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Student Found Deceased in I-House Dorm Room

By MATTHEW LEE | Editor-in-Chief A student was found deceased in an International House dorm room on Monday, September 27. The death was first reported at 11:26 p.m. in the University of Chicago Police Department Daily Incident Reports Archive. The incident does not pose a safety concern for the campus community, according to a campus-wide email sent by College Deans John Boyer and Jay Ellison on September 28.

Marcus Jacob Goodman, a third-year computer science major and I-House resident from Cincinnati, Ohio, was identified as the deceased in the University’s email.

The College hosted a memorial reception for Goodman in I-House between 4:00 and 5:30 p.m. on Thursday, September 30. All students, regardless of whether they live in on-campus housing, were welcome.

Editor’s note: Counselors at UChicago Student Wellness are available by phone at (773) 702-3625.

We hope to follow up on this article with an obituary memorializing Marcus’ life and his time as a member of the University community. We ask anyone who has memories they want to share about Marcus to please contact us at editor@chicagomaroon.com.

International House. courtesy of the university of chicago

CC Chair Resigns From USG Slate Less Than Two Months After Inauguration

Former CC Chair Murphy DePompei (right), pictured with President Parul Kumar (middle) and Executive Vice President of Student Affairs Natalie Wang (left).

VIEWPOINTS: Crown must offer online classes to support all its students PAGE 7

NEWS: Grad students attempt to thwart facial recognition technology with new algorithm PAGE 6

PAGE 2 ARTS: The Suicide Squad reboot handily outshines 2016 original

SPORTS: Football remains undefeated with victory against Knox College

PAGE 8

Like our Facebook page at facebook.com/chicagomaroon and follow @chicagomaroon on Instagram and Twitter to get the latest updates on campus news.

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NEWS DePompei resigns due to “…irreconcilable visions of leadership…”

By CLARK KOVACS | News Reporter Murphy DePompei, who was elected College Council (CC) chair in the spring as a member of the Thrive slate, resigned from the position in late July, just two months after taking office. She will be replaced by fourth-year Marla Anderson, who writes, “I firmly believe the most important voices here are student voices, so as we return to campus, I look forward to supporting the goals and initiatives of my Council members and USG peers.”

In a statement sent to The Maroon, DePompei wrote that she resigned “for personal mental health reasons stemming from different and irreconcilable visions of leadership to continue effectively as a Slate.” She declined to comment further on any details leading up to her resignation.

Thrive’s short tenure has not been free of strife. Before formally taking office, the

Thrive slate released a contentious statement in support of Palestine, writing that the Undergraduate Student Government “unequivocally condemns the violence carried out by Israel and stands in support of a free Palestine.” In response, an open letter and several competing petitions were published, some in support of Thrive’s statement and some calling for retraction.

A resolution to retract the statement was introduced to CC, but it did not pass. According to Abbott, when the Thrive slate officially took office shortly after this controversy, few USG members had the bandwidth for any meaningful work.

Nevertheless, late June and July marked a period of vigorous work by many USG members. “Murphy was doing an incredible amount of work…and so many other members of leadership and College

Council and the committees were active in an unprecedented and incredibly effective manner,” Abbott said. But fractures in leadership were also beginning to emerge.

“There was frustration that not everyone who needed to be or should have been active during the summer was,” Abbott noted.

In her statement, DePompei cited “different expectations of communication, diligence, and execution of goals” as reasons for her resignation. “We are all on good terms, and my decision should not reflect negatively on the dozens and dozens of USG members doing great work on a daily basis for students,” she continued.

The remaining members of the Thrive slate, President Parul Kumar and Executive Vice President for External Affairs Natalie Wang, told The Maroon, “Although we are sad to see Murphy’s departure from USG, we fully respect her decision and are

appreciative that we got the opportunity to work with her.”

Anderson, DePompei’s replacement, has not been involved with USG previously.

She is the President of the Georgiana Rose Organization and the Chief People Officer for BLK Capital Management. In the past, she has held leadership positions with the Black Professional Society and the Organization of Black students.

The replacement of DePompei was conducted via an application process open to all undergraduate students. The USG cabinet, composed of the remaining slate members and other executive leadership, nominated two out of three applicants for the position: Anderson and David Liang, the current Board of Trustees Liaison. CC selected Anderson by vote on Tuesday, September 21 and publicized their selection on Wednesday morning.

Faculty Forward Reaches Tentative Agreement with UChicago

By YIWEN LU and KATE MABUS | News Editors In a tentative agreement on a new contract, the UChicago administration has agreed to provide better pay and more protections for non-tenure track faculty after a six-month-long negotiation process with Faculty Forward, the union that represents more than 300 instructors teaching more than 1,500 courses at the University.

The new agreement, reached on September 24, promises non-tenure track faculty, including part-time and full-time lectur-

ers, a 7.5 percent raise within the next three years. It also outlines programs to increase professional development, extend parental leave, and improve retirement and insurance plans.

According to Stephen Todd, a spokesperson for Faculty Forward, the union has recently finished holding ratification meetings with its members. A final vote tally will be cast within a few days, and the new contract will come into force upon ratification.

Negotiations between Faculty Forward and the University have been ongoing since March. Faculty Forward collaborated with Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 73, which represents more than 31,000 workers in public service, to push for the new agreement. The union’s previous contract expired on April 30.

“What our bargaining team wanted to say to part-timers on the University of Chicago campus is ‘we see you and we’re advocating for you.’ The longer contracts, the higher pay, and the parental leave all go a long way

toward making us feel like valued members of the university community that we have been committed to through our dedicated teaching,” part-time lecturer Darcy Lear said in an SEIU press release.

The University administration has also agreed to pay adjunct instructors in the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice comparable salaries to those in other University programs. Crown’s adjunct faculty receives 25 percent less each course than other University instructors, as cited

by Faculty Forward in an open letter sent to President Paul Alivisatos in September.

UChicago Remembers Robert Ritner, Iconic Egyptologist

By BASIL EGLI | Senior News Reporter Celebrated Egyptologist and beloved UChicago professor Robert Ritner died on July 25, 2021, at Northwestern Memorial Hospital after a long battle with leukemia and kidney disease. He was 68.

