Staff Reporter
JI HOON CHOI
Daily Staff Reporter
MATTHEW SHANBOM
Daily Staff Reporter
Read more at MichiganDaily.com
JENNA HICKEY/Daily
Design by Sara Fang
Vice President for Governor Relations Chris Kolb, 20th President of the University of California Janet Napolitano, Professor of
Afroamerican and African studies Omolade Adunbi, Professor of Mechanical Engineering Margaret Wooldridge and Professor of Man-
agement & Organizations Andy Hoffman speak in a panel titled ‘Working Together to Tackle the Climate Crisis” during the Presidential
Inauguration Symposium in the Stamps auditorium Tuesday morning.