2024-05-01

ANNA FUDER/Daily

ANNA FUDER/Daily

ANNA FUDER/Daily

Design by Leyla Dumke

NEWS over the YEARS

2020

SEPTEMBER - The Class of 2024 faced a unique challenge of adjusting to college life while also dealing with the COVID-19 pandemic.

2021

JANUARY - Peter Chen, professor of computer science and engineering, was put on administrative leave following pending criminal sexual misconduct charges.

2022

JANUARY - University President Mark Schlissel fired.

FEBRUARY - Following 100 days of protest to show support for the survivors of former University of Michigan doctor Robert Anderson, Jonathan Vaughn, a former U-M football player and sexual assault survivor, speaks out and receives an unofficial honorary diploma commemorating his work on behalf of the survivors.

2023

MARCH - Hundreds of University of Michigan students, faculty and community members at the Hill Auditorium on March 8, 2023 to officially inaugurate and install University President Santa Ono into office.

MARCH 7 - The University of Michigan Graduate Employees’ Organization announced that they will begin striking starting Wednesday, March 29, 2023.

2024

MARCH - Following a student demonstration condemning the University of Michigan’s investment in companies profiting from Israel’s military campaign in Gaza at the 101st annual Honors Convocation on March 24, the University sent an email to the U-M campus community seeking feedback on a draft policy on disruptions to University operations.

University of Michigan President Mark Schlissel has been fired effective immediately following an internal investigation revealing Schlissel’s inappropriate behavior with a subordinate at the University, according to a Saturday press release from the Board of Regents.

The decision was made at a closed-door Board of Regents meeting Saturday morning without a public vote after the board hired a third party investigator to determine whether or not Schlissel’s actions as president had violated the University’s supervisor relationship policy.

“It is with great disappointment that we announce that the University of Michigan Board of Regents has removed Dr. Mark Schlissel as President of the University of Michigan, effective immediately,” the Board of Regents wrote in a Saturday press release.

The policy, which was introduced in July 2021, states that “a Supervisor may not, implicitly or explicitly, initiate or attempt to initiate an Intimate Relationship with a Supervisee over whom they

exercise supervisory authority,” and was implemented in July 2021 following allegations former Provost Martin Philbert had used his position to coerce women into sexual relationships.

The firing comes after an anonymous complaint submitted on Dec. 8. revealed Schlissel had been in an inappropriate relationship with a University employee. A subsequent investigation was performed which found he had used his University email account to inappropriately communicate with said employee.

Schlissel’s existing contract contained a morals clause which stated his behavior as President “be consistent with promoting the dignity, reputation, and academic excellence of the University.”

The Board of Regents released a letter transmitted to Schlissel informing him of his termination. In it, the regents outlined their justification for firing him, citing messages sent from his University email to a subordinate. Because the regents fired Schlissel for cause, he will no longer receive the golden parachute he and the regents negotiated when he announced he would resign in 2023. Schlissel had previously provoked the regents’ ire for failing to to communicate with the board

regarding the Detroit Center for Innovation. Talks broke down between donor Stephen M. Ross and Dan Gilbert, who owned the site. An anonymous administration official who spoke to the Detroit Free Press said the regents felt Schlissel left them in the dark as negotiations faltered.

In October, Schlissel announced that he would be stepping down from the job in June 2023, a year earlier than planned. The Detroit Free Press at the time categorized his stepping down early as a deal between the members of the board who were satisfied and dissatisfied with his performance.

The decision was announced Saturday night. A press release from the University announced president emerita Mary Sue Coleman will serve as interim president. Coleman served as president from 2002 until 2014.

In a statement posted to the Board of Regents website, Coleman wrote she was sad to learn of the allegations against Schlissel but was honored to once again be leading the University.

“While saddened by the circumstances, I am honored to be asked to again serve the University of Michigan,” Coleman wrote. “When I left the U-M campus at the

Freshmen adjust to first few weeks of college amid pandemic

SOFIA URBAN Daily Staff Reporter

The beginning of the 2020 fall semester has been difficult for students, staff and faculty alike.

Current freshmen at the University of Michigan have faced numerous challenges adjusting to college life, from the latest cluster of cases in South Quad Residence Hall to the strikes undertaken by the Graduate Employees’ Organization and resident advisers. This unconventional start to the school year has had wide-ranging impacts across campus, but freshmen bear the brunt of it without a baseline for a typical college experience.

LSA freshman Caleb Zheng said going to college is already an adjustment, but doing so during the pandemic has added a new obstacle.

“My first few weeks on campus have really revolved around being able to adjust to this new independence and freedom in a completely different setting during a pandemic,” Zheng said. During the first weeks of the semester, reports of unenforced move-in protocols meant to limit the number of people in residence halls and maintain social distancing raised fears that outbreaks on campus could grow. Despite the uncertainty, many students said they were looking forward to adjusting to a new environment and getting to experience life on campus.

LSA freshman Isa Cirulis told The Michigan Daily she’s been pleasantly surprised by her experience on campus so far.

“The beginning of this semester has honestly gone a lot better than expected,” Cirulis said. “I don’t have a particular desire to go to large gatherings or social events, so I don’t necessarily feel like I’m missing out on that aspect of the ‘college experience.’”

Though reports of people attending parties during the unofficial “Welcome Week” circulated online, many typical social activities like parties have been canceled this year. Students said they faced the added pressure of finding a social circle while adhering to public health guidelines. Currently, outdoor gatherings of more than 25 people are prohibited in Washtenaw County.

LSA freshman Kimia Beigzadeh said new friendships have made the transition to college easier.

“Coming onto campus was nervewracking,” Beigzedah said. “(But) once you meet people you love to be around and make your day better, (campus is) kind of amazing.”

Zheng said his peers have provided him with a support system.

“I think a highlight for me would have to be how welcoming everyone here is,” said Zheng. “I really felt like I was at home by the second week and everyone here is very friendly and I honestly have become very comfortable with my surroundings.”

Both Zheng and Cirulis both said they made friends on their floor and were able to find a sense of community on campus despite the social distancing requirements.

On Sept. 6, GEO began a nearly 10-day long strike in response to the University’s reopening plans. The union’s demands included the universal right to work remotely without documentation, more transparent testing plans and a diversion of funds from the Division of Public Safety and Security to other community organizations. After University President Mark Schlissel asked the court to file an injunction against GEO to get members to return to work, GEO members voted overwhelmingly to end the strike.

Zheng explained he felt supported by his professors and the campus at large during the strikes.

“For the most part, all of my professors and GSIs were very understanding of if people wanted to support the strike and did not want to attend class,” Zheng said. “I have felt like the resources provided to me have all been helpful and I have been given the proper support.”

Students have also voiced concerns about the availability of and access to frequent testing. Currently, the University is testing all symptomatic students through University Health Services and conducting random, opt-in surveillance testing every week. Yet some public health experts have raised questions about the University’s testing plan, saying it may not be enough to detect and prevent future outbreaks. A cluster of COVID-19 cases was confirmed at South Quad Thursday, increasing anxieties about the potential for more cases on campus. In an email to the University community on Friday, Schlissel said all residents on the floors where cases were detected would undergo mandatory testing.

“After extensive investigation, the majority of the cases were found to be connected, but three cases are

not associated and have no known source of exposure,” Schlissel wrote. “While this can happen at any time during a pandemic situation, we are taking additional measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19 within the building.”

Students living on campus who test positive for the virus, are symptomatic or were in close contact with an infected person are being asked by the University to isolate in quarantine apartments on North Campus. Recently, students have complained about the state of quarantine housing, saying they did not receive adequate meals and that some of the apartments were left in unsanitary conditions.

Some students said they felt the University could do more to prevent COVID-19 outbreaks.

Zheng said he wished there was required random surveillance testing for the entire campus community.

“I think if random testing became mandatory for everyone people would immediately be less reckless and the anxieties of possibly getting COVID-19 would go down a lot,” Zheng said.

Cirulis also emphasized the desire for mass testing as a proactive rather than a reactive measure.

“The cluster of cases in South Quad is definitely scary,” Cirulis said. “I wish mandatory testing had been implemented for the affected floors sooner.”

Freshmen — who often look forward to participating in fall sports or joining intramural teams — are also facing the cancellation of most sports. On Aug. 11, Big Ten presidents and chancellors voted to postpone fall sports. The league voted to reverse the decision to cancel fall football on Wednesday, saying the conference now has the ability to conduct daily rapid testing of all players.

Cirulis, who rowed in high school, said the lack of rowing season at the University due to social distancing requirements dampened her optimism.

“I think the most relevant way COVID precautions have impacted me personally is the cancellation of the rowing season,” Cirulis said. “I definitely understand this decision from a safety standpoint and know a lot worse things have and can happen surrounding the pandemic, but this still stays at the forefront of my mind.”

end of my presidency in 2014, I said serving this great university was the most rewarding experience of my professional life. I’m happy to serve again in this important interim role.”

The University has hired the private law firm Jenner & Block to continue the investigation into Schlissel’s behavior. According to the Detroit Free Press, the firm is also investigating whether Schlissel

misused University funds to support his relationship with the unnamed subordinate.

In an email obtained by the Michigan Daily addressed to LSA employees Saturday night, LSA

Dean Anne Curzan wrote she would be meeting with fellow deans and senior leaders tomorrow and will communicate additional updates in the coming days.

“As I process this news, it only strengthens my commitment to continuing the work we have been undertaking in the college, with the wise, research-informed guidance of the Preventing Sexual Harassment Working Group,” Curzan wrote. “It is essential.”

Curzan wrote Schlissel’s firing reinforced to need for sexual misconduct prevention on campus.

Computer science professor Peter Chen placed on leave following pending criminal sexual misconduct charges

JULIA FORREST Daily Staff Reporter

Peter Chen, professor of computer science and engineering at the University of Michigan, has been put on administrative leave for pending criminal charges of sexual misconduct, according to a Thursday email from Alec Gallimore, dean of the College of Engineering, to CSE students. At an arraignment on Thursday, Chen was charged with criminal sexual conduct of the first degree with a victim under the age of 13 by the Ann Arbor 15th District Court. The offense is reported to have occured on April 1, 2017, and a probable cause conference hearing is scheduled for Feb. 4. Chen’s teaching duties and other duties on campus have been reassigned, Gallimore wrote.

Chen co-taught two classes in the Winter 2021 semester — EECS 482 and EECS 498. According to Gallimore, there is

no indication the criminal charge is connected to his teaching or research at the University.

“Nonetheless, I realize this information will be shocking to many of you, and comes after several semesters of reports of climate-related issues in the CSE division,” Gallimore wrote.

Calling the “continued allegations” of misconduct by CSE faculty “troubling,” Gallimore wrote he plans to work with those in the CSE community — including CSE chair Michael Wellman — to confront the department’s climate and culture and create a positive environment for students and staff.

“Let me be clear – sexual misconduct is completely unacceptable in any form,” Gallimore wrote. “I encourage anyone who has any information about misconduct to report it. It is only when we are aware of issues that we can address them.” The email comes as the CSE department reckons with other allegations of misconduct. Jason

Mars, assistant professor of computer science and co-founder of tech startup Clinc, was accused of sexual misconduct and abusive behavior in February 2020. The announcement that Mars was one of the faculty members teaching a required computer science course for this winter semester sparked further outrage from students, leading to the University’s Central Student Government to recently call for his removal.

University spokesperson Rick Fitzgerald confirmed that Chen was arraigned Wednesday and is currently on leave.

“Peter Chen was arraigned on a criminal charge Wednesday and immediately placed on administrative leave,” Fitzgerald said. “The investigation is being handled by Ann Arbor Police.” In an email to The Michigan Daily, Mariell Lehman, Chen’s lawyer, said Chen denies the charges against him.

GRACE BEAL/Daily

LSA professor Silke-Maria Weineck introduced Jonathan Vaughn, a former University of Michigan football player and sexual assault survivor, at the beginning of a celebration commemorating 100 days of protest organized by faculty to show support of the survivors of the late former University doctor Robert Anderson. The event was planned by Art & Design Professor Rebekah Modrak. The School of Art & Design partially funded the commemoration.

Speaking at the University of Michigan Museum of Art (UMMA) Wednesday night, Weineck and LSA professor Allison Alexy granted Vaughn an honorary “Bachelor of Justice” degree, conferred to him on behalf of 302 faculty, and an unofficial honorary diploma commemorating his work on behalf of the survivors.

“It is my great joy to present you with the People’s degree,” Weineck said. “Hereby it is certified that upon recommendation of the rules of decency, the undersigned faculty of the University of Michigan have conferred upon Jonathan Stewart Vaughn, in recognition of his unflinching courage, public leadership and dedication to the cause of the institution’s integrity, the degree of honorary Bachelor of Justice.”

Applause from a standing ovation filled the room as Vaughn accepted his degree, along with a black felt graduation cap and trophy. He tried to speak but was overcome by tears and emotion. Fellow Anderson survivor Chuck Christian comforted Vaughn with a pat on the back.

When Vaughn was able to speak, he began by thanking his mother, family, colleagues and supporters for helping to make the protest a success. He followed with critiques of the University’s leadership and

their handling of Dr. Anderson’s abuse.

“Nothing has changed in this toxic culture,” Vaughn said. “Ex-president Schlissel just got caught, and Mary Sue Coleman knows where all the bodies are buried. We will not let that stand.”

He continued to condemn other members of the University administration, including the Board of Regents, for their “persistent silence” on abuse scandals in the University community. Vaughn called out each regent by name for their failure to meet with him individually to discuss systematic change on campus.

“Your constructive knowledge, functional blindness and incredible guilt needs no introduction,” Vaughn said. “I will not be the scapegoat. You need to prove that you are serious and committed to not allowing this type of atrocity to ever happen again.”

Vaughn also called for the removal of the Bo Schembechler statue and renaming of Schembechler Hall. Others in the community have also called for removal of the statue; last November, an anonymous local resident splattered red paint over the statue. Vaughn told The Michigan Daily last semester that the act was not associated with his protest.

Vaughn said he is willing to testify before Congress like the survivors of Larry Nassar, a former Michigan State University gymnastics coach. He then requested a meeting with Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist to discuss the legacy of Anderson and his abuse at the University. Vaughn ended his speech by stressing the importance of the unification and empowerment of sexual abuse survivors everywhere.

“We are sons and daughters, fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters,” Vaughn said. “We are teammates. We are citizens in your districts (and) in your states. But most importantly, we are all

survivors of something. We stand together as victorious victims. And whether they speak it or not, none of my brothers or sisters are John or Jane Doe. I will never be John Doe, I will always be Jon Vaughn.”

Following Vaughn’s speech, Kinesiology professor Stefan Szymanski read a letter from Business senior Job Mayhue to introduce Tad Deluca, an Anderson survivor and former U-M wrestler. In the letter, Mayhue, a current sprinter on the men’s track and field team, thanked Deluca for his bravery in being open about his story and in his fight against the University.

“It breaks me to try and imagine what it must have been (like) for you and the other athletes,” Mayhue wrote in the letter. “It angers me that everybody knew and nothing happened. … Thank you for being brave, because that bravery years later is lighting a fire in me to stand up for what is right.”

Deluca recounted the details of a phone call with Vaughn on Oct. 8, 2021 — the day Vaughn began his protest — and shared how the protest has altered his long-standing negative view of Ann Arbor.

“Leaders and the Best in my mind until quite recently was a charade,” Deluca said. “It was intentional malfeasance, intentional lack of integrity. I was ashamed of life. I hid it as much as I could. So tonight, I have to make this right … I want to thank everyone in this room for giving me a large chunk of my life back to me. You are the leaders, and you are the best.”

Chuck Christian, former U-M football player and Anderson survivor, spoke to the crowd following Deluca. In his speech, Christian described the struggles he faced when he was diagnosed with cancer in 2016, struggles he attributes to the abuse he experienced in college while being a patient of Dr. Anderson.