Born in Houston in 1953 to Bob and Margaret Ritner, Robert Ritner Jr. was entranced by ancient Egypt from a young age, reading extensively about it in the Houston Public Library as a child. He attended Rice

University and majored in psychology, graduating with honors in 1975. He also studied medieval history as an undergraduate, and this extracurricular interest in history eventually led him to publish his first academic work, “Egyptians in Ireland: A Question of Coptic Peregrinations,” in Rice

University Studies in 1976.

Ritner arrived at the Oriental Institute (OI) at the University of Chicago in 1976, studying and researching Egyptian history for more than a decade until he received his Ph.D.—once again with honors—in 1987. BeCONTINUED ON PG. 3

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“…one of the most remarkable professors I have ever had.”

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tween 1991 and 1996, Ritner was the Marilyn S. Simpson Assistant Professor of Egyptology at Yale University before returning to the OI in 1996. He became an associate professor and then a full professor, and in 2019, he was named the inaugural Rowe Professor of Egyptology at the OI during its centennial gala.

Ritner was best known for his revised dissertation work, 1993’s The Mechanics of Ancient Egyptian Magical Practice, which remains widely read in the study of ancient Egyptian religion and magic. In addition to the direct influence Ritner had on his students and colleagues, his work cultivated an interest in ancient Egypt for countless readers. He was considered a world-class expert on ancient Egyptian magic, religion, and culture, as reflected by his many publications on the subject.

Not all of Ritner’s work was restricted to the ancient world. He played a role in discrediting claims made by Joseph Smith, founder of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, that Smith had successfully decoded ancient Egyptian hieroglyphics in “translating” the Mormon Book of Abraham from two Egyptian scrolls that the Mormon community purchased from a travelling mummy exhibition in the mid-1800s. Ritner published The Joseph Smith Egyptian Papyri: A Complete Tradition in 2013, translating into English the Egyptian manuscripts upon which Joseph Smith based his Book of Abraham. According to Ritner, Smith’s translation was a fabrication, and the papyri he claimed to have translated were in fact from 1,500 years after Abraham’s death. He made an extended appearance on the Mormon Stories podcast, discussing his work to disentangle Smith’s

Robert Ritner. courtesy of george jacobi, the university of chicago

claims about his ability to translate hieroglyphics.

Ritner was a staple of the OI, and colleagues, students, and fellow OI members vividly remember his intense love of all things Egypt and his dedication to teaching and his work, OI volunteer manager Sue Geshwender said. An article Geshwender co-authored and shared with The Maroon describes Ritner as a fastidious and friendly presence at the Institute, decorating his office entirely with “Egyptomania kitsch,” frequenting potlucks and the docent library, and going on trips to museums and exhibitions with OI volunteers and colleagues.

During the final years of his life, Ritner was always accompanied by his dog Sheshonq, named after a pharaoh of the 22nd Dynasty of Egypt. Every Halloween, Ritner and Sheshonq came to class in matching mummy or pharaoh costumes.

In an email to The Maroon, Ariel Singer, another of Ritner’s graduate students, called him, among other things, “one of the most remarkable professors I have ever had.”

Singer also remembered Ritner and Sheshonq’s close companionship. “My favorite memories of Prof. Ritner were the times he would stop by the Demotic Dictionary office (where I was working) with, or perhaps more precisely led by, his Wheaton Terrier Sheshonq. Prof. Ritner and I shared a deep love of dogs, and Sheshonq is a particularly charming canine! Sheshonq was always happy to get as many pets as possible, and Prof. Ritner was always happy to chat about the latest news in Egyptology, or the world at large.”

Ritner is survived by his younger brother Rick, sister-in-law Jody, nieces, cousins, and his dog Sheshonq.

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Remembering Hugo Sonnenschein, the Man Who Reimagined UChicago

By MICHAEL McCLURE | Senior News Reporter Standing before the crowd in Rockefeller Memorial Chapel on a rainy October morning in 1993, newly inaugurated University president Hugo Sonnenschein faced the more than 1,400 scholars, dignitaries, and invited guests in attendance for his inauguration and said: “Let us come together bravely, willing to question and challenge all that we do.

May the work accomplished here significantly push forward the boundaries of knowledge. May it add to the record of outstanding scholarship and learning at the University of Chicago.”

Sonnenschein, who died at 80 years old on July 15, 2021, questioned and challenged how the University functioned in his work to push it forward.

During his tenure as president, which lasted from 1993 to 2000, Sonnenschein embarked on campaigns to strengthen the institution’s finances, upgrade its facilities, and make its image more appealing to undergraduates.

It was the last of those three items— the expansion of the undergraduate College and the reduction of the Core curriculum—that divided the school and its constituents, some of whom believed that the changes pioneered by Sonnenschein strayed from the University’s traditional structure of a large graduate and small undergraduate population. Regardless, his reforms have stood the test of time: The Core remains at its reduced size, and undergraduate enrollment has nearly doubled since Sonnenschein took office.

Sonnenschein is survived by his wife, retired epidemiologist Elizabeth Gunn Sonnenschein; their three daughters, Leah, Amy, and Rachel; and five grandchildren. Plans to honor Sonnenschein’s life are forthcoming, according to an email sent by President Robert Zimmer and Provost Ka Yee Lee to the University community.

“Hugo’s tireless work led to substantial improvements during his time as president, and set the stage for many of the advances the University has made in the decades since. He was a leader of

foresight whose achievements will be remembered with deep respect,” Zimmer and Lee wrote.

A distinguished economist, Sonnenschein contributed to the study of multimarket supply and demand functions and helped establish the theory of aggregate demand. He is one of three namesakes of the Sonnenschein-Mantel-Debreu theorem in general equilibrium economics. Sonnenschein was also an editor of Econometrica, an economics journal, from 1977 to 1984.

Unlike many other former University presidents, Sonnenschein had relatively little prior experience in higher education administration. His administrative roles were limited to three years as dean of the School of Arts and Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania and two years as provost of Princeton University.

Howard Krane (J.D. ’57) chaired the Board of Trustees from 1992 to 1999 and directed the presidential search committee created to replace Hanna Holborn Gray, the University’s president from 1978 to 1993. The committee felt that the next president should be an outsider—a person unaffiliated with the University.

“After a long presidency, which had been a very distinguished one, it was the feeling of a number of people that you are benefited by a fresh look at things,” Krane said in 1992.

Sonnenschein’s only previous experience at the University of Chicago was a summer spent taking mathematics and poetry courses in 1959, but his was the kind of outside perspective desired by the search committee. Krane said that among the more than 400 candidates nominated for the presidency, Sonnenschein quickly emerged as the favorite.

He was officially announced as the University’s 11th president on December 18, 1992, with Gray calling him “the perfect president.”

Sonnenschein’s journey to the University of Chicago took him between the East Coast and the Midwest sever-

al times.

Born and raised in New York City, Sonnenschein graduated from the Oakwood Friends School in 1957. He received his undergraduate degree in mathematics from the University of Rochester in 1961. In his final year at Rochester, Sonnenschein decided he wanted to pursue economics in his postgraduate career. He eventually landed at Purdue University, where he received his M.A. in 1963 and his Ph.D. in 1964.

After receiving his Ph.D., Sonnenschein started at the University of Minnesota as a professor of economics before moving on to the University of Massachusetts Amherst, Northwestern University, and Princeton University.

He also taught as a visiting professor at renowned universities in Colombia, Israel, and France.

But it was his time at the University of Chicago, first as president and later as a professor, that cemented his legacy in the world of higher education.

Sonnenschein arrived at UChicago at a time when it was struggling financially. The University’s real endowment growth between 1958 and 1993 was just 32 percent, while the endowments of most comparable universities had more than doubled over the same period. The school also lagged behind in its investment in educational facilities, fundraising growth, and donations from alumni and faculty.

W hile previous presidents like Edward Levi and Gray had observed these trends, it was Sonnenschein who took the boldest steps to change them.

During the third year of his presidency, the Campaign for the Next Century, a five-year initiative to boost the University’s finances, raised $676 million, exceeding its stated goal of $650 million and setting a new investment record for the school. The University’s $22.7 million budget deficit from the 1993–94 academic year was eliminated within three years, and the endowment grew from $1.2 billion in 1993 to $2.9 billion by the time Sonnenschein’s tenure ended in 2000.

But the large number of graduate

students and the small size of undergraduate classes created another financial problem: The cost of faculty wages, about $41.6 million per year, exceeded by several million dollars the revenue generated by undergraduate tuition each year.

The best way to rectify this, Sonnenschein believed, was to attract a greater number of talented students to the University and to encourage those accepted to matriculate. In a letter delivered to the faculty on April 30, 1996, he outlined his mission to increase the size of the College from 3,550 to 4,500 students within a decade, marking a return to the enrollment figures seen in the 1930s. This also departed from the recommendations of a faculty group commissioned during Gray’s presidency that suggested that the College enroll between 3,400 and 3,600 students annually.

“I am concerned that while the University receives the same attention for faculty scholarship as the handful of most outstanding research universities, we are much less familiar to large numbers of prospective students or to the broader public. This must change,” Sonnenschein wrote in his letter.

This proposal left students and faculty conflicted and led to the formation of the Faculty Committee for the Year of Reflection. The committee produced a report analyzing the change in the context of the mission and history of the University, but it ultimately stood by Sonnenschein’s recommendation.

“I think it will allow us to provide a Chicago education to more of the very best students, and to do it in a way that preserves what makes Chicago such a unique institution,” said physics professor and committee spokesperson Melvyn Shochet.

With the University’s finances bolstered and the undergraduate population set to expand, Sonnenschein commissioned then-provost Geoffrey Stone to lead the process of drafting a new campus Master Plan, the fourth in the University’s history. It laid out the CONTINUED ON PG. 5

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“[Sonnenschein] was a leader of foresight whose achievements will be remembered with deep respect.”

Hugo Sonnenschein speaking at the University’s 523rd convocation on June 13, 2015. courtesy of robert kozloff CONTINUED FROM PG. 4

plans for constructing the Gerald Ratner Athletics Center and Max Palevsky Residential Commons, a new campus for the Booth School of Business, expanded capacity at the Library, and new facilities for physical and biological sciences research and the University Press. In 1997, the University campus was also designated a botanical garden by the American Public Gardens Association.

All of these improvements, Sonnenschein contended, would improve the experience of the University’s current constituents and make the campus more appealing to prospective students.

And it seemed he was right: Applications to the College in the 1998–99 school year rose by 25 percent, and as

the school expanded its undergraduate enrollment, its selectivity grew as well.

Even after this reworking of the College, it was a later initiative that Sonnenschein led that would prove to be arguably the most controversial of his tenure: a reduction of the Core curriculum from 21 courses to 18. Sonnenschein and his colleagues hoped that the change would encourage undergraduates to explore a greater variety of electives and study abroad.

The College Council approved the change with a vote of 24–8. In the fall of 1999, when the change was implemented, 95 percent of students opted to pursue their studies under the reduced Core requirements.

But the reduction of the Core curriculum drew ire from certain quarters

of faculty, students, and alumni, with several groups rallying in opposition.

These groups included the Concerned Friends of the University of Chicago, a group of alumni who pledged to withhold financial contributions to the University until the change was reversed; the Scholars for the University of Chicago, a group of UChicago–affiliated intellectuals who sought to block the change; and 74 faculty members who expressed their concerns directly to the Board of Trustees. A group of 1,700 students also participated in a “fun-in” on campus on April 20, 1999, satirizing Sonnenschein’s attempts to soften the University’s austere reputation.

On June 4, 1999, Sonnenschein announced that he would step down from the presidency at the end of the follow-

ing academic year. The firestorm brewing around him had simply become too strong to endure.

In his resignation letter, Sonnenschein wrote, “I have come to feel that it is time for another president, one who is less a symbol of change and who has less reason to initiate change, to carry the momentum forward.”

According to The New York Times, opponents of Sonnenschein suggested that the Board urged Sonnenschein to resign, having grown tired of the complaints levied against him.

After stepping down from the presidency, Sonnenschein became the Charles L. Hutchinson Distinguished Service Professor in Economics and the College. He received an honorary CONTINUED ON PG. 6

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“They tell me it was a real education, not a pretend education.”

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doctorate from the University in 2002 and remained a South Side resident until his death.