Hundreds of students, faculty and community members at the University of Michigan gathered in the Hill Auditorium Tuesday afternoon to officially inaugurate and install University President Santa Ono into office. Delegates and representatives from nearly 50 other universities also attended the ceremony.

University Provost Laurie McCauley opened the ceremony, welcoming Ono and commending him for his work thus far at the University. McCauley also described Ono’s ability to match the present needs of the University.

“During every major chapter in history … our presidents have been responsible for asking the fundamental question: how can the University of Michigan contribute to the public good in this moment?” McCauley said. “Today I’m so proud to say, without a doubt, that we have found someone worthy to ask and answer that fundamental question.”

Victor J. Dzau, president of the United States National Academy of Medicine, spoke after McCauley and mentioned that Ono is the first Asian-American president in the University’s history, going on to describe Ono’s ability to connect with a community.

“(Ono) is driven by his mission and values, which allowed him to persevere through challenges and provide steady compassionate guidance through difficult times,” Dzau said.

Allen Liu, associate professor of mechanical engineering and chair of the Senate Advisory Committee on University Affairs, welcomed Ono on behalf of the University faculty and expressed his hopes for a fruitful partnership between the faculty and Ono.

“I’m confident that under Ono’s leadership we will grow and prosper as an institution,” Liu said. “On behalf of the faculty, I will once again give my warmest welcome to Ono, and we look forward to having a positive and collaborative relationship with Ono for many years to come.”

Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist

Ono on behalf of the state of Michigan and spoke about the University — his alma mater — and its value as a place of empowerment for its students.

“The University of Michigan is nothing if not a place where people come to respond to cynicism with sincerity and despair with determination,” Gilchrist said.

“That embodies who we are as Michiganders: bold problem solvers who are not afraid to think outside of every box.”

Hanna Holborn Gray, former president of the University of Chicago, spoke about the challenges that come with working in higher education, which she said she believes Ono will face during his presidency.

“The world of higher education is struggling, today, with a widespread sense of crisis, a time of questioning and sharp conflict over the quality and constant performance of its institutions, of doubt as to whether higher education is doing its job, uncertainty as to what that job should be and how it should be accomplished,” Gray said. Gray went on to express her confidence in Ono’s ability to face the challenges she described.

“You understand the current problems very well, and you will confront them, as you have always done, with determination, openness, with patience and courage, consulting widely and wisely to reach solutions that will command respect,” Gray said.

Professor Earl Lewis, director and

founder of the U-M Center for Social Solutions, spoke in a video message played in the auditorium about the importance of service in the role of a university president. Lewis also urged the students, faculty and staff to work with Ono to enact change.

“Today, I call on the University of Michigan community to engage, to challenge when called for, to support when necessary, to advance always, to care deeply and to believe in the power of this great institution to transform lives, and thereby the world,” Lewis said.

The speeches were interspersed with performances from U-M professors, students and Ono’s brother. Following the speeches, Paul Brown, chair of the Board of Regents, formally installed Ono as U-M president.

Ono went on to address the audience, giving thanks to the leadership, faculty, staff and students of the University, as well as those who spoke at the ceremony and his family.

“Thank you again, all of you, for this opportunity and for your faith in me,” Ono said. “It is a singular honor and privilege to be inaugurated today to serve as the University of Michigan’s 15th president.”

Ono proceeded to delineate his objectives and priorities as president, which include supporting diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, highlighting the physical and mental health of students, and finding solutions to the climate issues prevalent in the world.

Michigan

welcomed

ANNA FUDER/Daily.

MARTHA LEWAND Daily Staff Reporter

‘You are funding genocide’: TAHRIR members protest during 101st Annual

Honors Convocation

In an interview with The Michigan Daily, SAFE board member Zainab Hakim said she and other TAHRIR members chose to interrupt Ono’s speech because the convocation represents excellence at the University.

with The Daily after the ceremony ended, Ryan said he supports the protesters and believes the University should invest its money elsewhere.

The University of Michigan’s 101st Annual Honors Convocation was cut short as about 100 U-M students staged a demonstration condemning the University’s investment in companies profiting from Israel’s military campaign in Gaza. Students held signs reading “Divest Now,” “30,000 killed” and “No Honor in Genocide,” among the rows of Hill Auditorium’s audience and on stage. The protest interrupted a speech by University President Santa Ono, who sat down and later left the stage as hundreds of attendees left the auditorium. The protest was organized by the TAHRIR Coalition, a coalition of more than 80 U-M student organizations, including Students Allied for Freedom and Equality, and continued outside after the ceremony concluded early.

“(The ceremony) is one of those things that symbolizes, ‘Oh, we’re such an excellent university,’ like Leaders and the Best,” Hakim said. “It’s like, ‘Oh, actually, you’re not that good of a university. You can’t call yourself the best if you’re funding genocide, if you’ve repeatedly refused to divest from Israel and a war of occupation when you clearly can.’ ”

Outside, protesters circled Hill Auditorium and the outdoor tent with convocation refreshments, shouting chants such as “Regents, regents you can’t hide, you are funding genocide” and “Regents going on the attack, what do we do? Stand up, fight back.”

Engineering senior Joseph Ryan attended the ceremony while the protest unfolded. In an interview

“I would say I do support (the protesters) because they do have the power to reinvest that money, and we’ve got some really good investors on this campus, and I’m sure they could find something else,” Ryan said.

Other U-M students expressed frustration with the disruption of the Honors Convocation. LSA sophomore Alexander Kaminski told The Daily the protest interrupted a time when he and other students had family members from out of town in attendance.

“I very much support people sticking up for their opinion,” Kaminski said. “I just think the manner in which this was done was disruptive of people’s achievements and taking away from something that people deserved.”

In an interview with The Daily, LSA senior Nicole Wan, organizer of

the protest and co-president of the U-M ACLU Undergraduate Chapter, which is part of the TAHRIR Coalition, said the movement to divest is important to her even as someone who is not personally affected by the Israel-Hamas war, and that she hopes to use her privilege to advocate for others.

“Movements like this are really important to me,” Wan said. “Being someone who has the privilege to speak up, who is not affected by Islamophobia or antisemitism, I feel like I should speak up.”

In an email to The Michigan Daily, University spokesperson Colleen Mastony wrote that while the University administration supports students’ right to protest, the disruption at the Honors Convocation was a violation of U-M policy.

“We recently reiterated our commitment to free speech and free expression with the adoption of a statement of principles that is guided by the letter and spirit of the First Amendment,” Mastony wrote.

“Although we support students’ right to protest, such rights are not limitless. Disrupting speakers and events is not protected speech and is a clear violation of university policy. More than 1,800 students who earned honors were registered to attend Honors Convocation. The ceremony was almost complete and all student awards had been given out by the time the protest began.”

Wan said the TAHRIR Coalition chose to protest at the convocation because it offered the chance to speak directly to key members of the U-M administration.

“We mainly decided that we should speak up while we’re at the Honors Convocation because Ono was speaking there, and also, the Board of Regents was present at the Honors Convocation,” Wan said. “The Board of Regents and President Ono vote on approving the investments of the University’s endowment and the endowment, as you might know, from (the) TAHRIR Divest! Don’t Arrest campaign. The endowment supports the Israeli

military campaign that is continuing the ongoing genocide.”

In a statement to the U-M community released Tuesday evening, Ono expressed his disapproval with the protesters’ interruption of the event and wrote that it was not in line with the University’s principles on freedom of expression.

“The protesters’ intrusion on one of the university’s most important academic traditions was unacceptable,” Ono wrote. “It was not in keeping with our student code and our longstanding policy on freedom of speech and artistic expression.”

Ono also stated the administration would begin drafting a policy on disruption of U-M events with the University community.

“Tomorrow, we will begin seeking feedback from the university community on a draft policy governing disruption of university operations, including academic and social activities, events, gatherings, and celebrations,” Ono wrote.

GEO strikes for the second time in three years

The University of Michigan Graduate Employees’ Organization announced in a tweet March 27 that they will begin striking. The strike will officially start Wednesday, March 29 at 10:24 a.m., which will be initiated by a walk out at that time. This announcement comes after GEO members authorized leadership to call for a strike in their meeting a week earlier, with 95% of members voting in favor of a work stoppage. The last GEO strike took place three years ago in fall 2020.

The strike comes after five months of negotiations with the University without a compromise reached on a new three-year contract agreement.

In a press release, GEO claimed that striking is the natural next step in their ongoing activism, including protesting Ono’s inauguration and filing unfair labor practice charges against the University in March. In the press release, GEO said they hope it will help encourage the University to meet their demands. Throughout their negotiations, GEO has asked that graduate employee salaries increase to $38,537 per year, claiming that what they are currently being paid is not a liveable wage in Ann Arbor. They have also asked for improvements in their current health care plan and for the University to make alterations to campus security.

In response to GEO members authorizing a strike, University President Santa Ono and University

and

bargaining

JEREMY WEINE/Daily

ELLEN DREJZA & AMANDA VENCLOVAITE-PIRANI Daily Staff Reporters

Students and Ann Arbor community members protest the University’s investment in companies profiting off Israel’s military campaign in Gaza outside Hill Auditorium during the Honors Convocation Sunday afternoon.

RILEY HODDER Daily News Editor

ANNA FUDER/Daily

ARTS over the YEARS

2021

2022

2023

2024

AUGUST 15 - The social networking app Yik Yak is relaunched, igniting anonymous and unfiltered discourse in Ann Arbor and beyond on all matter of topics, mundane or illicit.

SEPTEMBER 3 - Drake releases his sixth studio album Certified Lover Boy, which debuts at number one on the Billboard 200 but faces mixed critical reception for its lack of depth, collaboration, or innovative additions from his typical work.

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NOVEMBER 11 - Ann Arbor band Kingfisher releases their debut studio album, Grip Your Fist, I’m Heaven Bound as they grow beyond their status as the new college band on campus.

NOVEMBER 18 - The Berlin Philharmonic returns to the University of Michigan’s Hill Auditorium, performing symphonies by Erich Korngold and Gustav Mahler in an electrifying Ann Arbor concert.

Ann Arbor’s Yik Yak scene

LAINE BROTHERTON Daily Arts Writer

Anonymity is the internet’s most sacred asset. The freedom to say anything, to ignore the draconian social rules of everyday life, is what made the anonymous messaging application Yik Yak popular after its initial launch in 2013. The app shut down in 2017 after cyberbullying concerns, but in August of this year, Yik Yak re-appeared in app stores. This Yik Yak is a buggy yet functional reincarnation of its previous self — the app centers around “yaks,” text posts with a 200-character limit shown to anyone within a five-mile radius. Users can upvote or downvote posts, and enough upvotes can earn yaks a spot on the “Local Top Yaks”; yaks that receive more than five downvotes are hidden from the feed. Each poster is nameless; the only way to tell users apart is from their representative emoji randomly chosen by the app — this can be changed at any time.

Whether it’s from the nostalgia of the 2010s, the excitement of returning to campus after a year and a half or the innate desire to connect with people, the Ann Arbor Yik Yak bubble has been populated with hundreds, possibly thousands, of University of Michigan students. From South Quad to the UGLi to North Campus to the Blue Leprechaun, Ann Arbor’s pandemic-weary student body has yikked every yak, putting every fleeting thought on blast no matter how obscene. It’s unclear exactly how many people actively use Yik

Yak, but the archive of “Local Top Yaks” gives an idea — the most popular yak in the area exceeds 450 upvotes, which doesn’t account for the additional downvotes the post may have received or the users who simply didn’t interact.

Over the last several weeks, I’ve happily shoved aside impending midterms and assignments to pursue the more stimulating task of researching the University’s Yik Yak scene. At first, I tried to reach out to the Yik Yak community and ask them what they would like to say to The Daily. The responses included, but were not limited to:

“Don’t go to class, eat ass,” “Fuck MSU,” “No one in the daily knows how big my dick is” and “balls.”

With this, I determined that the best move forward would be to leave the yakkers up to their own devices and simply observe. So, I did — from morning to evening, I took in every new yak, scrolling with abandon during any and all spare moments. With a paralyzing amount of confessionals, complaints, jokes and drunken rambles, I was able to interpret Yik Yak as a microcosm of local youth culture. Yik Yak is a place for speaking your mind — evidently, the minds of U-M students are fraught with dysfunctional group projects, midterms, Math 116 assignments on “WeBWorK” and the hassle of finding an unoccupied study space in any campus building. On a fundamental level, all students can relate to personal experiences with stress and exhaustion. After all, suffering is easier when it’s shared. When the dining halls are open, you might see complaints about the long lines at South Quad or the

quality of the food from that day.

One user posts detailed dining hall reviews, ranking their experience with the culinary competence of Gordon Ramsay. Other notable yak topics include the resounding shrieks of 6 a.m. Amtrak trains, midnight fire alarms at the residence halls, offensive B.O. on the Bursley-Baits Loop and scathing fraternity slander. The lighthearted innocence of Yik Yak stops there. Sometimes, actually most of the time, yaks lean towards the cruder side — on a midOctober evening, an influx of yaks revolved around an alleged pooprelated incident in the Stockwell showers. With 62 upvotes, the sentiments of many residents were memorialized in the following yak, “Trying to go to sleep but I cannot knowing the stockwell shitter walks free.” As much as there was disgust, the jokes ran rampant too: one yak reads, “Just went to take a shit in Stockwell and there was a shower in the way??!” and another “McCarthyism, but it’s the poop in the shower.”

On the other end of the “out-ofpocket” spectrum, hormones rage with reckless abandon. After the sun goes down, roughly one out of every three yaks is a cry for help, an S.O.S. from the throes of loneliness.

I couldn’t forget them if I tried: “I’m so down bad I might just try finding love with the next snapchat sex bot that adds me” and “what are boobs?

I’m a visual learner btw” are the tamest of the tame. The efforts of Yik Yak’s community guardrails are of no avail of even the most vulgar expressions of biological needs.

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JULY 21 - “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” release to theaters on the same day; double-screenings of “Barbenheimer” vault both films to box office success and iconic status despite their controversial storytelling.

OCTOBER 20 - Super Mario Bros. Wonder is released for the Nintendo Switch, overhauling the iconic sidescroller’s artistic style to massive success while Sonic Superstars fails to impress.

JANUARY 15 - The 75th Primetime Emmy Awards are held, with “Succession,” “The Bear” and “Beef” winning big in a night full of sweeps and no surprises, the deserved celebration dominating the night.

Kingfisher—more than just the new band on campus

Ann Arbor is full of college bands. They play at dingy venues downtown, parking lot tailgates and backyard parties behind oddly shaped homes. They play “Crazy” by Gnarls Barkley and “Someday” by the Strokes. They make for a great time and a great party: you dance, you sing, you have a blast. But after a while, all those college bands, playing those same college songs, sort of start to blend together. And then along came Kingfisher. Kingfisher is not not a college band. That is, all 12 of them are U-M undergrads, and all of them live within two blocks of each other in Kerrytown. But, as anyone who has been to their shows or listens to their music will tell you, Kingfisher is a lot more than just the new band on campus. Kingfisher does things different.

I was able to sit down with the group on two consecutive afternoons — once last Sunday in an LSA conference room and then again in East Hall’s math atrium next to the ping-pong table. The following article is based on those conversations.

“When you come to a Kingfisher concert, it’s like: ‘Ok, you’re coming to see Kingfisher.’ We’re not entertainment for a party. We’re trying to do more,” lead singer and songwriter and senior Sam DuBose said. Doing “more” means a lot of things.

In the studio, doing “more” means eight musicians, two visual artists and two photographers, all collaborating on one original album, Grip Your Fist, I’m Heaven Bound, which came out on Friday, Nov. 11, at midnight. It means senior guitarist Ben Wood spending four hours with a keyboard and a computer, trying to mimic the intonations of a trumpet solo just to have one measure of the riff spliced and looped by the group’s producer, senior Sam Botero, who doubles on alto-sax.