Ahead of his accession to the presidency, Sonnenschein recounted that several graduates had spoken with him or written letters to him, all of them lauding the institution’s educational value.

“They come charging up to me and they tell me about their love of the place—how special it is, how they got a Chicago education. They tell me it was a real education, not a pretend education.”

Some felt that Sonnenschein’s reforms diminished what made that Chicago education so real and special. In an interview published by The Univer-

sity of Chicago Magazine shortly before Sonnenschein left office in 2000, he acknowledged the impact those decisions had on the University community.

“Although some things I’ve done have been controversial, in the mail I get and in much of the rhetoric I hear, there’s conviction that the changes were right. There is, however, the feeling that they’ve been painful. It is painful

to look at a place that represents something so special, to feel its fragility, and to say we will have to make some changes. The fear is that the changes will affect the qualities that make the place so special. I am convinced that the changes we have undertaken, rather than altering the character of our University, will help us retain our special qualities in the very long run.”

UChicago Graduate Students Develop Software to Avoid Facial Recognition Technology

By RANIA GARDE | News Reporter An open-source software program “Fawkes,” developed by a UChicago research group, can modify images in ways largely imperceptible to the human eye while still rendering faces in the image undetectable to facial recognition systems.

Facial recognition software is often trained by matching names to faces in images scraped from websites and social media. The aim is to develop software that can correctly identify pictures of people’s faces it has not previously encountered. This allows people to be easily identifiable when an image of their face is captured in public spaces, such as at a political protest.

By changing some of your features to resemble another person’s, the Fawkes “mask” prevents facial recognition software from training their model. A facial recognition model is successfully trained when it associates your name with a distinct set of features and can accurately recognize you in future pictures. The Fawkes mask decreases the difference between your set of facial features and other people’s, thus preventing facial recognition software from training. The Fawkes mask is largely imperceptible to the human eye but deceiving to machine learning models.

The Fawkes project is led by two computer science Ph.D. students at Security, Algorithms, Networking and Data (SAND) Lab, Emily Wenger and Shawn Shan, who work with UChicago Ph.D.

student Huiying Li and UC San Diego Ph.D. student Jiayun Zhang. They are advised by the codirectors of the SAND Lab, professors Ben Zhao and Heather Zheng, in the Department of Computer Science.

Fawkes was inspired by the concept of model poisoning, a type of attack in which a machine learning algorithm is intentionally fed misleading data in order to prevent it from making accurate predictions. Usually, poisoning attacks take the form of malicious virus used by computer hackers. Shan asked, “What if we could use poisoning attacks for good?”

Crafting an algorithm that tweaks photos in ways that will confuse detecting systems but remain unrecognized by humans requires striking a delicate balance. “It’s always a trade-off between what the computer can detect and what bothers the human eye.”

Wenger and Shan hope that, in the future, people will not be identifiable by governments or private actors based purely on images taken of them out in the world.

Since the lab published a paper on their program in Proceedings of USENIX Security Symposium 2020, their work has received lots of media coverage. Wenger says that some of the coverage has made Fawkes seem like a more potent shield against facial recognition software than it actually is. “A lot of the media attention overinflates people’s

expectations of [Fawkes], which leads to people emailing us… ‘why doesn’t this solve all our problems?’” Wenger said.

Florian Tramèr, a fifth-year Ph.D. student in computer science at Stanford University, has written that data poisoning software like Fawkes gives users a “false sense of security.”

Tramèr has two main concerns: Fawkes and similar algorithms do not account for unaltered images people have already posted on the internet, and facial recognition software developed after Fawkes can be trained to detect faces in images with the distortions applied.

In their paper, Wenger and Shan address the first problem by suggesting users create a social media account with masked images under a different name.

These profiles, called “Sybil accounts” in the computer science world, mislead a training algorithm by leading it to associate a face with more than one name.

But Tramèr told The Maroon that flooding the internet with masked images under a different name isn’t going to help. “If Clearview [a facial recognition system] has access to the attack (Fawkes) then [it] can easily train a model that is immune to the Fawkes attack.”

Tramèr is unconvinced that Fawkes could provide them a strong enough shield against recognition software that will be developed in the future. There is “no guarantee of how strong this perturbation is going to be in a year,” he said. Attempts to render one’s face un-

detectable in images could be thwarted by training next year’s algorithm on a set of photos masked by an old version of Fawkes.

However, Tramèr does believe that wearing a mask in a public space could evade detection, because the advantage always goes to the party playing defense.

“If there is a facial recognition at the airport, and you know it’s there, then every year you show up at the airport, you can come with a new mask that is better than the year before.”

However, Tramèr believes that the use of facial recognition software can only be limited via policy changes. He seemed moderately hopeful and cited companies like Microsoft, Amazon, and IBM, which have said they will not sell the facial recognition software to law enforcement agencies. Among these companies’ concerns is the fact that these models have demonstrated less accurate recognition of darker-skinned faces than lighter-skinned faces, which could enable police brutality towards Black people. Still, other companies, like the doorbell camera company Ring, continue to collaborate with police forces.

Wenger and Shan said there would always be a new facial recognition model that could trump their latest masking attempt. Still, they think Fawkes and other software that make facial recognition more difficult are valuable. “We’re increasing the costs for an attacker. If no one proposes the idea, however imperfect, nobody ever moves forward.”

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VIEWPOINTS

A Royal Mess: Crown School Turns Its Back on Social Work Students The Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice fails its students in both social policy and social practice.

By SOCIAL WORK STUDENTS FOR REMOTE LEARNING Social work students at the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice find themselves trapped between an uncompromising administration and an unrelenting pandemic. The Crown School administration insists

that in-person classes are safe for students, and the school is transitioning to an exclusively in-person classroom experience for the autumn quarter.

At the same time, the school acknowledges the impact of the continuing public health crisis for licensed social workers in the school’s Professional Development Program, for whom programs will remain online to

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support the health and safety of professionals, their clients, and the communities they serve.

This stance recognizes safety concerns and the merits of online learning to the benefit of professional social workers—at the exclusion of social work students. While last year, the Crown School held the position that online learning is a meaningful form of social work education, for the upcoming 2021–22 academic year, the administration’s position on online learning is contradictory at best. As a school of social work, the Crown School teaches its students to work compassionately with individuals and communities—so the administration should follow its own stated ideals of helping others live a quality life and support its students by offering remote learning options during the 2021–22 school year. By failing to offer inclusive, accessible learning options, the Crown School undermines its ideals and undervalues its students.

As the coronavirus pandemic evolves, the rapidly shifting epidemiological landscape has prompted peer institutions to revert to a virtual learning environment, either in part or in full; in one example, as a result of breakthrough COVID-19 cases at the beginning of the school year, Rice University pushed back its class start dates and pivoted to remote learning at the beginning of

the academic year. Schools of social work at Loyola University Chicago, the University of Illinois at Chicago, and DePaul University will either conduct courses fully remotely or offer pathways for graduate students to take courses remotely or in a hybrid format this year. DePaul has taken the extra measure of providing flexible accommodations to all its students. Thus, the Crown Family School fails to meet the standards of its Chicago area peers in its refusal to offer remote or hybrid learning options this academic year. The Crown School administration must examine what is happening at universities around the country and make appropriate accommodations to serve all its students, recognizing that the Crown School community includes immunocompromised individuals, individuals who cannot be vaccinated, and individuals living with others who cannot be vaccinated.

The Crown School is denying the realities of a public health threat while stripping life-changing accessibility options from students with disabilities. Forcing these students to undergo a rigorous and potentially costly process to be considered for disability accommodations is both antiquated and antithetical to social work values. Rather, the administration should offer a pathway for remote or hybrid learning to all of its students.

If the Crown Family School cannot offer a hybrid pathway this year, it should prioritize the needs of its most vulnerable students and return to remote learning entirely.

Despite UChicago’s vaccine mandate, which the Crown Family School uses as precedent for its new policy on virtual learning, many immunocompromised individuals remain vulnerable to COVID-19. Many of the Crown School’s policies prove dangerous and run the risk of disincentivizing COVID-19 procedures. Some faculty members have zero-absence policies, and there is currently no system in place for recorded lecture accommodations. These policies are likely to deter students from reporting COVID-19 symptoms truthfully and staying home or quarantining when appropriate. The school will not go beyond the City of Chicago guidelines, so there are currently no social distancing requirements in place.

During the 2020–21 academic year, when all Crown School classes were remote, many of us found that online learning supported our needs.

For students who are immunocompromised or have chronic conditions, remote learning afforded the opportunity to attend classes without the increased chance of becoming ill. For students with physical CONTINUED ON PG. 8

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“When we stop using a one-size-fits-all approach to education access and instead center the needs of our most vulnerable, everybody and every body benefits.”

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disabilities for whom education within a building is challenging, remote learning was a welcome respite from physical hurdles. For students with chronic illnesses, remote learning afforded unprecedented access to education and the ability to attend class during flare-ups that would have previously resulted in absence. For students who are caregivers, remote learning provided savings on childcare costs and allowed them to be present for their children or other dependents. Some caregivers are hesitant to put children too young to be vaccinated in daycare settings, and daycare options are limited besides. With classes starting at 9:30 a.m. and ending at 8:20 p.m., in-person learning feels nonviable for caregivers and non-caregivers alike, particularly for the many students who do not live in Hyde Park.

The Crown School’s faculty advocates a both/and stance in social work, yet the administration holds a fully polarized, either/or stance to remote learning: fully remote like last year or fully on campus. We say that is unacceptable—we must use this unprecedented time as an opportunity to push for a change in the way the Crown School operates so that our school acts as a leader in modeling the inclusivity we wish to see in education and social work. When we stop using a one-sizefits-all approach to education access

and instead center the needs of our most vulnerable, everybody and every body benefits. The Crown School must open the door to actual accessibility by increasing remote options, which is a long-term change that helps leave fewer people behind. After all, reimagining our notions of disability and challenging able-bodied privilege is precisely the kind of leadership and advocacy work our faculty is trying to instill in us. We know that we can help dismantle institutional ableism by increasing accessibility. Refusing to model anti-ableism within our own community through mandating in-person learning is hypocritical within the context of a radical social work education.

Remote or hybrid learning is a resoundingly popular option with Crown School students. In the 2021 spring quarter, Graduate Students United (GSU) conducted a survey to gather student feedback about field placements and mental health supports during the pandemic. The survey fielded answers from more than 190 students, a statistically significant number based on the program’s total enrollment. When asked what practices should continue postCOVID-19, more than 50 percent of students who responded wrote about their desire for virtual offerings. The administration is aware of the survey results and student concerns around accessibility, COVID-19, and caregiver needs, yet

they have not provided students with a remote or hybrid option for the upcoming school year in a move that is both exclusionary and largely unpopular. In alignment with the letter recently sent to UChicago by GSU, we echo the calls for graduate student representation in the Zoom room in order to demand these options.

Stuck between inflexible mandates from UChicago and Council on Social Work Education (CSWE) accreditation requirements, the Crown School is failing to live up to the values that bring students to this work. Just as our communities expect us to stand up for our values in our work, we expect the Crown Family School to stand up for students.

Accepting the restrictions placed on the Crown School from the University administration and the CSWE maintains an untenable double bind. As students actively striving to live out social work ideals in our community, we engage in the Crown School’s mission “to increase access, opportunity, and agency in order to dismantle systems of oppression and to help meet the basic needs of diverse individuals, families, and communities with compassion and humaneness,” and we demand that the Crown School do the same.

In order to remain true to the values of the social work profession, accessibility must be the top priority for the administration as it enters the autumn

quarter. We implore the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice to put the needs of its students first and provide remote or hybrid learning options this year.

Support our calls for accessibility by signing our petition here.