Kingfisher doesn’t leave the extra effort in the studio: They do more on stage, too.

“When we perform, we’re trying to curate an experience,” Botero said. “We’re trying to explore emotions and express them in song.”

But they’re not always trying to express the same emotion. Kingfisher crafts an original set for each performance, changing the vibe of the show to fit the vibe of the night. Venue permitting, the Kingfisher visual team — STAMPS seniors Gray Snyder and Sky Christoph — fix up set-specific projections, which they sync up to the songs’ vocals and work wonders for setting the tone of the night. Some nights the chosen tone is something of an intimate sadness. They often ask their audience to sit. That way, DuBose said, “The audience (can) listen to the band play, not just listen to what the band plays.” Tears are encouraged but not required.

But last month at The Blind Pig, Kingfisher decided to curate a more energetic intimacy. This was partially necessitated by the space:

Berlin Philharmonic electrifies Hill Auditorium during Ann Arbor residency

No one wants to pop-a-squat on that musty pig floor. Instead, Kingfisher encouraged the mosh. They swelled the jams and slammed the cymbals. Senior bassist Tyler Thenstedt and sophomore drummer Casey Cheatham laid down a continuous stream of fiery beats. Senior violinist Kaysen Chown closed her eyes and unleashed. Brass specialists Connor Hoyt and Callum Roberts, both seniors, lit up center stage with sweeping, red-faced solos. They had the audience dancing and shoving their way through a riot of a night. Emotional range unlocked. So things seem to be going pretty well for Ann Arbor’s latest breakthrough college band. Their newest album medleys heartfelt ballads and instrumental extremes. Their gigs are intimate, emotional, rowdy and attentively well-attended. But Kingfisher have a big problem on their artistic hands: figuring out what comes next. They already have plans for a second album, but they’re going to have to work against the clock.

As I’m sure you’ve noticed, most of the group’s members are seniors. And as is often the case with seniors, they are graduating and have no intention of hanging around campus. You read that right: Ann Arbor’s brightest band is leaving college and leaving Ann Arbor.

“We love it here,” Botero explained, “but we want to share what we’re making with people who don’t know us and don’t know our music.”

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There’s a common perception that the broad genre of classical music is “dead.” It isn’t a new feeling: When 18th-century composer and music critic Robert Schumann dubbed a young Johannes Brahms the successor to Ludwig van Beethoven in the late 19th century, he tacitly suggested that Beethoven was the peak of music to that point. When Brahms struggled under the weight of those expectations, taking 20 years to compose his first symphony, it started to seem like the age of Beethoven was an insurmountable pinnacle of music.

Schumann and Brahms died over a hundred years ago, but the perceived downward trend of classical music has persisted due to the genre’s aging audience, the challenge orchestras face in maintaining financial solvency and the extent to which Beethoven and other long-dead Romantic-era composers continue to overshadow modern composers. But is classical music really dying? The Berlin Philharmonic’s recent Ann Arbor

residency would suggest the exact opposite. During their stay in Ann Arbor, the orchestra brought to life some of the greatest and most underappreciated classical compositions, and engaged the local community, attracting huge audiences at both of their Hill Auditorium performances and several masterclasses at the University of Michigan’s School of Music, Theatre & Dance. To open their two-concert series at Hill, the Berlin Philharmonic showcased the work of Grand Rapids-born modern composer Andrew Norman, performing his 2008 piece “Unstuck.” The piece, named after an iconic line from Kurt Vonnegut’s “Slaughterhouse-Five,” perfectly translates the chaotic time-travel-driven suspense of the novel into musical form, with different musical ideas repeating themselves unpredictably in varied voices throughout its brief duration. The piece was an excellent showcase for the stunning acoustics of Hill Auditorium. In its softest moments, the delicately placed pizzicato notes could be heard just as clearly from the first rows of the main floor to the back of the auditorium. In the piece’s loudest moments, the

different instruments were perfectly balanced and crisp.

Following “Unstuck,” concertmaster Noah Bendix-Balgley led the Berlin Philharmonic in a performance of Mozart’s “Violin Concerto No. 1,” an infrequently performed piece that is one of Mozart’s earlier works, composed when he was still a teenager. For fans of the orderly and regimented style of classical music Mozart mastered, Bendix-Balgley and the Berlin Phil’s performance was nothing short of perfection, setting the standard for how Mozart should be played. For those who find Mozart boring and predictable, Bendix-Balgley’s varied and masterful solo playing was more than enough to keep the piece captivating. Additionally, hornists Stefan Dohr and Sarah Willis stood out for the right reasons, perfectly nailing a treacherously high and exposed accompaniment part in the condensed orchestra without backing from trumpets or low brass.

Rounding out the Berlin Philharmonic’s concert programs, their performance of Mahler’s seventh symphony was absolutely awe-inspiring. This image is from the official website of the Berlin Philharmonic.

The two highlights of the Berlin Philharmonic’s concerts were unquestionably their brilliant performances of Erich Korngold’s “Symphony in F Sharp Major” and Gustav Mahler’s “Symphony No. 7 in E Minor,” two overlooked masterpieces by renowned composers. In their performance of Korngold’s symphony, the Berlin Phil beautifully captured the anguish of an Austrian film music composer caught between political and artistic movements, a Hollywood innovator who watched from afar in the 1930s as war ravaged his homeland. Within the tried-and-true symphonic format, Korngold blurs the lines between romanticism and modernism. In romantic fashion, the first movement introduces melodic motifs that recur throughout the symphony, but those motifs often feature irregular tonality and rhythms, like the powerful horn line that appears in near isolation near the beginning and end of the symphony. Additionally, Korngold incorporates several film music tropes into the symphony — at times, it’s impossible not to hear similarities between Korngold and the younger John Williams.

Drake sees no reason to change the formula on ‘Certified Lover Boy’

Love him or hate him, it is undeniable that a Drake album release is a pop culture event. His studio album, 2018’s Scorpion, shattered every streaming record in the book upon its release in June of that year. Despite a mixed critical reception, Drake has proven time and again that he can make a hit like no other artist. However, when an artist has experienced recordbreaking success for more than a decade, they are susceptible to getting a little too comfortable.

Despite his many recent shortcomings, there’s a reason that Drake is one of the most-streamed musicians. In a release that is not even close to being his best, there are still multiple flashy moments in which the listener is reminded of his greatness. Highlights of the album include “Fair Trade,” a collaboration with frequent compatriot Travis Scott. Drake and Scott almost always come up big when they work together, and this track is no exception. The production is outstanding, as is standard on

While Certified Lover Boy broke the streaming records that Scorpion set on its release day, it is stylistically very similar. While Certified Lover Boy is fine to listen to (and even good at times), it comes off as lazy and uninspired from an artist who we know is capable of so much more.

Drake-Travis collaborations (like “Company” and “SICKO MODE”), and Travis continues the strong feature stretch he has been on leading up to the imminent release of his fourth studio album, Utopia. Drake has always been elite at effortlessly crafting high-quality hooks, and he keeps up the good work on “Fair Trade.” Another highlight from the album is the Future and Young Thug-assisted “Way 2 Sexy,” which interpolates Right Said Fred’s 1992 hit single, “I’m Too Sexy.” With “Way 2 Sexy,” the rappers have given us the male strip club anthem we never thought we needed; when coupled with a hilarious video in which Drake shows off his comedic chops, the song’s viral ascent is bound to

become an iconic cultural moment of this year. As is standard, Future has a brilliant outing, putting together a hook that will be screamed in clubs for years to come. The collaborations with trap artists are some of the most fun moments on the otherwise unremarkable album. Likewise, “Knife Talk,” featuring Atlanta’s 21 Savage and a sample of Memphis legend Project Pat’s vocals, is a welcome homage to the city that Drake’s dad hails from. 21 Savage continues the absolute tear he has been on since last year’s Savage Mode II, and Drake holds his own over a sinister trap instrumental. The best solo track on the album, by a large margin, is “TSU.” The song has been bouncing around the internet for a while as “Not

Around,” and the Pi’erre Bourne beat is perfect for a laid-back Drake croon about a relationship with a stripper. Bourne has been remarkably consistent with his production this year, and the spacey synths and heavenly vocal samples that have become his trademark could not be more apparent on “TSU.” However, all is not well in Drake’s world of champagne, strippers and private jets. Where Drake has previously succeeded at including meaningful introspection in his albums, his attempts fall flat on Certified Lover Boy. While songs like “Champagne Poetry” sound like a moment for Drake to be candid, they are ultimately rehashes of the snotty braggadocio he has previously explored. “I’m rich and

famous, but I’m still sad” is a tired rap trope, but Drake seemingly hasn’t gotten the message yet, as at least four songs on the album are built around this theme. “7am on Bridle Path” is another notable example, with corny bars like “Don’t move like a puto / could at least keep it a buck like Antetokounmpo,” and a few notso-subtle shots at a certain rapper who also dabbles in fashion design. While both sides of the DrakeKanye beef seem manufactured, Drake’s diss bars are formulaic and boring. At least on Kanye’s side, he did his part to make the beef look like more than an obvious marketing ploy by “leaking” Drake’s address in Toronto.

JOSHUA MEDINTZ Daily Arts Writer

RYAN BRACE Daily Arts Writer

JACK MOESER Daily Arts Writer

‘Barbie’ gets worse and less feminist when you push past the jokes

ERIN EVANS Daily Ars Writer

The “Barbie” movie could have been alright if it weren’t directed by Greta Gerwig, who until this point we have had no reason to distrust.

Her film “Lady Bird” is an offbeat coming-of-age story for an oft-infuriating character whose emotional proximity to the viewer makes her impossible not to love. Gerwig’s take on “Little Women” could make any viewer’s childhood look bleak by comparison. The March sisters’ bonds and individual journeys are innovative despite the age of their source material. Even “Frances Ha,” which Gerwig wrote and in which she stars, while not as polished, is an intimate portrait of a love- and life-affirming character.

So “Barbie” didn’t just have whatever expectations one might have of a live-action Barbie movie. It had the expectations of a Gerwig film — something personal, something moving, a tight and sensical script. We might not expect a “live-action Barbie movie” to be flawless. In fact, had Gerwig not raised expectations, the movie might have exceeded them. There are some quite catchy musical numbers. It’s kind of like “Grease” with even more outfit changes, a pastel and pink color scheme, blonder hair and the polish of a blockbuster production budget. As is, any flaws are glaring. Instead of thinking “Wow, I didn’t think I would like a Barbie movie, but that was quite enjoyable for the most part,” I feel betrayed. The colors, the music, the production value all feel like an admittedly well-constructed

mask for a mediocre-at-best script. Where is Gerwig in all this? I trusted her. I came into that theater confident I would walk out emotionally altered, at the least. Why am I leaving mildly confused that the greatest emotional response I had was the desire for Ken’s fluffy, rainbow “I am Kenough” hoodie?

Yes, there are some good jokes. The film starts with the reference to “2001: A Space Odyssey” seen in early trailers: Little girls play with baby dolls in a desert, only to shatter them against the rocks when Stereotypical Barbie (Margot Robbie, “Babylon”) enters the scene. The film’s inciting incident is funny because of how out of character it seems: Barbie starts having irrepressible thoughts of death, a pivot from her joyous, pink demeanor. Ken’s (Ryan Gosling, “Drive”) entire arc is a joke. When he and Stereotypical Barbie travel — by car, boat, spaceship, tandem bike, camper van, snowmobile and roller skates — from Barbie Land to the real world, Ken discovers that despite what the Barbies in Barbie Land believe, “men rule the world.” He is enchanted by patriarchy, at least his limited understanding of it — men and horses. He boasts to Barbie that a woman asked him for the time. Ken’s friend Allan (Michael Cera, “Scott Pilgrim vs. the World”) has been to the real world many times and claims that all of *NSYNC was composed of escaped Allans. Later, the film is interrupted by an ad for “Depression Barbie,” who bears a perpetual frown and mascara-stained under eyes, eats Starbursts until her jaw hurts and keeps watching reruns of BBC’s “Pride and Prejudice.”

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‘Sonic Superstars’ is one unpolished step back, ‘Super Mario

Bros. Wonder’

HUNTER BISHOP & SAARTHAK JOHRI Senior Arts Editor & Digital Culture Beat Editor

Coke vs. Pepsi. The Beatles vs. the Beach Boys. “Gangnam Style” vs. “What Does the Fox Say?” Popular culture has been torn in two by battles like these, fights that pit two phenomena against each other and lets the fans duke it out in fits of capitalistic tribalism. But no battle has been as impactful (at least to nerds like us) as Mario vs. Sonic.

In 1991, Mario was the king of video games. After three entries on the Nintendo Entertainment System, the latest entry in the Mario franchise, “Super Mario World,” had just been released for the Super Nintendo in

one wonderful leap forward

North America, and would go on to sell 20 million copies. But a new player was about to enter the field.

Released just months before “Super Mario World,” “Sonic the Hedgehog” introduced the world to the titular blue hedgehog, which would bring Sega’s Genesis console up to speed with the Super Nintendo. Ad campaigns further inflamed this rivalry, including the infamous “Genesis does what Nintendon’t” commercial featuring Michael Jackson. In the years since, both franchises have continued to produce games, toys and even movies. However, one fact has remained constant: Mario is the top dog, and Sonic is (ironically) leagues behind, both in terms of sales and cultural appreciation. The announcements of “Super Mario Bros. Wonder” and “Sonic Superstars” seemed like opportunities for both franchises to

return to an era when competition between the two was still fiery.

“Wonder” revived the long-stagnant 2-D Mario games and “Superstars” offered a “reimagining” of the 2-D Sonic games of old. Two Digital Culture writers have purchased each game (both priced at $60) to bring them back into the ring for you today.

May the best game win.

Hunter: With the release of “The Super Mario Bros. Movie,” it seemed like Nintendo had solidified the new era of Mario. The movie, while creative in its casting choices and soundtrack, played its story safe, holding itself very closely to the limited lore that the mainline games present. After more than a decade of repetitive mainline games (the “New Super” series), seeing the movie adaptation refuse to push any boundaries felt like a solidification of

The 75th Emmy Awards

the fears many Mario fans had: That the suspender-clad plumber we all knew and loved had stagnated, choosing to live a life of IP surety, content with starring in games that retread the same tired themes and mechanics.

And then came June, bringing with it a new Nintendo Direct. After a string of other Mario-related titles (including the remake of “Luigi’s Mansion: Dark Moon” and a new game with Peach as the protagonist), Nintendo unveiled the newest game in the Mario series: “Super Mario Bros. Wonder.” The trailer, filled with talking flowers, wacky visuals and Mario transforming into an elephant, made it clear that Nintendo was gunning for a game that was anything but safe.

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were all sweeps and no surprises

SERENA IRANI Daily Arts Writer

This year marks the 75th anniversary of the Emmy Awards, and the Television Academy has spared no expense. They ditched the stand-up comedian routine (and dodged the bullet that massacred the Golden Globe Awards) by having Anthony Anderson (“blackish”) as the host and, for the first time, did an opening monologue that wasn’t chock full of halfhearted jokes about all of the famous people in the audience. I, for one, deeply appreciated it. Instead, Anderson waxed nostalgic about iconic TV theme songs, serenading us with the intros from “Good Times,” “The Facts of Life” and “Miami Vice.” It was not quite as theatrical as the Tony Awards, but still a fun musical return to form for the Emmys.