Signed, Niki Colon, Lisa Howard, Jennifer Nemecek, Henry Rosh, Rachel Tsen, Nahime Aguirre Mtanous, Demi Collins, Anna Crofts, Fabiola Cuevas Flores, Jessica Erickson, Brooke Ferguson, Ana Fuentes, Sabrina Geraghty, Ami Goetz, Connie Greene, Crystina Harris, Anna Hoban, Bianca Huerta, Madeline Jones, Meghan Keane, Marty Kezon, Asiyah Khafiyya, Sumi Kirk, Alix Kramer, Imani LaGrone, Nicole Levonyak, Alyssa Linvell, Katherine Lobo, Gianna Lorbeck, Molly Lubetkin, Rob Meeker, Sarah Mitchell, Kim Oria, Neelima Prabhala, Emma Rust, Naomi Salcedo, Eve Skosey-LaLonde, Hannah Smith, Lindsay Somberg, Tara Song, Mehreen Tariq, Olivia Venegas, Jessica Weinstock, Charity Williams, Barrett Winston, Xoe Wise, Shan Zhang The authors and signatories are students at the Crown Family School of Social Work, Policy, and Practice and advocates for remote learning.

ARTS The Suicide Squad Reboots Franchise With Guts and Glory

By ALINA KIM | Arts Reporter Writer-director James Gunn (Guardians of the Galaxy) ambitiously reintroduces DC Comics fans to the infamous ragtag team of antiheroes in The Suicide Squad (2021). Viciously violent and saturated with crude humor that fits its nihilistic bleakness, the semi-sequel, semi-reboot unapologetically sets aside any obligation

to serve as an expository reference to the DC extended universe. Rather, neither confirming nor denying its relation to David Ayer’s Suicide Squad (2016), it carries its own and revels in the unpredictable, gory chaos of its titular villains.

As a comic book adaptation, The Suicide Squad applies the tried-and-true su-

perhero film formula. Like its predecessors in the superhero genre, it combines the Western film genre’s standoffs and general lawlessness and the heist subgenre’s use of a morally gray ensemble of skilled but wearied individualists to supplement its easy-to-follow storyline.

Leading a mostly new cast of antiheroes, Viola Davis reprises her role as Amanda Waller, who assigns the black ops squad

Task Force X, led by veteran Colonel Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman), to a mission on the fictional island Corto Maltese. Joining Flag are familiar faces Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie) and Captain Boomerang (Jai Courtney) as well as a long list of new recruits from Belle Reve prison, including Bloodsport (Idris Elba), King Shark (Sylvester Stallone), Peacemaker (John Cena), CONTINUED ON PG. 9

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“That said, The Suicide Squad brings to DC an entertainingly fresh individuality that almost wipes away the foul aftertaste of the 2016 original.”

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Polka-Dot Man (David Dastmalchian), Ratcatcher 2 (Daniela Melchior), Savant (Michael Rooker), and Blackguard (Pete Davidson). The mission’s objective serves as the main plot: Waller orders that Task Force X infiltrate the island, which has suffered a violent coup by dictator Silvio Luna (Juan Diego Botto), and eliminate the danger posed by Nazi-era laboratory Jötunheim, which holds within its fortress an alien experiment called Project Starfish. A question, however, remains: Is there an underlying motive behind Waller’s determination to see Project Starfish erased from history?

The strength of Gunn’s vision comes less from the generic plot but rather from how his flawed characters depict the vileness of the carceral system and governmental dismissal of human life as expendable commodity. Serve or die.

Waller exhibits a cold-hearted ruthlessness that far surpasses her more lenient 2016 counterpart, implanting bombs and trackers into her inmates’ necks to ensure their loyalty. Even before the mission, she threatens to incarcerate Bloodsport’s daughter in a prison with the highest mortality rate in the nation should Bloodsport refuse her offer to join Task Force X—Machiavellian to the point that her own personnel question her tactics. Ratcatcher 2, whose rodent friends kept her warm as she slept on the streets of Portugal, turned to crime in a desperate attempt to find her American dream after the death of her father (Taika Waititi), who passed away from a drug overdose. From a more meta perspective, Gunn whimsically murders his characters, including innocent residents of Corto Maltese, with abandon, and even a huge chunk of Task Force X meet their brutal deaths before the audience can digest their brief introductions. In other words, the premise that the characters find themselves in is one of coercion, puppeted by corrupt, violent institutions that deny their existence as human beings.

Yet that’s not to say that the film feels unbearably heavy. Gunn balances the harrowing theme with crude humor, a chaotic clash that only stories like those about a villainous suicide squad can successfully

mold. Stallone’s King Shark is delightfully stupid, reading a book upside down, prancing around predatory sea creatures as he declares them his new friends, and attempting to eat his own teammates for the sake of “nom-nom.” An exceptional contrast from Ayer’s Suicide Squad is the complete rehash of Rick Flag’s character: Rather than the stoic, lovesick blandness from the original, Kinnaman brings to the screen a more naïve but good-at-heart leader who does not hesitate to save a captured teammate—although our favorite harlequin needs no assistance when it comes to prison breaks—and the two proceed to hug with weapons in hand. As a personal favorite, Melchior’s Ratcatcher 2 excellently parodies stereotypical millennial laziness yet kindly sympathizes with her teammates’ traumatic backstories.

A standout scene is the effortless hilarity of a murderous competition between Bloodsport and Peacemaker, who stare each other down as they take turns creatively eliminating perceived enemy targets, saturated with squelching sound effects and the dreadful crack of breaking bones. Ultimately, they are saved by Polka-Dot Man, who nonchalantly remarks

that to make killing easy, he imagines that his enemies bear his mother’s face—a horrifyingly amusing delivery from Dastmalchian that effortlessly unravels his character’s trauma as a victim of human experimentation.

I must also applaud the creative cinematography, although Gunn does occasionally seem to overcompensate with bloodbaths for the coveted R rating. Stylistically, the chapter titles are composed of background material to guide the audience through the film’s nonlinear trajectory. The first chapter, “3 Days Earlier,” for instance, is written on bubbles forming on a toilet seat. In other notable features, we witness a fistfight from the reflection of a character’s shiny helmet, following the fighters staggering around the room. And in a gruesome close-up, the camera zooms in on the still-moving eyes of a decapitated head mid-battle. Gunn also refreshingly executes constant tonal shifts to establish one hell of an emotional roller coaster, switching from a romantic collage to sudden murder to a flashback from a few days prior without much warning.

Nevertheless, The Suicide Squad is not without its criticisms. Most notably, Gunn

The cast of The Suicide Squad. courtesy of warner bros

struggles with Robbie’s Harley Quinn, suspending her in a confusing position as both supporting character and main superstar. As aesthetically wonderful as her escape was, brimming with colorful floral explosions that parallel her insanity, it felt detached from both the other characters who weren’t given such elaborate solo moments and Harley’s subsequent scenes as a watchful observer to the rest of the team.