They did lay on the whole “love letter to television” schtick pretty thick, but it kind of worked. For once, they actually used their celebrity presenters fairly well — mini-cast reunions and comedic bits are old hat at award shows, but this year the Emmys really did pull out all of the stops. We got cast reunions on iconic TV sets like the bar from “Cheers,” the hospital room from “Grey’s Anatomy,” the therapist’s office from “The Sopranos” and the gender-neutral bathroom from “Ally McBeal.” It was probably great fun for the older crowd of TV fans, who are now presumably the award show’s target audience. As always, the show wasn’t without its snubs. “Better Call Saul” set the unfortunate record for most nominations of a TV series (a whopping 53) with zero wins. Ouch. For the first time in five seasons, “The Crown” went home empty-handed. Tough year for the

Brits. Save for Jennifer Coolidge’s win, “The White Lotus” did not do nearly as well as last year — though that may have more to do with its migration from the limited series to the highly competitive drama category than an actual decline in quality. Personally, I would have loved to see a win for “Jury Duty,” as it was one of the most original and inventive comedies we have had in a long time. Don’t get me wrong, I love seeing a great show get acclaim in its time, but the number of sweeps this year was kind of ridiculous. The directing, writing and outstanding series awards all went to the same three shows: “Succession,” “The Bear” and “Beef.” I’m sure these voting bodies strive for objectivity, but it happens far too often to call it sheer luck. Any sensible TV fan likes a healthy dose of drama, and sweeps make the award show viewing experience predictable and unexciting. Well, there’s

always next year. Now, on to the fun stuff!

Best Drama Series — “Succession” I’m not surprised. You’re not surprised. And for good reason. For the last three consecutive seasons, “Succession” has taken home the gold with this award. I know every other HBO drama still on the air just let out a huge sigh of relief because this was the show’s fourth and final season. It closed out the Emmys with 75 nominations and 19 wins in the show’s complete run. As sad as I was to watch it end, what a phenomenal ending it was. Grappling with loss, ego and betrayal by the boatload, the Roys were in supremely fine form this season. The writing, directing and acting work from the cast and crew were in perfect synergy, making this a well-deserved win for a show firing on all cylinders.

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Study ID: HUM00207056

JAMES SCARBOROUGH

On March 27, 2024, the University’s Office of Public Affairs circulated a campus-wide email soliciting input on a “Disruptive Activity Policy” draft formulated in response to a protest during the 101st Honors Convocation ceremony. The second primary provision of the draft is as follows:

“2. No Person may disrupt the University Operations of UM Facilities, including but not limited to the communications or activities of speakers or performers on University Facilities, or of any class, laboratory, seminar, examination, performance, formal proceeding, activity in a reserved space, field trip, or other educational, research, artistic, athletic, medical, operational, or service activity occurring on UM Facilities by obstructing lines of sight, making loud or amplified noises, projecting light or images, or otherwise creating substantive distractions.”

This policy would essentially grant the administration the authority to punish students and faculty participating in any demonstration, protest or rally perceived as disruptive.

Consequences could extend to suspension or, more severely, expulsion and termination. The draft has not officially passed, yet its hooks are already being sunk into the student body. Three students involved in the Honor Convocation protest have received police citations for “trespassing” at a public event. U-M seeks feedback, so here’s

Michigan in Color

2022 2023

What we’ve earned through disruption

mine: The proposed Disruptive Activity Policy directly infringes upon our First Amendment rights. The right to protest is constitutionally protected, and our university’s own student body has a long-standing history of utilizing this precedent. Let’s call this what it truly is: an embarrassing attempt to force student protestors to put down their Palestinian flags, remove their kuffiyahs, quiet their chants and become complicit in genocide. It won’t work.

Not only would this protocol keep

students from protesting against the University, it would also bar us from creating civil disobedience in response to global and domestic issues, criminalizing examples of U-M student activism such as the anti-Vietnam war movement demonstrations, anti-Asian hate protests in March 2021, and BLM protests in the summer of 2020, etc. Disruption works. The University of Michigan’s legacy showcases countless advancements for marginalized populations that prove this.

In 1965, a cohort of faculty members took a stand against the U.S. bombing campaign targeting Hanoi by declaring a teaching strike. Faced with the prospect of disciplinary measures if they halted classes, they opted to intensify their teachings through aroundthe-clock extracurricular sessions focused on Vietnam. Faculty disruption birthed the concept of a “teach-in.” Teach-ins are still prolific throughout numerous campuses nationwide, educating the masses on the intricacies of

Premarital eye contact and its consequences

look like someone who has never been in love. I stared at the straight line of her mouth and blinked because that was all I could do. She said it with the same tone she would use to tell me that I have two eyes and two lips and two nostrils. The facts of my life and my love are obvious to her, somehow, and as unsettled as I was by this, I knew that she had never been in love either. That truth was written somewhere in the space between her eyebrows, in the greenish veins underneath the thin skin of her face. My friend is a pale green, the color of a matcha latte with too much milk and sugar that tastes good anyway, which may be why she is my friend. My green is darker. Both of us are crisp and young, our inexperience fresh like kale and lettuce. In the Hallmark movies my mother watches, love finds protagonists easily and predictably. The few sharp edges around a relationship are cured by a kiss in swirling styrofoam snow. For me, love is “Christmas in July.” It is performative, unreal, intangible. It exists on a screen, carefully constructed for two straight Midwestern WASPs who only wear ugly flannel and boots that never seem broken in. It will never be real for me. In the old Bollywood movies I watch with my mother, people also fall in love simply. All they have to do is lock eyes before they decide they will die for each other. Their love is incongruous with what I grew up seeing in my Indian community, marred by arranged marriages and domestic strife. My mother spends hours on the phone talking to women her age, all complaining about their husbands. Some of them have husbands that beat them and others have husbands that beat their kids and most of them have husbands that never put dirty plates in the sink. Having a husband is hell but they all ask when my eldest sister will get married so that she can suffer too. None of us know what a marriage is supposed to look like.

I don’t know what eros looks like, either, not in real life. My friends describe their partners and romantic encounters to me and I feel like I’m watching mating rituals in an aquarium. Bathed in blue light, I watch as they dance and cling to each other, my own face mirrored on the glass and disrupting my view. There is tenderness and care in their dance but also a sort of desperation. They’ll die if they stop dancing. Anything, even something awful, is better than loneliness. In her essay Bluets, Maggie Nelson writes, “Loneliness is solitude with a problem.” Everyone in this aquarium is lonely, crushed by hundreds of meters of water above us. The worst loneliness I’ve ever experienced was on the third floor of East Quad, sequestered in a dorm room during the winter semester of 2021. We had not yet gotten vaccinated. The Diag was gray and empty and my cheeks were always cold. During the daytime, I slept on the bed reserved for napping, and when I couldn’t sleep, I stared at the ceiling with dry eyes. I went days without speaking to anyone. That time did something irrevocable to me, something I to this day can’t explain. It feels as if someone peeled back layers of my skin and stitched a hermit into me.

Another friend — this one is electric blue — had a recent and brief obsession with online tarot readings. We picked cards that told us our fortune on her screen, the unrelenting fluorescent lights of the CCCB basement blurring moments into hours. Most of the quizzes involved picking six cards, and I always somehow ended up getting the hermit, a gray guy that looks like Gandalf. My electric blue friend always picked the magician, the talented face of Gandalf. The internet algorithms might have been looking at the lines in our faces through her laptop camera, understanding the truths that are written there. The online tarot told me that my current circumstances barred me from finding love. Not now, it seemed to say, not ever. Afterward, I opened Co-Star, which tells me that I’m having trouble with “love,” a fun fact that it tells me every day.

I’ve known my electric blue friend since middle school and we’ve oscillated between best friends and acquaintances ever since, depending on our schedules. She can take one look at me and know when I’m too tired to function, even though my eye bags always look the same. When I look at her, I think of the 12-year-old that used to help me with my pre-algebra homework. In

Safura Syed/MiC

college, she told me about sleeping with the boy that she loves, and my head started buzzing as if she had just poured Pop Rocks in my ears. We are children, I thought through the crackle. We are barely 13. When I was 6, I thought I would fall in love for the first time in high school. All I did was develop crushes on ugly libertarians.

I know that it isn’t love that I want, but attention. I confessed to being a narcissist to my friend over the phone recently. “I just want someone to tie my shoelaces,” I said, because I had just seen a show where the man gets on his knees to tie his girlfriend’s shoes. He ties them and remains like that — at her feet, on his knees, head bowed — for a few seconds, crying because they are breaking up. It’s all very romantic and sad and blue-black. He notices her shoelaces even as he is leaving her. His attention to detail is unmatched because he is not a real person. He never will be.

The friend on the other line is a smooth slate gray in an unnerving and calming way. Last semester, we created a character named Mack and tried to convince our other friends he was real. Mack was Irish Catholic and had a poster of Jesus on the ceiling above his bed.

political and social issues.

In 1968, on the day of Martin Luther King, Jr.’s burial, the Black Student Union took over the Administration Building (now the LSA Building) and chained themselves inside for five hours. This demonstration was accompanied by demands for increased Black student funding and faculty hires. Black student disruption led to the establishment of the Center for Afro-American and African Studies in 1970.

In the early 1970s, the Black

Action Movement spearheaded a monumental sit-in involving thousands of students and faculty, nearly bringing the University to a standstill. They prompted the University to address issues concerning admission and space allocation for Black students. Ironically enough, BAM protestors also staged a demonstration during an Honors Convocation. The Trotter House (now the Trotter Multicultural Center) and the Office of Special Services & Programs (now MESA), two essential safe spaces for BIPOC populations that spearhead much of the University’s DEI programming, only exist because of disruption. Further down the line, their work catalyzed a doubling in the number of faculty from underrepresented minority groups, a 10% increase in African American student enrollment, and heightened financial support for minority graduate students. In 1972, after several years of Chicano student activism, Michigan’s chapter of Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán was formed. The chapter focused its efforts on hiring a Chicano advocate in MESA. Students were met with pushback and forced to relentlessly pressure those in power. Chicano disruption birthed MECha and propelled the hiring of a Chicano advocate in 1973. As recently as 2022, negotiations between the Graduate Employees’ Organization and the University commenced for a new contract concerning Graduate Student Staff Assistants and Graduate Student Instructors.

Tea leaves and territories

NURAIYA MALIK MiC Columnist

The robust aroma of a Darjeeling or an Assam blend, rich bergamot oil and a sprinkle of jasmine leaves: tea is an emblem of British culture. Historically, the custom of tea drinking in England has been bound by rules of etiquette. From raising one’s pinky finger to napkin placement, the English have mastered the art of such unreasonable, yet ingrained, traditions. This dignified pastime was once reserved only for royals and the upper class, before filtering into other pockets of society during the 19th century. To this day, the affair of tea drinking charms royal families, overseas dignitaries and the masses.

Personally, I find no joy in Earl Grey or English Breakfast. The black tea base lacks depth, while the fruity flavor is an unsatisfactory essence. Yet, when I tell people that I am from London, they presume that finger sandwiches and scones are staples of my daily routine. There is always a playful ridicule of the refined British ritual of afternoon tea, one that I politely laugh off. Instead, my cup of tea is a comforting mug of pink Kashmiri chai. Mixed together with a vibrant symphony of cardamom and cinnamon spices and enhanced by the delightful crunch of pistachios layering the creamy chai, it is almost too easy to indulge in this sensory experience. Kashmiri chai dances like a kaleidoscope in a cup, its rosy opulence in stark contrast to its more subdued British counterpart.

Chai is woven into the social fabric of my culture, running through the veins of each Pakistani.

We like our flavors sweet, our spices rich and our chai piping hot. It is creamier in texture than British tea and, I would argue, richer in practice, too. In South Asia, the versatile art of chai spans every facet of life. An offer of chai marks the start of one’s day, a gesture of good faith in hard times or a sign of mutual respect. British tea, with its meticulous

regiment, encapsulates a pastime savored in the quiet of drawing rooms and tearooms. Conversely, chai transcends the boundaries of social stratification. It is as much at home in the energetic bustle of roadside dhabas (tea stalls) as in the intimacy of family homes. My perspective is deeply influenced by my grandparents’ unwavering devotion to their morning ritual. “A day without chai is a day not begun” — and they mean every word. I remember, and still witness, them sitting in the living room, relishing their cup of chai as though there was no greater joy. Their daily practice has now become the lens through which I view the rhythm of everyday life.

In this regard, there is one overwhelming distinction between British and South Asian teadrinking cultures. Every sip of Earl Grey is a nod to the British imperial footprint. After all, have you ever stopped to think about where Darjeeling and Assam tea leaves come from? Or why British tea-drinking culture coincidentally gained popularity around the time they expanded their already vast colonial empire into India?

Tea production was a source of agitation for the British in the 18th century, given that it was dominated by their Chinese competitors for many years prior.

At the time, tea was an expensive commodity for British consumers and highly sought after by their Indian colony for the essential ingredients of their cherished national drink. Therefore, when The East India Company discovered the cousin to Chinese tea in Assam, India, the British seized the opportunity to cultivate their own supply and intensify their colonial grasp on Indian industries. This British-controlled enterprise was instrumental in establishing and profiting from oppressive trade monopolies, further fortifying their grip on the Indian subcontinent. This discovery ushered in a new era for British tea drinkers: a once inaccessible luxury had now become a common delight in Britain.

SAFURA SYED 2023 MiC Managing Editor

UDOKA NWANSI MiC Columnist

Special thanks to Karla Bell, Seba (Historian) for the Black Student Union. The William Trotter Multicultural Center recently celebrated its 50th anniversary in February and with each passing milestone, there comes an even greater need to preserve the history and purpose of this building so we do not lose sight of the communities Trotter is supposed to serve. To learn more about Trotter’s history and its significance to Black students at the University of Michigan, I had the opportunity to sit down with Business senior Karla Bell, who serves as the Seba (Historian) on

the Black Student Union 2021-2022

Executive Board.

Trotter was originally called Trotter House and was colloquially known as the “Black House” amongst Black students. Directly resulting from the actions of the first (of three) Black Action Movements, Trotter House was built in 1971 as a Black Student Cultural Center to meet the needs of Black students on campus. When talking about the early beginnings of Trotter, Bell said, “Black students really only had Trotter, and it was neither in a safe location on campus nor well funded. Trotter was funded and built at the hands of student labor.” Trotter House was the host building for events for Black students, but they had to risk their safety to be able to use the space. Bell said, “At the time, Black people on

Michigan in Color

What Trotter means to us

campus were susceptible to violence and danger because (Trotter House) was off-campus in a poorly lit area. Yet still, they risked their wellbeing to be there.” In 1972, the original Trotter House burned down in a kitchen fire so the University bought a building on Washtenaw Avenue to house the student center. By 1981, Trotter House would expand its scope to become a multicultural student center. As the Trotter House expanded to include programming for students of all racial minorities on campus, Black Student Union executive board members tried to appeal for increased funding from the University to expand their efforts in promoting equity on campus. In 2013, undergraduate and graduate students began “A New Trotter Initiative,” a plan to have a

new multicultural center be built at the center of campus. After three years of advocating to the University of Michigan administration for a new building, a $10 million budget was finally approved in 2016 for the building of The William Trotter Multicultural Center. By 2019, Trotter had officially found a new home on South State Street and was open for student use. Currently, less than 4% of the U-M undergraduate population is Black, making it easy to feel like an outsider in most spaces on campus. Because of this, Trotter is an essential space for Black students. It exists as our place to congregate; it’s one of the only buildings on campus that feels as though it belongs to Black students — a home base of sorts where we can build fellowship, work together and exist in the

comfort of our own community. This is why Trotter is frequently used by organizations like BSU and HEADS (Here Earning A Destiny through Honesty, Eagerness, And Determination of Self) to hold their meetings. Students of Color, and specifically Black students, commonly frequent the multicultural center, which speaks to its necessity in the community. For me personally, I find myself in Trotter after a day of classes more often than not. I always know I’ll run into at least a few of my friends every time I step into the building. Between homework assignments, I’ll usually take a break from my work to make conversation with them and joke around. If I’m not doing homework or hanging out with friends, then usually I’m somehow finding my way into the

activities that might be going on in Trotter that day, like a game night or a cultural event. There is such an intrinsic sense of community in Trotter, which makes it unlike any other building on campus.