Additionally, the last quarter of the film dragged, lacking in depth beyond a simple objective to defeat the cartoonishly designed alien starfish. For a premise that strives to subvert the expectations within the superhero genre, I was disappointed to see that The Suicide Squad fell right back into it for a tidy resolution.

That said, The Suicide Squad brings to DC an entertainingly fresh individuality that almost wipes away the foul aftertaste of the 2016 original. Almost. But, as Colonel Flag’s shirt cheekily reads “obstáculos son oportunidades” (“obstacles are opportunities”), Gunn’s reboot-sequel gorefest triumphantly made the best out of our hesitancy—my hopes have risen for this promisingly strong franchise.

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Lollapalooza Celebrates Its Return Music brings all sorts of people together in Grant Park

By KATE LU and VERONICA CHANG | Arts Reporters For four days, it looked like a return to normal. The smell of weed and sweat filled Grant Park, social distancing ceased almost entirely (although your resident reporters were sure to stand in the shade, far away from any mosh pits), and masks were replaced by drunk foolhardiness. Lollapalooza 2021 marked one of the first major outdoor music festivals since COVID-19 swept the world, though whether it marks recovery or the start of a new COVID-19 variant is the question of its legacy.

From Thursday, July 29, to Sunday, August 1, there were highs and lows and everything else in between. The Delta variant dominated the news from day one with images of packed, maskless crowds, and countless rumors of fake vaccination cards and COVID-19 tests circulating. Machine Gun Kelly made a surprise appearance on Saturday, Limp Bizkit called for the crowd to get vaccinated, and the cancellation of DaBaby’s headlining performance on Sunday due to the rapper’s homophobic remarks at the Rolling Loud festival in Miami on July 25 kickstarted a wave of similar cancellations and hilarious jokes at DaBaby’s expense.

Festivalgoers and performers alike were optimistic—even ebullient. From headliners like Miley Cyrus and Lauv to smaller acts like Cavetown and mxmtoon, the theme of the festival was celebration: celebrating a return to live music, to coming together, and to soaking in the atmosphere of an outdoor performance. Cyrus’s headlining set was a particular standout, with an array of her older classics like “Wrecking Ball” and “The Climb” (to which the crowd happily scream-sang along) in addition to covers of songs that inspired her as an artist, notably Blondie’s “Heart of Glass.” Clad in sparkling red, Cyrus spoke about how artists learned in the past year that they are nothing without fans and joked that, “I am who I am today, in my customized,

bedazzled Gucci jumpsuit that was flown personally from Italy, because of you!” And, of course, it wouldn’t be a perfect opening night without “Party in the U.S.A.”—complete with an ocean of people waving their arms at “hands up” in the largest party in the U.S.A. at that very moment.

Other highlights included Tyler, the Creator, whose set was a uniquely artistic interpretation of his journey to where he is now (complete with props, fire, and costume changes), and Megan Thee Stallion, whose electrifying performance drew one of the largest crowds of the weekend. Although some of her tracks blurred together in unmemorable sameness (think of listening to her B-sides as taking shots; you hype yourself up and the energy is great and then all of a sudden it’s all gas no brakes and you just want to tell the driver to slow down or pull over so you can puke at the side of the road), the rapper’s fierce charisma kept the crowd on its feet and screaming for the duration of her set.

Of course, this intensity didn’t last the whole weekend. Some of the smaller sets during the day held more intimate atmospheres, which were great ways to find new songs to add to our Spotify playlists (shout-out to Sarah Barrios for the catchy “IH8EVERY1” and an excellent cover of Avril Lavigne’s “Sk8er Boi”). Our favorite acts, then, were the ones that managed to captivate crowds consisting of both loyal fans and curi ous onlookers. Complete with excellent vocals, good vibes, and eye-catching jumbotron graphics, Young the Giant’s performance was particularly memorable: The band’s tireless energy fed the zealous audience even as the lead singer remarked on the passage of time (10 years had passed since the band’s first performance at Lollapalooza in 2011).

Despite the announcement of a mask mandate for indoor spaces on Saturday and the looming backdrop of the Delta variant, the colorful, wackily

dressed, and upbeat crowds at Lollapalooza showed no signs of the weariness brought upon by the pandemic. It’s worth considering, then, whether artists’ acknowledgements of the pandemic (many spoke about the difficulty of the past year, including Journey, who gave a speech to thank essential workers) were performative measures at odds with their encouragement of packed, maskless crowds. The elation of being free to get lost in the music was buoyed by a sense of the pandemic being “over”—but was it?

Still, in the end, Lollapalooza was a

celebration: a celebration of perseverance and coming together as crowds cheered at every occasion for artists both seasoned and emerging; a celebration of music that connected us even when apart, with several familiar pandemic-born songs finally making their live debuts; and a celebration of possibilities, because there’s nothing like yelling Journey’s “Don’t Stop Believin’” at the top of your lungs and hearing the rest of the crowd yell-sing with you, then sprinting to the opposite end of the festival to catch the last chorus of Post Malone’s “Sunflower.”

Miley Cyrus performs at Lollapalooza. courtesy of ashley osborn

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SPORTS Riding Run Game, Football Remains Undefeated

By MARCOS GONZALEZ | Sports Reporter Bigger, faster, stronger. The University of Chicago’s 45–10 blowout victory against Knox College was proof that this team really is different from the ones we have seen in past years. While everyone has done their part on offense, the rushing attack by the Maroons has shouldered much of the load, and that trend continued Saturday afternoon at Stagg Field.

In the first quarter, senior running back Nicholas D’Ambrose capped a nineplay drive with a nine-yard touchdown run to put the Maroons on top. It was the first of three touchdowns of the day for a running back group that has found little resistance four games into the season.

Head coach Chris Wilkerson said, “There are a lot of factors driving our success on the ground so far this fall. We stress being efficient with the running game and trying to get a hat on a hat,” attributing the team’s success on the ground to “the offensive line, super backs and wide receivers…taking pride in playing physical football,” and a talented backfield.

The running backs were not the only ones who showed up to play on Saturday.