“If you’re coming into Trotter, learn the history of the space and respect the effort that it took to have this,” Bell said. “(Black) students lost their scholarships for this and faced consequences to have Trotter as a space.” Everyone who comes into Trotter, whether it be for personal use or for an organization, should be mindful that such a space came directly from Black activism. There is a rich history behind how Trotter has transformed into the multicultural center that we know it as today and this history is intertwined with the Black Action Movements.

‘Where are you from?’: a reflection on residential segregation

It’s 9 o’clock in the morning and the start of the semester. Your social battery didn’t charge enough over break to be talking to dozens of people, but small talk and introductions are unavoidable this first week. When prompted, each person gives their spiel: Name, year, major, maybe a fun fact and of course “Where are you from?” That question always makes me a little uneasy. I usually answer with a simple “Livonia.” That answer though feels ingenuine as it doesn’t feel like the city belongs to me and frankly, even from a young age, I understood that it never did. I have vivid memories of an elementary school-aged me explaining how I lived in a “white neighborhood.” I knew it belonged to them. Even as homeowners, the Kouassi family rented that space. We could not take pride and ownership of our neighborhood as a home. We didn’t get the full benefits of suburbia that everyone else did. Why did my family drive 20 minutes every day to Detroit and then 45 minutes every day to Troy to take me to school when other kids in the neighborhood simply took the bus to neighborhood schools? Why did my family, especially my father, go to work and straight back home, not taking walks around the block or making friends with other families in the neighborhood? And, when we first moved in, why were there eggs thrown at our house and dead birds left at our door? You guessed it: racism and not being welcomed within that environment. As intense as my family’s story may sound, it is a microcosm of the larger issue of housing inequality and residential segregation in this country. Douglas Massey and Nancy Denton’s “American Apartheid” suggests that racial segregation between Black and white populations in the U.S. has been steadily increasing since the mid1800s. Due to rampant anti-Black racism post-abolition, indices of Black-white segregation almost doubled in northern cities and almost quadrupled in southern cities between 1860 and 1940. In historical

eras that preceded this, while residential segregation existed, class was a leading factor in where people lived. Poor white sharecroppers could be seen living alongside freedmen. Subsequent legislation and actions, however, would serve as a catalyst for residential segregation becoming increasingly racialized.

Between the mid-1910s and 1930, during the Great Migration a large influx of Black Americans moved northward and westward to escape racial violence and gain access to new industrial jobs. As competition for these jobs increased between “native” white people, white immigrants and Black Southerners, discrimination and tensions began to reflect this dynamic.

Pre-existing anti-Blackness and this new resentment manifested in a combination of private and institutionalized practices, which barred Black Americans from living in certain communities, leaving them segregated and isolated amongst themselves. Some common practices that were utilized included zoning restrictions and the buying out of Black residents. Others included restrictive

Michigan in Color hosts its first annual Open MiC Night on the Diag

hosts trailblazing social justice advocates at its annual conference.

Lights, Camera, Action! As the sun started to set, crowds of students gathered on the Diag to watch their friends and peers light up the makeshift stage on the front steps of Hatcher Graduate Library. Students took the liberty of bringing their own blankets and snacks in preparation for the show. On Oct. 5, Michigan in Color hosted its firstever annual Open MiC Night, a public event intended to showcase the talent of performers of Color on campus. Before the show started, the Diag was already brimming with an excited audience. MiC Managing Editor Eliya Imtiaz, a Business senior, opened the event. She emphasized the importance of showcasing student artwork.

“We wanted to do Open MiC Night to amplify the talents of students of Color on campus and showcase that Michigan in Color, and to a larger extent. The Michigan Daily is for and by the students that it reports and covers,” Imtiaz said.

“MiC is increasingly focusing more on multimedia and this event gave us a perfect opportunity to share the artistry of everyday students.”

Before starting the show, audience members were encouraged to check out the student organizations (Asian American High School Conference, South Asian Awareness Network (SAAN) and Thai Student Association) tabling around the iconic Block ‘M.’ These clubs promoted themselves to potential new members and spread their organizations’ missions.

SAAN is a South Asian identitybased social justice coalition that

Easheta Shah, Public Health senior and SAAN community relations chair, thought the event was a great way to interact with University of Michigan students.

“I really hope (Open MiC Night) becomes an annual thing,” she said.

“I think it’s really great to see so much community.”

In addition, the Thai Student Association advertised for their show, Thai Night, an annual festivity with exhibits and Thai food to celebrate their culture.

At 7:30 p.m., the performances began. Performers had the unique opportunity to showcase their talents, ranging from comedy skits to monologues to song and dance.

The show started with a stand-up comedy routine by LSA sophomore Joe Gailey. He said he felt like the event provided a judgment-free space for performers to escape the typical confines found in other places on campus. Gailey also said he was also grateful for the stage time that the event provided so people could share their craft.

“Growing up, I was always feeling like I don’t (relate) as much as other very prominent Asian comedians that are out there, so kind of bridging the gap is something I am still trying to work on,” Gailey said.

During intermission, students explored the static art displays showcased along the edge of the Diag. Art & Design junior Nina Walker’s mixed media piece included a self-portrait to express the internal pressures she set on herself as she navigates adulthood post-pandemic.

“As a nontraditional artist, I was glad to share my work in a space where my pieces could truly be understood and appreciated,”

Walker said. “I got to feel famous for the night. It felt nice to have my art on display in such a unique environment.”

Following an intermission, Business junior Roman Rhone performed two pieces on his steel drums: “The Girl is Mine” by Michael Jackson featuring Paul McCartney and a self-composed piece. Rhone said he finds the history of the steel drum empowering. Enslaved people in the Caribbean island of Trinidad created steel drums out of oil barrels after colonists prevented them from playing on normal drums. Rhone connected this resilience to the purpose of Open MiC Night.

“You can make beauty out of where you come from, so that’s why I enjoy playing here and sharing this space with everyone,” Rhone said. “It made me remember how much I love playing.”

LSA junior Kendall Grayson said it was beautiful to see students appreciating the art and talents of people of Color on campus during the show.

“It really shows all the love these people have for each other,” Grayson said. “It is not often when you get to see other people of Color represented in forms of art like this. I feel represented and reflected in the art that’s on the stage.”

Open MiC Night provided a unique atmosphere for spotlighting performers of Color and giving them an outlet to display their talents in a comfortable environment. Michigan in Color wants to thank all the performers and individuals who made this night so special. In the future, we hope to make this an annual event for student organizations to recruit new members and provide a space for performers of Color to showcase their art at the heart of campus.

covenants written into deeds, which made ownership or renting of properties by Black people illegal, blockbusting, redlining and physical violence. At the same time, white Americans were benefiting from the subsidization of suburbanization.

After World War II, the Federal Housing Administration and Veterans Affairs began giving generous loans to white families moving into white, suburban neighborhoods. Clear lines began to form between groups, thus creating the “Black ghettos,” void of resources and opportunities, and the “white neighborhoods” that a younger version of me could clearly identify.

Even after the Fair Housing Act outlawed these more overt forms of discrimination in 1968, the intense racial segregation persisted via more covert forms of discrimination. Banks began to discriminate by either not supplying loans to Black families or by only considering more risky loans. Real estate agents would strategically only show certain homes to Black families and white families would participate in white Flight by leaving a neighborhood

after a Black family moved in, for fear of their property value dropping or of integration. Living in proximity to Black families became a threat to white families’ social and economic capital. Within six months of my family moving into the neighborhood, a white family moved away. Then within two years of our move, another white family left the neighborhood. While I don’t know the exact reason for their leaving, in many ways, this echoed the trends of the past. My family represented a threat to them, their property value

and their community’s white purity and homogeneity. My Black family is not a threat. None of the Black families that have been subject to discriminatory housing practices were. We are like any other family. We have family dinners, we sing and dance together, we tend to our lawns, we laugh, we cry, we survive and we ignore the isolation of our house’s walls. So when I introduce myself in class, sure, I will still say I am from Livonia.

DEVEN PARIKH MiC Assistant Editor

Ankitha Donepudi/MiC.

LAUREN KOUASSI MiC Columnist

Ankitha Donepudi/MiC.

Somewhere, up in space, floats a small time capsule. In it are more than 1,000 interviews etched on silicon wafers and encoded DNA experiments collected by a group of University of Michigan students and faculty. The group, named the Michigan Bicentennial Archive, launched the capsule into orbit in 2017 in hope of its eventual return to earth a century later. Said return would inform the next generation of U-M students of its internal contents, largely discussing hope for the University’s future and testifying to its commitment toward continued technological achievement. It wasn’t sent without a touch of ego, though; the group is proud that their capsule does not lay dormant like those buried in the dirt or under the Pumas outside of the U-M Museum of Natural History. Further, it is up to the class of 2117 to design the mission to retrieve it, because to M-BARC, they would “rather send our successors on a glorious chase, and they must emerge triumphant to hear our voices.”

So, in an abundance of caution — assuming there isn’t a successor up to the task of using a laser to find the satellite’s built-in reflectors or if the contents cannot survive radiation — I would like to assemble my own small, terrestrial time capsule that is slightly less susceptible to otherworldly complications.

To do this, I took to the Bentley Historical Library, a compact brick building that sits quietly on North Campus as it shelves the history of our campus within thousands of donated student scrapbooks, files and ephemera. But instead of simply including a few images or recounting what happened in Ann Arbor this year (you can get that from reading The Michigan Daily,

of course), this very “unscientific” attempt seeks to explore what can change in a century while also recognizing what remains constant. These words, stories and people are very much alive and far from being dormant or distant.

And you, the reader in the class of 2124, will have the opportunity and privilege to not only be a part of it, but learn from it. I know this because right now, I am you.

1924 The then-largest class in history shuffled into Ferry Field, filling every seat as they awaited to receive their diplomas and hear the commencement address following the morning rain. The ’20s were certainly “roaring” and were perhaps the best time to be an undergraduate. Throughout their time on campus, some students exchanged poetry with Robert Frost, others strolled among the first peonies to be planted in Nichols Arboretum and those with a radio listened in to the Paris Olympic games as classmate William DeHart Hubbard became the first Black athlete to win an individual Olympic gold medal.

U-M administration planned for a boom in Ann Arbor to mirror that of the broader bustling landscape of the United States. The construction of Angell Hall was complete, fronted by a row of bold stone columns and sloping steps, providing the perfect place to study, sunbathe, smoke and roller skate. Nearby was the newly finished Lawyers Club, William Clements Library, Yost Field House and numerous housing solutions for the growing student body no longer burdened by war.

For this — though there were no (legal) toasts of champagne — there was much to celebrate.

Among the 1,800 graduates of the class of ’24 sat Ruth Harvey, a native Michigander and resident of the Adelia Cheever house. Upon parsing through Harvey’s personal scrapbook, it was clear she was a frequenter of the many themed

costume parties, dances, operas and games hosted on campus. But perhaps most important to Harvey was her status as a “Cheever gal,” selected to live in the all-female boarding house based on her demonstrated “high character, fine personality and scholarship.”

According to records, Harvey had to pay $172 per semester to reside in the dormitory on East Madison Street and abide by the Cheever handbook, which contained a collection of chants and rules including stipulations, like a strict nightly curfew, sign-out process, barring of male guests and a ban on wearing blue jeans (to name a few). Also within the handbook was the “gals” commitment to expanding leadership opportunities, community engagement and broadened global perspectives.

Harvey’s photograph collection and saved notes did not indicate whether she broke the “no necking or petting” rule or took unsupervised dips in the Huron River (history will never know), but it did reveal that the connections she made lasted decades after graduation, despite obstacles like the quickly impending stock market crash, World War II and the demolition of the Cheever House to make way for South Quad Residence Hall.

Harvey would go on to travel with and document her fellow “Cheever gals” everywhere from local Michigan beach towns to London for their annual reunions and policy conversations — removing their mortarboards to reveal strands of gray and white hair.

Harvey’s time at the University (filed into three leather-bound scrapbooks) reveals the possibility of finding lifelong community in the people you meet all while never aging out of your purpose.

While it is unknown if their paths crossed, class of ’24 graduate Alena Grace Edmonds also received her diploma on the rainy day in June 1924.

The morning after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade, I awoke to the sound of rain. Instead of getting up to begin my day, I stayed in bed — a move foreign to my routine. I was sad and dejected, I lacked the motivation to leave the cocoon of my covers. So I lay and listened to the rain. I knew the universe was sad, too; its tears were rolling off my window.

That night, I attended a Grateful Dead concert for the first time. I went with my friend and her dad, a Deadhead who was going to Wrigley Field, rain or shine, to hear them play. Music is one of my favorite things. I don’t listen to the Grateful Dead, but I appreciate all talented musicians. I was excited. I threw on some overalls and, of course, a raincoat, as it was projected to pour.

On the ride to Wrigleyville, my friend’s dad passionately prepared me for the experience that awaited. He reviewed set lists from their recent shows. He narrated the Drums and Space section that would take place three-quarters through the concert so I’d know to take my seat for this part, and this part only. He described the myriad of people who’d line the streets outside of the stadium, tripping on molly and any other hallucinogen ever discovered or created.

While his prepping helped me step into the right headspace and look like an old pro threequarters through as I took my seat with the rest of the stadium, nothing could have prepared me for the moment the music started playing. I was transported to an alternate universe, a dimension I did not know. Conversations halted, reunions of Deadheads ceased, picture-taking ended. As if a spell had been cast over the stadium, everyone stood, singing and

swaying in the rawest and purest expression of joy and contentment I had ever witnessed. Reality was on pause, and we were existing in a vacuum where only the sound produced by a few old guys and John Mayer could penetrate our brains.

I, too, swayed with myself, confused at how quickly I had succumbed to this bizarre and cultish experience, but also at how natural and soothing it felt. I reeled in the genius of Mayer’s fingers plucking his guitar, Jeff Chimenti’s fingers pounding his keys and Bob Weir’s voice echoing through the stadium. Pure art. I watched the swaying sea of 50- and 60-year-olds in tie-dye. No fashion statements here — just pride in cotton rainbows cloaked over adult bodies. No phones in the air, either, videoing or taking pictures. As I listened, I pretended I was in the ’80s. I wondered if everyone around me was pretending this, too. That’s where we had been catapulted: the height of the Grateful Dead’s popularity, many of these people’s youths.

I pretended there were no social media feeds to check or contribute to, no crushing news alerts to be attuned to. I pretended that Donald Trump had not been president. I pretended we were free to be you and me; that fringe was in and violence was out. I pretended there was no pandemic. No resulting market tanks. I pretended mass shootings weren’t something to fear in a crowd like this one. I pretended that we all had the right to an abortion. Swaying in the music, surrounded by the old ivied walls of Wrigley Field, smiles, lyrics, tie-dye and weed, the pretending worked. My raincoat went unused that night. Maybe the universe was pretending, too. It was joyous for the night, like I was, its sadness temporarily dissipating, creating a dome of safety and freedom and happy reminisce. I wondered if the band members who had passed

away, such as original lead vocalist Jerry Garcia staring down at this little haven they had left behind, were grateful they were dead. That they had gotten to exist in the era that they did, not the one now. I wondered if the 50- and 60-yearolds swaying in their tie-dye were grateful that their youth had died in the ’70s and ’80s. That their glory days took place in an era before mine. If I was them, I would be. Nine days later, my heart palpitated and my legs went weak as I opened the “Find My Friends” app to check my parents’ location to see if they were at the Highland Park Fourth of July Parade. They walk my dog there every year. To my relief, their location read as home. When I texted my mom in a frenzy, asking what she was doing, she told me she was riding her Peloton. I told her to get off — there was an active shooter on Central. I was at Dartmouth, visiting my twin sister. We sat on her bed, watching from her computer as the abandoned main street of our little hometown appeared on NBC, ABC, CNN, Fox. As the anchors I watch every day narrated the live events of the shooting and manhunt unfolding on the roads that I could drive on with my eyes closed. As the name of the town where I grew up was

2021

2022

2023

Sex, drugs and rock n roll: How

we fall

in love with addiction

the 9-to-5 stability and too chic to understand what matters.

“I chose not to choose life: I chose something else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who needs reasons when you’ve got heroin?”

CW: Mentions of substance abuse, physical assault, glamorization of addiction.

“Choose life. Choose a job. Choose a family, choose a fucking big television, choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers. Choose good health, low cholesterol and dental insurance. Choose fixedinterest mortgage repayments, and choose leisure wear and matching luggage.”

That is the opening monologue delivered by narrator Mark Renton from one of the movies that permanently resides on my Letterboxd feed — “Trainspotting.” He continues through his Rolodex of society-pilled, quasirandom options, “Choose a three piece suit on hire purchased in a range of fucking fabrics. Choose D.I.Y and wondering who you are on a Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing, sprit-crushing game shows, stuffing fucking junk food into your mouth.”

Mark, portrayed by the suave and ever-likable Ewan McGregor, is a sly scottish fella with a quick wit and dishonest friends who has recently bottomed out in his relentless crack addiction.

“Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pissing your last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked-up brats you have spawned to replace yourself. Choose your future. Choose life.”

But Mark isn’t like that. He’s too urbane for sobriety, too fiery for

There’s something that impinges on my brain when I watch films about drugs and recklessness and fatalism — like a static shock from the carpet or the jolt of waking up when you die in a dream — particularly when it’s all tossed in a salad bowl and dressed with brilliant cinematography.

And in pining for these movies, in the way I swallow and slurp the sweet slew of postmodern media, overdosing on the eroticism of revolution, from naked and nude to needles and knives, I become a part of the problem.

The absolute romanticization of drugs and substance abuse disorders in the media is a ball we cannot stop rolling. How can we, though, when shows like “Euphoria” make them seem like an edgy high school fad, and when classics like “Scarface” and “Blow” make them seem so sultry, so captivating?

Because who doesn’t want to watch a movie about breaking social norms? Who doesn’t enjoy a narrative that usurps the idealism of white picket fences and the banality of gym memberships? We’re all just dreamers, and we live vicariously through the images distorted by the black screen.

And drugs on the big screen ooze sex — literally. Drug movies by virtue are rarely about the drugs themselves. There’s often secondary characteristics, deemed desirable by society, that build up the repertoire of being a drug addict. Think “Wolf of Wall Street” and the gorgeous yet reserved supermodel you wish to woo, the

one who won’t even look your way unless she’s strapping your money to her boobs. Think about the big boy yachts and snow white ferraris and the ensuing Quaalude dependency you keep up to make it all possible.

Think 90s-era Heroin Chic and the exponentially increasing expectations for a woman to not fit her own clothes, to smoke the drug that keeps her skinny, and to maintain the habit that keeps her glamorous. Think of heavy sultry smoke and backless dresses and the promotion of violence against women, both within the mirror, and without. Think Gia Carangi and her tragic death at 26 years old, succumbing to the addiction that built her very brand.

Obsession. Fascination. Because “being a junkie was very glamorous” in those days.

And yet — just like when you go to a doctor, aching all over, in every nook and cranny, and she asks you to point a finger to where it hurts most — I cannot name a single medium this narcotic eroticism has not affected. It engulfs everything because, despite dwindling interest in the culture of “sex, drugs and rock n roll” throughout the years, it will never quite fade from the background completely.

Drugs are still common, if not proliferate, in the fashion industry today. Moreover, drug dealers continue to fly under the radar on social media apps like TikTok, where posted content can be accessed by virtually anyone, including children and underage teens. Even on our very own campus, we continue to observe some of the highest rates of drug use among students in decades.

‘Why is it so essential that I die in here?’ What I learned visiting ‘Ninja Killer’ Temujin Kensu in prison: He’s innocent.

But to know about Temujin Kensu, inmate number 189355, you should know how he got here. The Case

Scott Macklem, and they bent over backward for a conviction.

Have you ever been to prison?

Temujin Kensu has. In fact, he’s been in prison for nearly twice my lifetime: 37 years. Kensu is currently serving a life sentence he received after being convicted of the murder of 21-year-old Scott Macklem in 1987. This is usually how things go in the American justice system: If you murder somebody, and it’s proven in court that you really did it, you go to prison for a while. Sometimes for your whole life. This is what has happened to Temujin Kensu.

There’s just one small problem: Kensu was more than 400 miles away from the scene of the crime when Scott Macklem was murdered in 1986. For 37 years, he has maintained his innocence. An amalgamation of politicians, police officers, judges, record producers, journalists and private investigators — all of various political affiliations — have publicly called for his freedom. That freedom is yet to come.

No matter how many people stand for Kensu, as I pulled into the Macomb Correctional Facility parking lot, I felt alone. I stood in the parking lot and emptied my pockets down to the bare essentials: drivers license, notepad, pen and a handful of quarters for the vending machine. In a few minutes I would be getting a pat down before sitting down with Kensu. I was nervous. I tucked my shirt in and shuffled my hair in the reflection of the driver’s side window.

I took a deep breath and walked in. But this is not a story solely about me or Kensu’s crimes and conviction. This is a story about a man who has been battered and wronged continually by the American justice system, a man whose hopes have been tested and laid bare by every strand of red tape imaginable. This is a story of a man who wakes up each day with hope in a world where hope is hard to come by.

Despite the messy and ugly aftershock of Scott Macklem’s murder, the actual murder itself was relatively simple. At about 9 a.m. on Nov. 5, 1986, Macklem was shot once with a shotgun in a parking lot outside of St. Clair County Community College in Port Huron, Mich. While investigators have revealed that Macklem was struggling with his grades and possibly involved with drug dealers, any motive for his murder was unclear. There was very little evidence left at the scene, other than a shotgun shell and an empty carton of ammunition, which carried a fingerprint. A matching print was never found.

In 1986, DNA forensics as a method of obtaining evidence was in its adolescence, and the St. Clair County police were left with very little information to discern who could have committed the murder. It didn’t help that there were no witnesses to the crime. The police interviewed Macklem’s family in the days following. They spoke with Crystal Merrill, his fiancée, and her teenage sister, Tracey. Tracey suggested that a man named John Lamar could be responsible for Macklem’s death; he was an unpopular and intimidating character Crystal had been seeing. He wore a leather jacket and listened to loud music. Tracey would later testify that when Crystal was around him, she felt like she lost her sister. The police were intrigued. They followed the lead and discovered Lamar, the rambunctious martial artist who Tracey Merrill spoke of, was actually a man named Fred Freeman who used aliases to dodge warrants for bouncing checks. This, of course, was before Freeman converted to Buddhism and changed his name to Temujin Kensu. From then on, Port Huron police pursued Freeman (now Kensu) as suspect number one for the murder of

In an interview with The Michigan Daily, Imran Syed, clinical assistant professor of law at the University of Michigan Law School and co-director of Michigan Innocence Clinic, said, “From the very beginning, (the police) were getting evidence only that said Kensu was the wrong man, but they never let that stop them.” Syed has been the lead attorney on Kensu’s case for the majority of the last decade. “Every time they would see something that showed it wasn’t Kensu, they would see that as evidence that he was some mastermind that was covering his tracks.”

And that is how Robert Cleland, the St. Clair County Prosecutor at the time, portrayed Kensu to the jury: a cunning mastermind — a “ninja killer.” How the prosecution landed a conviction

Bill Proctor, a Michigan Journalism Hall of Famer, first brought Kensu’s claims of innocence to mainstream media in the spring of 1995 with a five-part series of stories on Channel 7, evaluating the conviction of the “Ninja Killer.”

Proctor was the lead story reporter for WXYZ-TV Channel 7, the ABC affiliate in the Detroit Metro area. He built a nearly 33-year-long career as a smooth-talking truth seeker on the screens of southeastern Michigan televisions. Ten years ago, he retired from news to pursue a career as a private investigator and founded Seeking Justice, a private investigative firm for those who have been wrongfully convicted. For years, Proctor was an investigator for Kensu.

I met Proctor in Ann Arbor to discuss the case. He spoke with a steely, measured tone and an air of earned confidence. In his reporterly timbre, he called Kensu’s conviction “the most ludicrous thing ever in the history of the world.”

2024

The weight we carry: college journalism’s untold grief

SARAH AKAABOUNE Statement Deputy Editor

The first time I ever had to carry grief that did not belong to me was the day I began to report on survivors of former University of Michigan Athletics doctor Robert Anderson. Over a span of 37 years, more than 950 victims reported thousands of incidents of sexual abuse and misconduct at the hands of Anderson, remaining as likely the most sexual abuse allegations against a single person in United States history.

There is an untold grief in reporting this kind of trauma, in reporting the tragedies that affect our schools and communities — the people we love and know — and what they ultimately leave behind. In time, even grief that does not belong to us has a way of becoming our own.

College journalists are especially vulnerable to the weight of reporting. The world sees them as too young to understand the heaviness of grief or to report on the shootings that fracture their campuses, the homicides that destroy their student bodies, the bomb threats and sexual abuse scandals that define the way they reckon with themselves. But oftentimes, long after national news outlets have left, when press conferences become a rarity and towns begin to quiet again, student journalists and student-run newspapers become the last to remain, to understand, to painstakingly cover all that happens in between. And at a cost few are ever willing to make. What becomes of college journalists in the face of collective grief? What does it mean to grieve, to process, to become

angry, to be in pain, to know joy and love and healing as a journalist first, and as a student last?

I’ve spent the past month researching college newspapers across the country, and more importantly, college newspapers that found themselves at the forefront of national tragedies — those that have had to contend with what it meant to no longer feel safe in your own libraries, classrooms, newsrooms and homes. Over the past few weeks, I spoke to Ava MacBlane, Editor in Chief of The Cavalier Daily at the University of Virginia; Haadiya Tariq, Editor in Chief of The Argonaut at The University of Idaho; and Jasper Smith, Editor in Chief of The Hilltop at Howard University. These are their stories. This is the weight they carry. The Cavalier Daily, The University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Va.

The Cavalier Daily — The CD or The Cav, for short — is the University of Virginia’s independently-run student newspaper. It employs approximately 400 staffers and is led by Editor in Chief Ava MacBlane. The Cavalier Daily’s offices are located in the basement of Newcomb Hall, a student center that also houses the campus’s main dining hall. Staff sometimes take long naps on a couch chock-full of Squishmallows. A life-size cut-out of Will Ferrell sits in an odd corner, and there are lopsided frames of old newspapers from decades ago hung on the walls. Meetings are held in an area fondly dubbed “The Office” and on Fridays, when the production schedule is pleasantly light, the Copy staffers spend hours at one of the few empty tables gossiping about the day’s latest happenings. The newsroom here

is well-loved. It’s the kind of place people visit just because they can.

On Sunday, Nov. 13, 2022, University of Virginia students and football team members Devin Chandler, D’Sean Perry and Lavel Davis Jr. died after a gunman opened fire on a bus returning from a University of Virginia class trip to Washington, D.C. Two other students were wounded. A shelterin-place warning issued a campuswide “Run, Hide, Fight” alert that lasted well into the next morning. Students spent the whole night cramped into libraries and a variety of campus and academic buildings, trapped in an uncomfortable state of limbo and a terribly unsettling cloud of fear, in search of a reason why. MacBlane, who was the Managing Editor of The Cavalier Daily at the time, spent the entirety of the next 72 hours following the shooting, on the ground reporting. She missed meals and sleep, and much of her grief was experienced as a journalist first. Reporting on her community became one of the only ways she carried her grief, or rather, the only way her job as a student journalist allowed her to.

“You want to feel connected to people and to your community, but you can’t because you’re still the media,” MacBlane told me. There is a heaviness that comes with reporting on fellow peers who left the world so violently, a halfremoved kind of grieving. While it became the sole responsibility of MacBlane and The Cavalier Daily to print the victims’ names, their hometowns, what they studied, the lovely, wonderful tiny things that made them who they were, there is also the realization that the journalists are students, too.

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

‘Why do you eat? Why do you breathe?’: My conversation with SAFE President Salma Hamamy

My first two years at the University of Michigan have been characterized by what I can only describe as a divided campus. Even when sharing in the communal act of football games, weekend parties or a warm fall day on the Diag, there’s been an underlying political and cultural divide. In my first year of college, the Graduate Employees’ Organization went on strike, prematurely ending some of my classes and leading to conflicting feelings of annoyance and solidarity among the undergraduate population. During this time of division, an article in The Michigan Daily, “Humans of GEO,” shed light on the people behind the strike, encouraging bonds of familiarity with a group many undergraduates saw only in the context of their lab and discussion sections. When Israel invaded Gaza in the aftermath of Hamas’ October 7 attack on Israel, different student groups on campus immediately mobilized, organizing a vigil for Israeli victims of the attack and, a few weeks later, Palestinian victims of Israel’s ground assault. With the Palestinian death toll rising to more than 100,000 killed or injured as of this article’s publication, Students Allied For Freedom and Equality, a pro-Palestine organization at the head of the multigroup TAHRIR Coalition, continued protesting in earnest. Their target? The University’s endowment, which they allege profits from companies with military and business interests in Israel. Although the movement is popular, with more than 90 involved student organizations and a victory in the most recent Central Student Government election, it still drives controversy.

The conflict on campus, as large or small as you choose to imagine

it, has caught the attention of national media publications, such as The New York Times, Fox News and New York Magazine. Central to all of these stories is one person: SAFE President Salma Hamamy, who has seen her words and social media posts scrutinized under an ever-magnifying lens. At times, it can be difficult to divorce the public persona of an activist, Hamamy herself becoming increasingly well known with every rally, from her identity as a person: her hopes, her personal interests and even her reason for fighting in the first place.

Thinking back to that GEO article, I decided months ago to work on a similar interview with Salma, with the goal of breaking down a person some see less as a fellow student and more as a bullhorn calling for whatever they think she believes.

My first interaction with Salma had actually come a month earlier, though I didn’t know it at the time.

On Feb. 8, I decided to dip my toes into the waters of documentary photography, using a SAFE walkout that was protesting the University’s investments as my pool. Armed with my camera, I hurried to catch up with the stream of students leaving the Diag, destined for an odyssey through the Michigan Union and Ross School of Business, ending

in front of the Alexander G. Ruthven Building. As I sprinted to keep in front of the march, I was stopped from passing through the side door of the Business School by a marshal in reflective clothing. Barred from the inside — lest I was willing to force my way through the small entrance with the rest of the marchers — I worried about losing a photo. Something was happening inside; protesters were filling the ears of Business students with hundreds of voices chanting in unison. Ready to capitulate and enter the established door, Hamamy appeared by my shoulder, insisting that I be let through the side door with my camera. The moment happened so quickly; I was more focused on my success than the person I had just met, assuming they were just one of the leaders I was so diligently capturing just minutes earlier. It was only later that I realized it was Hamamy herself, working to facilitate the documentation of a movement she had led. Though I documented other SAFE events in the month between, I didn’t again have a chance to meet directly with Hamamy through the organized chaos of protest.

2021

2022

FEBRUARY

The Board of Regents doesn’t

QUIN ZAPOLI

When the Board of Regents fired former University of Michigan President Mark Schlissel, The Michigan Daily Editorial Board was focused on the regents themselves. The regents — who serve unpaid for eight-year terms and are elected by Michigan residents — approve the yearly budget, appoint the president, oversee the University’s $17 billion endowment and regulate all three U-M campuses through the Regents’ Ordinance. They answer to Michigan voters, not the University community. How can the regents meet the needs of students, faculty and staff when those groups have little to no control over the board’s membership, and when regency itself is only a voluntary, part-time position?

The board has clearly made mistakes with its power, particularly in the last couple of years. In the words of the Editorial Board, “many of the trademark bad decisions made by Schlissel were directed, or at least directly influenced, by the board (of regents).” The regents’ decision to reopen student housing in the

fall of 2020 is specifically cited. In the same month, the regents failed to temper the administration’s aggressive response to the GEO strike or act on the Faculty Senate’s historic vote of no-confidence on Schlissel. One University’s fight to provide the Flint and Dearborn campuses with equitable resources also faces resistance from the regents. More recently, the regents didn’t stop Schlissel from returning to campus as a tenured professor — despite an ongoing investigation into his actions. And, as the Editorial Board points out, the regents have also historically failed to address sexual misconduct throughout the University with any sort of vigor.