The passing game once again showed up in a big way. Quarterback Philip Martini completed 17 of his 25 passing attempts, three of which resulted in a touchdown.

His second passing touchdown was arguably the biggest one of the game, as he found senior wide receiver Caden Kalinowski in the end zone on a last-second Hail Mary pass to end the first half.

It was only Kalinowski’s fourth reception

of the year and his second touchdown of the year.

Martini’s day was mostly flawless, though his only mistake was costly.

Martini threw an interception to Knox linebacker Ean Rau, who returned it 92 yards for a pick-six. However, Martini and the Maroon offense answered with a seven-play drive that resulted in a rushing touchdown from Marcelo Alanis. When asked about the importance of picking each other up, Wilkerson said, “We certainly stress being able to feed off each other and playing complementary football.”

While the offense has been the story (rightfully so, as it is averaging an impressive 52 points per game from just the first four games), the defense has been just as vital to the team’s 4–0 start. “This last week, our defensive had the challenge of defending the triple-option attack, and that requires some adjustments from your base defensive alignments and techniques,” Wilkerson said. “We know every week it’s important to be successful on both lines of scrimmage. Our defense prides themselves on attempting to limit our opponents’ running game.” The defense succeeded in doing so, holding Knox to a measly 3.3 yards per rush. The Prairie Fire offense did not have any success through the air either, completing just one pass on six attempts, including an interception to sophomore linebacker Steven Arellano.

The Knox College Prairie Fire fell to 0–3 following their second blowout

George Coyle (right) earned UAA Athlete of the Week honors after a six-tackle, 1.5-sack outing against Knox. courtesy of uchicago loss in as many weeks. They are slated to take on a Beloit College squad that is two weeks removed from a 66–0 defeat at the hands of the Maroons.

As for the Maroons, they are looking to continue their hot start as they face a 3–1 Monmouth College team on the road.

This will serve as a big test for the Maroon defense, which has only allowed roughly 11 points per game thus far. The Monmouth offense has averaged 40 points

per game on offense after a tough opening week loss at the hands of Wartburg College. While Wilkerson did not give any specific details on what his team needed to work on ahead of this big matchup, he said, “there are always tons of details and technique things we need to improve on.

We are chasing perfection knowing full well we are not going to catch it. But we are going to relentlessly chase it because in the process we will catch excellence.”

Cross Country Rises to National Championship Contender

By BLAIR PENN | Sports Reporter The success of UChicago’s men’s and women’s cross country teams may be one of the best-kept secrets in the athletic department. The women’s cross country team is ranked seventh in the nation, and the men are just behind them, coming in

at twelth.

The UChicago cross country team has been on an upward trend these past few years. Both the men’s and women’s teams have qualified for the DIII championship meet and placed among the top 12 teams

for the past three years.

So far this season, the women’s team appears to be on an unstoppable streak.

They have won first place in three out of their four meets so far. At the September 17 Michigan State University (MSU) Invitational meet, which included teams from Division I, II, and III, first-year runner

Claudia Harnett and second-year runner Lucy Groothuis placed in the top 25 out of 236 competitors for the women’s 6K event.

Even though UChicago is a DIII school, these two underclassmen beat runners from DI schools such as Michigan State and the University of Toledo.

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“The teams’ successes should be attributed to a combination of solid coaches, strong team culture, and the unwavering work ethic of all the runners.”

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The success of the women’s team cannot be attributed to just one or two star runners. Fourth-year Rachael Hutson said, “the team is very deep—there are over 30 of us, and everyone brings something unique and equally valuable to the table.”

The men are also on to an incredibly strong start to their season—they have come in second for two of their meets, placed fifth in one, and, in their most recent meet, were able to secure the coveted first position.

The men’s team also competed in the MSU Invitational meet and UChicago runners were able to go head-to-head with competitors from DI schools.

Runners from both the men’s and women’s teams agreed the teams’ successes should be attributed to a combination of solid coaches, strong team culture, and the unwavering work ethic of all the runners.

“All of us chose to be on the cross country team because we enjoy running in general and running competitively,” said Joshua Cheung, a third-year runner on the men’s team. That’s a big part of the team’s success: how they all motivate one other.

Cheung also pointed to the importance of the social camaraderie of the team. “Eating together at Bartlett after practice then going to study in the Reg together builds bonds that allow us to enjoy the process even if we are all physically sore,” he added.

First-year runner Elisabeth Camic on the women’s team offered a similar

perspective. She said that what makes the team successful is “the hard work of the girls. They give their all every day at practices and meets.” She also commented that coach Chris Hall is an integral part of the team’s success because of his “great training philosophy.”

Another big piece of the team’s success comes from the amount of joy the girls get from going to practice and spending time together. Hutson says that practices “are the highlight of [her] day; they’re full of laughter, smiles, and fascinating conversations.” She also added that the team likes to “stick around long after practice ends to chat and eat for hours.”

This is Hutson’s first year on cross country, but she is not new to UChicago athletics, as she played soccer and ran track her other three years. She believes that the UChicago cross country team is a special group of women and said that she has “never trained or competed with a more uplifting, resilient, and ambitious group of women.”

Both the men’s and women’s cross country teams are currently halfway through their seasons and have just four meets left to give it their all. Camic is optimistic about the rest of the season. “We have what it takes to finish the season strong and go all the way,” she said.

Hutson agreed and said there is a strong, palpable collective desire to succeed” and that she “can’t wait to see the team’s commitment and hard work lead to exceptional results in the approaching championship meets.”

First-year Claudia Harnett (above) placed second in the recent Brissman-Lundeen Invitational, where both teams placed first. courtesy of david camic

Upcoming Games SPORT

OPPONENT

Football Cross Country Men’s Soccer Men’s Soccer Women’s Soccer Volleyball Volleyball

Monmouth Multiple Carthage Rochester Rochester UW-Eau Claire Hope

DATE Sat. Oct 9 Sat. Oct 16 Wed. Oct 6 Sat. Oct 9 Sat. Oct 9 Sat. Oct 9 Sat. Oct 9

LOCATION Away Away Home Home Home Home Home

Sylwia Mikos (right) defeated fellow first-year Miranda Yuan (left) in the finals of the International Tennis Association Central Region Championships. courtesy of uchicago