The regents were also criticized for raising tuition in the summer of both 2020, where it failed the first time it was proposed, and 2021. Each increase added just under $300 to in-state tuition and nearly $1,000 to out-of-state tuition. Financial aid awards were increased for low and middle-income in-state students, so many, myself included, weren’t impacted by the increase. Additional aid was not awarded to out-of-state students, who already paid the highest out-of-state tuition of any public university in the country.

Despite their importance to the University as a whole — out-of-state

represent

students make up nearly half of all undergraduate students and their experiences and ideas are invaluable to the growth of in-state students — out-of-state students suffered the brunt of recent tuition increases engineered by a board they have no say in electing. In fact, they have

“

2023

JANUARY

2024

UMich stakeholders; it’s time they do

responsibilities with millions of other voters, most of whom have no vested interest in the University. The fact that University voices are drowned out was evident after the 2020 election, when former Regent Shauna Ryder-Diggs (D), one of two regents to oppose the 2020 tuition

The board members, who all have obligations elsewhere, aren’t paid either. That has two implications: the University will always come second to the regents’ paid obligations, and those without ample resources might not be able to serve on the board at all.

no say over how the University’s highest authority handles any of the controversial issues impacting students. Moreover, because the board appoints the president, and the president fills most high administrative positions, outof-state students’ lack of input extends to the entire University administration. Representation is only marginally better for in-state students and staff because they share electoral

From The Daily: Commit to DEI through tri-campus equity

THE MICHIGAN DAILY EDITORIAL BOARD

Earlier this month, the University of Michigan’s Central Student Government approved a proposal requesting $10,000 from the CSG budget to fund a rally for tricampus equity, which ultimately took place yesterday. The decision came in the wake of the backlash to a survey question making the implication that tuition assistance at U-M Dearborn and U-M Flint would be a burden for the Ann Arbor campus. The question was part of a survey sent to over 4,000 faculty by University President Mark Schlissel. Although Schlissel has since apologized (albeit discreetly) for the incident, the clear bias demonstrated by his phrasing represents a problem that runs much longer and deeper than one survey question.

Schlissel’s implication that the success of U-M Ann Arbor is mutually exclusive to that of U-M Dearborn and U-M Flint demonstrates that he, and the University’s administration, have only a surface-level commitment to diversity, equity and inclusion. Showing true commitment to DEI at the University of Michigan

entails expanding the Go Blue Guarantee to Dearborn and Flint. Providing support to all campuses, and therefore to lowincome students at all campuses, is the bare minimum. His actions exemplify bias toward U-M Ann Arbor, especially as he formulates a narrative that the success of the regional campuses is and will be at the expense of Ann Arbor. We condemn Schlissel’s refusal to support low-income students at the regional campuses of the University of Michigan — the entirety of which he was chosen to serve, regional campuses included. We support CSG’s decision to allocate funds for tri-campus equity efforts. We encourage other student efforts moving forward to promote Flint and Dearborn voices, including within the One University campaign as well as the Lecturers’ Employee Organization.

Out of the University’s three campuses, Ann Arbor students have the highest median income and the lowest proportion of students eligible for Pell Grants. The University of Michigan loves to tout its commitment to DEI and uses the Go Blue Guarantee program on the Ann Arbor campus to do so, but this commitment is clearly only surface-level when the administration has been so hesitant to expand this financial support

program to all three campuses. It seems as though the University considers low-income students benefiting from the Go Blue Guarantee as pawns in their DEI initiatives, and only here to market U-M Ann Arbor as “inclusive.”

If support for low-income students is truly about inclusivity, why would the administration be reluctant to branch the Go Blue Guarantee program to the regional campuses? Not extending this program exacerbates the barrier to higher education that low-income Flint and Dearborn students already face. It also signals to the Ann Arbor students receiving the Go Blue Guarantee that the administration’s purpose in implementing the program comes more from public relations concerns than from genuine care about low-income students. It is imperative to the University’s commitment to DEI that the Go Blue Guarantee is available to all U-M students, including and especially those at Flint and Dearborn that need it most. Additionally, Schlissel’s survey question highlights a troubling attitude that exists in Ann Arbor — one that constantly “others” Flint and Dearborn, including faculty and their students.

Mike Illich, the founder of Little Caesars Pizza and owner of Detroit’s baseball and hockey teams. Regents Mark Bernstein (D), Jordan Acker (D) and Michael Behm (D) each come from prominent family law firms (Bernstein’s commercials have plagued my television my entire life). And, of course, Regent Ron Weiser, famous in part for calling Michigan’s top three state officials “witches,” is Chair of the Michigan Republican Party and a large Ann Arbor property owner.

increase, narrowly lost reelection to current Regent Sarah Hubbard (R). Even by acting clearly in the interest of students, Ryder-Diggs was not able to keep her seat. Because the average Michigan voter isn’t involved with the University, and because downballot races often draw careless decision-making, the board has become dominated by powerful, recognizable figures. Regent Denise Ilitch (D) is the daughter of the late

The board members, who all have obligations elsewhere, aren’t paid either. That has two implications: the University will always come second to the regents’ paid obligations, and those without ample resources might not be able to serve on the board at all. The decision to bring students back to campus in fall 2020, for example, was allegedly influenced by Weiser’s extensive property interests. He went as far as donating $30 million to the University days before it announced it would reopen. All told, the board’s mistakes are due in part to regency’s part-time nature and because those affected are, at best, weakly represented.

The board has taken an important step by including students, faculty and staff in the Presidential Search Committee. Even then, University

stakeholders shouldn’t have to rely on the board’s generosity to have representation. Changing how regents are chosen so that all relevant University stakeholders are always represented — while maintaining the centuries-old relationship the University has with Michigan voters — is the best way to tackle the University’s ongoing struggles. Current graduate and undergraduate students, members of the Faculty Senate and other University staff (including lecturers, MHousing and MDining employees and other support staff) should each be allowed to elect one regent. Terms should also be limited to two years instead of eight, encouraging the board to evolve with the campus population — or face a challenging reelection fight. For the 2022 fiscal year, student tuition will account for $1.8 billion of the University’s budget, far more than the $322 million Michigan taxpayers will contribute. The University’s world-class faculty is critical not only to our institution’s prestige but to its ability to bring innovation to Michigan as a whole. And, of course, without additional staff, the entire campus would quickly grind to a halt.

From The Daily: President Ono’s appointment is an opportunity for positive change

THE MICHIGAN DAILY EDITORIAL BOARD

The search for a new University president has come to an end. Following the unpopular tenure of former-President Mark Schlissel and his termination by the Board of Regents, students and faculty alike questioned who would be next to take the job. This summer, after months of searching, the University hired Dr. Santa Ono, sitting president of University of British Columbia (UBC) and former president of University of Cincinnati (UC). Ono has not only been appointed to lead the University of Michigan onward, but has been chosen to revitalize and fortify the relationship between the University president and the student body. With the loss of trust that accompanied the previous administration, the reconstruction of this connection is essential in order to make institutional progress.

To know the student population, you must interact with them. At Ono’s previous institutions, he found multiple ways to connect with students and make his presence known. Whether it be crowdsurfing at homecoming football games or effectively using social

media platforms, Ono has taken initiative to meet with students rather than forcing them to come to him. This people-oriented, personable presence makes a difference: it allows for comfortable connections to be made between the president and students. We expect Ono to uphold this commitment to connecting with students just as closely in his new position.

While participating in the fight songs in the Big House every Saturday and posting the occasional tweet does make a difference in the public perception of the Office of the President, structural change cannot come without trust. In the past, there has been a severe lack of faith in our leadership, but Ono can assuage this distrust by prioritizing the needs of students rather than those of his office. We expect for Ono to not only communicate with students but more broadly to reembody the aura of a trustworthy and thoughtful campus administrator. Renewing this belief in University officials is the backbone by which change can happen, as trust permits open dialogues and a confidence in the authority figures that dictate so many important matters on campus.

Santa Ono’s agreeableness distinguishes him from our last dormant and somewhat stiff

president. A popular figure around his previous campuses, Ono has proved that he is capable of naturally engaging with the student body and the University as a whole. For instance, Ono has actively endorsed the University’s athletic department, and, during his time at the UC, he got into uniform and started practicing with the football team. He was also spotted at several Cincinnati games cheering for the team.

On top of this school spirit, Ono is a talented cellist, having studied at the Peabody Conservatory of Music in Maryland. At UBC, he was quite involved in the music department, and not just administratively. For example, he performed at a pop-up concert with several music students at a train station, which was a pleasant surprise for individuals boarding.

Ono is a well rounded individual to say the least, but what has he done in regards to the pressing issues many North American universities face? Well, for starters, he’s an active leader in the University Climate Change Coalition, an organization that’s dedicated to reducing carbon emissions and relying more on renewable sources of energy.

Sunday, May 19, 2 pm, Michigan Theater

• Professional soloists, orchestra and chorus • Selections unique to this historic production • Features newly restored orchestrations of the theater music master

This historic concert will honor the Father of Broadway on the 100th Anniversary of his death. Beside the pleasure of being in one of America’s remaining classic movie theaters, you will be witnessing music that hasn’t been heard in its original form since the theater was built.

The event will feature soloists with orchestra and chorus, conducted by the country’s foremost expert on Herbert’s music, Adam Aceto. The program will include selections from shows the Guild has revived, with orchestrations newly restored by Mr. Aceto.

TICKETS A portion of income from all tickets sold will go to Washtenaw Area Council for Children. Tickets are $25.00, reserved seating, and can be purchased online at: https://michtheater.org/events

From The Daily: Admin should amp up the weak connection with students post-internet outage

One day before the start of the new semester, University of Michigan’s Flint, Dearborn and Ann Arbor campuses went dark. On Aug. 27, the University shut down all Wi-Fi access, including Canvas, Wolverine Access and, most importantly, the LSA Course Guide. Students, especially those newest to campus, were left scrambling as they searched for their classes and tried to access their syllabi. Despite the presence of advisors from LSA around campus, hysteria still reigned, and students, professors and staff alike were left reeling without the internet.

The reason behind the administration’s decision is still up in the air. Several updates were sent to the U-M community, most of which emphasized that the University’s IT department was “not able to share any information that might compromise the investigation.” As such, the impetus for this investigation is still unknown to U-M students, even after we were instructed to change our U-M-affiliated passwords. With little knowledge of what actually happened, students are left rattled: What information could have been stolen, who could have stolen it and why?

It’s not yet established that the internet blackout was due to a bout of hacking, but — barring any communication from the U-M administration that we weren’t hacked — that seems to be the most obvious scenario. The involvement of federal law enforcement likewise supports this conclusion.

The damage to student experience was widespread and will likely take several months to fully quantify. Students struggled to find classes, and once there, they couldn’t access their syllabi, and professors pushed assigned work to later dates, causing stress about when homework was due. It didn’t help that this happened right at the beginning of the semester, when students were already having a stressful adjustment period. Beyond the Wi-Fi outage’s effect on students and their classes, concerns about why the internet was shut down in the first place raised alarms. For most students, updates about the situation could only be found on X, formerly known as Twitter, where information was vague and at times posted late, a cause for even more frustration.

Some students have taken the near radio silence from the University as a major point of contention, fearing that personal information of theirs could have been stolen or put at risk.

Communication is the responsibility of any university or organization, especially in unique times of crisis. Though the internet outage may have been only a minor inconvenience for some students, the possibility of U-M-related data being breached poses a much greater danger. With this in mind, students want information about the internet, their data and other potential sensitivities from the University. Considering the unprecedented circumstances, it’s understandable that the University can not divulge all of the information about the internet outage. If some information needs to be kept confidential to further protect student and faculty

information, then it makes sense to remain reticent about what caused the outage. Students shouldn’t demand that the University give a detailed account of what happened, but, instead, should respect the investigation process.

It’s not easy to believe that the University has the best in mind for its constituents, especially when the communicated information was not particularly useful.

Students don’t know if they’re still in danger of a cybersecurity attack or what (beyond changing their passwords) they can do to protect their information. Updates about what happened — or could happen — can be conveyed without divulging anything contentious. The University should recognize these concerns from the affected campus population and alleviate stress by giving students and staff a glance into their administrative process.

It should be noted that these circumstances are novel and that reactions to situations like these will only become better and more streamlined going forward. As students, we can only hope that the University has our best interests at heart, and ask that it communicate more openly with us. Let this also be a lesson for the future: U-M students are paying tens of thousands in tuition, and all we ask in return is clarification of our safety on campus from our administration. In the meantime, listen to what the University says and change your password — even for your social media accounts and other emails. Also, take a screenshot of your schedule and read up on your syllabi; you never know when the internet could go out again.

Why a longer winter break is necessary

RUSHABH SHAH Opinion Columnist

Junior year is tough. Scratch that. Every year is tough. Each semester at college comes with its own challenges. As I attained upperclassmen status last fall, I braced myself for a difficult semester, and fall 2022 delivered. My toughest — yet most enjoyable, — semester had me on my knees by October, and when Thanksgiving break rolled around, I was physically, mentally and emotionally drained.

“All I want to do over the holidays is relax,” I remember telling my parents midway through the term. Once I factored in the approximately two-day trip between the States and my home in India, I realized that I had exactly 20 days of winter break and I intended on doing nothing but recharging my batteries. As of today, the winter semester has begun and I, unfortunately, do not feel nearly rested enough for what promises to be another jam-packed four months.

For students who had exams on the final day of the fall semester, the winter break was just 16 days long. Meanwhile, other prominent public universities across the country such as UC Berkeley and UCLA offer 25 and 26 days, respectively. Even the holiday periods of neighboring universities, namely Ohio State and Michigan State, are similar to those of the aforementioned UCs. While an early start for U-M students also means that we break for summer earlier than most, an extra couple of weeks in an already long summer break is not nearly as valuable as even just a few extra days before the winter semester begins.

Over and above the shorter

Mcards are more than an ID

break, however, is its timing. Since winter break falls during the holiday season, it is often filled with social commitments that are timeconsuming and can sometimes be more taxing than relaxing. Even without the holiday celebrations, going back home usually involves meeting friends and relatives that you haven’t seen for a few months.

In a bid to maintain relations, fulfilling multiple social obligations are crammed into one day and the time to rest and recuperate is lost.

Then there’s the matter of academic work. Yes, there are no assignments or projects over the break, but professional commitments hardly take a step back either. Job and internship searches, which can sometimes take a backseat during the semester, are at the forefront of many students’ minds during the break. Part of this process is attempting to bump up one’s resume with personal projects or something of that ilk. I attempted to dedicate my time to a personal project, by building a website for a client, but was unable to even get a working version of the site up and running because of constantly being on the move and having to squeeze work sessions in at airports and train stations.

Yes, there is an argument to be made that a lot of these things are optional and could even be considered distractions. You don’t need to meet all your high school friends and relatives. You don’t have to work on internships if you already got one in the fall cycle. You can choose to not do any of these things and just rest. But the truth is that it isn’t that easy. The importance of rest, which I believe many students today do understand, stands in direct contrast with the environment of toxic productivity that society and educational institutions create. Finding the balance between getting enough rest and still being productive or between pushing your limits and while prioritizing wellbeing is one of the biggest challenges students of this generation are facing, and only those with great discipline and time-management are overcoming it. If, by some miracle, there are a special few who have the ability to do all of this (and more) while also taking the time out to take care of themselves, I want to remind you that this is just the tip of the iceberg.

The University of Michigan has been using essentially the same Mcard design since before I was born. The current graphic design that graces every U-M community member’s ID card was introduced in 2001. But you didn’t need me to tell you that the design was a product of the 2000s — just look at the card, ’90s bubblelettering, low-resolution picture and all. Your initial response to this might be some version of “who cares?” It was certainly the response I was met with when I pitched this idea to one of my friends. It’s a fair question. But the Mcard isn’t just a tool that helps U-M students buy lattes at the Michigan Union Sweetwaters or enter campus buildings. It’s an important part of how we conceive of ourselves as Wolverines and how the outside

world thinks of the University — and by extension, us. Unfortunately, I’m not the only one who thinks the Mcard’s design is a little out there. Design choices matter, and even the University’s own branding style guide discourages many of the design choices seen on the Mcard.

Marketing is a trillion-dollar industry for a reason; even minor design choices that are imperceptible to your average viewer make huge differences in how people perceive a company and have tangible effects on consumer behavior. So even if you are personally immune to the charms of a well-designed piece of plastic, most people aren’t.

In an interview with The Michigan Daily, Engineering sophomore Rachel Smith described how she thought the Mcards compare to IDs at other institutions.

“(Other colleges’ IDs) look more professional … the Mcard graphic itself above the IDs looks very much like a cartoon. I feel like it’s just kind

of hard to take it seriously,” Smith said.

In an interview with The Daily, LSA sophomore Ella Hedberg expressed similar thoughts.

“I was a little underwhelmed,” Hedberg said. “When I first got it freshman year, I kind of just saw, like, somebody learning how to do Photoshop really quickly off of their computer.”

If bubble letters and off-hue coloring are unappealing to current Wolverines, how do they appear to prospective ones? How do donors feel when their grandchild comes home and plops this wonky piece of plastic on the dining room table?

The outdated design is especially concerning because the University actually has a good brand to stand on. In the past few months, the University weathered consecutive scandals and came out the other side with a National Championship trophy.

Just a few weeks ago, “Late Night” host Seth Meyers joked that Harvard University’s reputation had been

so poisoned that he spotted Colin Jost — host of Saturday Night Live’s Weekend Update and a notable Harvard alum — in the hall “wearing a Michigan hoodie.”

Referring to the Block ‘M,’ the style guide cautions users to “ensure no other graphic becomes visually attached to the official identity.”

“Official identity” is strong language, and that makes sense. The Block ‘M’ represents our school much better and more often than our mascot does, so obscuring part of the Block ‘M’ with some silly bubble lettering borders on sacrilegious.

It goes without saying that the University’s graphic design guidelines are just that: guidelines. I, and the University, shouldn’t be trapped in a straitjacket of its own bureaucracy every time it makes a design decision. But these standards exist for a reason.

The University of Michigan is defined by symbolism more than most universities. “Go Blue” is the phrase we use to acknowledge block

‘M’-wearing strangers on the street. The fact that the yellow and blue on the Mcard aren’t even the standard hues for our prolific maize and blue makes me question my campus experience. Am I a U-M student, engaging in a rich campus tradition of living, learning and winning, or am I just being handed a piece of plastic, an interchangeable education for an interchangeable consumer?

My language, as I’ve been informed by my various editors, is often cataclysmic. Sure, the Mcard design doesn’t matter that much. But we cannot discount the marginal effect, the people at the margins of our sample, the people most affected by branding. For some subset of people, this will be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.

If I am a prospective student deciding between schools, the gleaming Spartan Card might draw me just a little closer to Michigan State University. If I’m a prospective alum donor, my memories of having to swipe eight times to enter a building

after the magnetic strip wears thin (or stops working) might put me in a more fiscally-conservative mood. Hedberg mentioned that her Mcard — like many — has worn out pretty quickly.

“I know there’s like the CAPS after hours number that’s meant to be on there,” Hedberg said. “I can’t read it anymore. Just from holding it, the numbers have been wiped away.” There’s no perfect university ID. But Mcards have a long way to go. Take MSU’s ID: They feature the Beaumont Memorial Tower on their Spartan Card, a campus staple. I don’t know what our university’s best symbol would be, but a diagram of the Diag and the intersecting paths that join our various departments and University, or any design that represents our campus with pride and skill, strikes me as a preferable backdrop to the off-hue piece of plastic we have been left with by some long-retired U-M administrators.

From The Daily: Students deserve more than vague free speech principles

On Jan. 16, the University of Michigan Board of Regents approved and adopted a set of “Principles on Diversity of Thought and Freedom of Expression.” The 1 1/2 page document, initially drafted in October, outlines the University’s position on freedom of expression and creating inclusive

environments. With questions about the nature of free speech on the rise nationally, the principles were meant to chart a clear path through difficult political terrain. In practice, they were highly rhetorical. The document’s language is intentionally vague, allowing for multiple interpretations. Without clear communication from the administration, the principles are left up to readers’ analysis, which poses a problem for effective policy. The University must engage in good faith with students and make

itself more clear as it turns these guidelines into action.

The free speech principles were introduced to the student body in an email from University President Santa Ono, who announced the assembly of an initial panel to “recommend ways to put the principles into practice” and a second panel to analyze its successes and failures. There is no specification about the composition of the first panel in the email, but Ono does promise the second panel will include students. As

this process unfolds, it’s important to examine the University’s track record on protecting free speech.

There are examples of the University living up to its ideals as a public institution. Student demonstrations, including those by pro-Israel and pro-Palestine groups, have been allowed to occur around campus, including right outside of Ono’s house. This can’t be said in other higher education institutions, where Students for Justice for Palestine chapters have been banned outright. In a clear success, the University also formed an institute to research rising antisemitism nationwide.

Yet, a series of more recent U-M failures have cast doubt on the University’s intent to uphold free speech.

On Nov. 17, 2023, dozens of protesters gathered at the Alexander G. Ruthven Building to call on the University to divest from Israel and protect students from Islamophobia and anti-Arab sentiment. The entrance to Ruthven — typically open to the public during business hours — was blocked by a heavy police presence. Some students were able to enter the building, staging a sit-in, while others protested outside. Despite it being a peaceful demonstration, several students reported experiencing excessive force from officers.

Forty students were arrested on charges of trespassing after failing

to comply with a dispersal order, and, as of the publication of this article, the charges against these students have not been dropped. They have also been barred from attending Board of Regents meetings.

The Daily’s Editorial Board rejects the massive police presence at Ruthven and condemns any and all excessive use of force by law enforcement. Moreover, we are deeply concerned by the University’s choice to block a public building during regular hours of operation and limit student access to Board of Regents meetings. Allowing charges to be levied against students and limiting access to public forums directly contradicts the principles U-M leadership seeks to promote.

The University must show its dedication to free speech and begin mending its previously antagonistic relationship with pro-Palestine student groups. The charges against student protesters should be dropped and their ability to attend board meetings reinstated.

Many student organizations complain that they have inadequate access to the University administration. In an email to The Michigan Daily, Shubh Agrawal, board member of Students Allied for Freedom and Equality, explained how the organization would like to see its communication with the University improve.

“We would like an open line of communication to administration and the Regents,” Agrawal said. “We don’t want to have to fight and face police repression just to get a meeting. We don’t want to be restricted to talking to the Regents through whatever limited parameters they allow at the meetings.”

While free speech does not mean that the University should do everything student organizations demand, it does mean that the University should be willing to listen. So far, it hasn’t been.

On Nov. 30, 2023, the University canceled two Central Student Government ballot initiatives related to Israel and Palestine, citing violations of the University’s Responsible Use of Information Resources policy. In addition, the University disallowed all future ballot initiatives concerning the same topic. This unprecedented action, among other things, drew the attention of the American Civil Liberties Union of Michigan, which sent a letter to U-M administration arguing that the University was engaged in the suppression of student speech. CSG is meant to be an independent institution and should not be impeded by the University. The administration should not be able to cancel ballot initiatives at its discretion.

Design by Sara Fang

Design by Grace Filbin

2021

MARCH

SPORTS over the YEARS

historic run ends with a loss to Louisville, 62-50.

DEC 4 - In its second straight Big Ten Championship, the Michigan football team beats Purdue, 43-22, after defeating Iowa in 2021 for the title.

2023

MARCH

2024

Michigan shocks Ohio State, ends eight-game losing streak in The Game

JARED GREENSPAN

For 3,653 days — long, arduous, hollow days — the Michigan football program lived in the shadows of its unremitting failures against Ohio State.

There won’t be a 3,654th day. At long last, that futile streak is over.

After eight consecutive bitter losses to the Buckeyes, the Wolverines emerged from The Game victorious. No. 5 Michigan (11-1 overall, 8-1 Big Ten) shocked No. 2 Ohio State (10-2, 8-1), 42-27, clinching the Big Ten East and punching a ticket to next Saturday’s Big Ten Championship Game.

“One of my favorite sayings of all time is, ‘When there’s a will, there’s a way,’ ” Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh said after the game.

“And the will was very strong for our team.”

As the fourth quarter wound to a close, reality melded with imagination. Senior running back Hassan Haskins stood in the endzone with outstretched arms, celebrating a touchdown that handed Michigan a 15-point lead with 2:17 minutes to play. He blew kisses to the crowd, beckoning the raucous sea of maize pom poms that serenaded him for an electric five touchdown performance.

Pandemonium had officially set in.

When the clock struck doublezeroes, everyone seemed to forget about the freezing cold and the endless nightmares from previous defeats. Droves of fans plunged from the stands and spilled out

onto the turf, reveling in their newfound glory.

Michigan, champions of the Big Ten East.

“It was a surreal moment,” junior quarterback Cade McNamara said.

“It’s something we’ve dreamed of. Every 6 a.m. (practice), that feeling is the reason why we do it.”

Saturday offered an opportunity for the Wolverines to exorcise past demons, escaping the recent doldrums and persistent pain of the rivalry. A win would vault them into the Big Ten Championship Game and buoy aspirations of a berth in the College Football Playoff, two hurdles that the program had yet to clear as of the morning, seven years into Jim Harbaugh’s tenure.

But just as toppling the Buckeyes began to feel sisyphean, the Wolverines punched first — and refused to relent.

“It was really like a war out there,” senior defensive end Aidan Hutchinson, who wreaked havoc on Ohio State’s offense with three sacks, said.

On Michigan’s opening possession, sophomore receiver A.J. Henning found the endzone on a 14-yard touchdown run, whipping Michigan Stadium into an immediate frenzy.

In the second quarter, even as Ohio State took a brief 10-7 lead, Michigan proved unfazed, embodying its season-long serenity.

A 13-play, 82-yard touchdown drive sent the Wolverines into halftime clenching a 14-13 lead.

In past years, Michigan unraveled in similar moments, particularly in The Game. On

Saturday, the team merely grew stronger.

The second half started to a tee.

The Wolverines’ defense forced a crisp three-and-out, and the offense blazed down the field, running the ball three times for a total of 81 yards; Haskins capped the drive with a touchdown.

They had kicked Ohio State back onto its heels, and the Buckeyes would never recover.

Michigan’s offense, having re-discovered its rhythm, operated with machine-like efficiency.

A 31-yard pass from freshman quarterback J.J. McCarthy to sophomore receiver Roman Wilson set up a 34-yard flea-flicker from

Michigan defeats Ohio State for second year in a row, 45-23

RAINES

SPENCER

2022 Managing Sports Editor

COLUMBUS — It feels like a lifetime ago.

Last year when the Michigan football team finally broke its decade-long curse against Ohio State, when the Wolverines stormed the snowy streets of Ann Arbor and when Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh deemed it just a “beginning.”

It was the Wolverines’ biggest win of the millennium. And on Saturday in Columbus, Michigan did it again.

Whenever they needed to, the third-ranked Wolverines (12-0 overall, 9-0 Big Ten) delivered blow after blow to Ohio State (11-1, 8-1), as they defeated the secondranked Buckeyes, 45-23.

“It feels great to sing ‘The Victors’ in Columbus,” Harbaugh

said Saturday. “Our team really earned it in every way.”

The Game this year was different from the last, and that was obvious from the start. Ohio State’s offense took the field first and immediately got to work.

A 12 play, 81-yard drive capped off by receiver Emeka Egbuka’s touchdown sent the Horseshoe into a frenzy. Not even five minutes into the game, Michigan was already in an unfamiliar situation: For the first time all season, the Wolverines didn’t score first. The discomfort was obvious.

Sophomore quarterback J.J. McCarthy was erratic. He dipped out of the pocket before he needed to, he was missing throws — nothing was working.

“In the first half, I was a little amped up because I’ve been waiting to play this game so long,” McCarthy said. “But once the

nerves kind of calmed down and everything settled, I knew it was over from there.”

It took a while to get to where McCarthy knew the outcome — his team, at times, looked like they were just trying to survive the first half. The Buckeyes smelled blood, and they were trying to run away from Michigan. Everyone in the packed Horseshoe could sense that Ohio State was thoroughly outplaying the Wolverines in the first quarter, and yet, there was an uneasiness settling in.

Michigan was just hanging around. After giving up the opening drive touchdown, the Wolverines’ defense regrouped — only allowing three points on the next three possessions.

“We felt like any kind of stop was going to be like gold,” Harbaugh said.

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

Michigan wins national championship 34-13, summiting Washington in Houston

JOHN TONDORA Daily Sports Writer

HOUSTON — It had almost started to fade.

Victors valiant. Conqu’ring Heros. Champions of the West. Words that had once invoked so much, slowly dulling to a blunt edge. They certainly hadn’t lost all their shine, but the punch those lauded lyrics packed was perhaps no longer the same. The antiquated Michigan football program had stumbled its way into the new millennium.

No Big Ten Championships since 2004, a 3-17 record against Ohio State in the 21st century, a 6-12 bowl game record and a 2-4 finish in a rock bottom 2020 season. But by 2023, everything had changed.

Asked by some to step down, Jim Harbaugh doubled down. Jeered for being antiquated and old, the Wolverines went full bore — full Big Ten. Starting in 2020, they built

from the lines out, establishing a dominant ground-and-pound style that harkened back to football of old. Even as Michigan fell in two difficult CFP semifinal losses, something had changed within the storied walls of Schembechler Hall. If they were going to go all the way, it was only going to happen one way.

Running into Houston, the firstranked Wolverines didn’t skip a beat. Thrashing No. 2 Washington’s (14-1 overall) run defense, Michigan (15-0) summited the Huskies 34-13 on the back of none other than a good, old-fashioned 300 yard, four touchdown rushing attack en route to winning a 12th national championship in grand fashion.

“Dominance — (offensive coordinator Sherrone Moore) say every day we gon’ smash some,” sophomore quarterback Alex Orji said. “And I think he showed exactly who he is today. We got the best back duo in the nation, we got the best O-line in the nation. I promise that.”

For a moment, it looked like the Wolverines would run away with it. On their first two offensive drives they found the endzone with ease, courtesy of two 40-yard home runs by junior running back Donovan Edwards. Scoring 17 points on its first three offensive drives, Michigan throttled the gas pedal as the Huskies spiraled. But three stalled offensive drives later, the Wolverines went into the halftime break up just 17-10. A once red-hot rushing attack sputtered, and Michigan allowed Washington to hang tough. The yard differential was large, but the margin for error small.

“Sometimes, when you break the runs like that early, you tend to think that you may not need to block as hard throughout the rest of the game,” graduate center Drake Nugent said. “…But in reality it’s kind of the opposite because the defense is gonna get more stout.”

Read more at MichiganDaily.com

McNamara to junior receiver Mike Sainristil.

So hapless were the Buckeyes that only a brief kerfuffle could slow down the Wolverines.

After a scrum triggered an unsportsmanlike conduct on Ohio State’s Cameron Brown, Michigan found the endzone again. Haskins bounced outside, scoring for the third time on the day, staking the Wolverines to a stunning 15-point lead.

The result incited delirium and momentarily broke the Michigan Stadium scoreboard — an apt microcosm for the shock of The Game’s result.

Even as Ohio State scratched

and clawed its way to an early fourth quarter touchdown, Michigan responded with yet another emphatic, methodic drive. Haskins wiggled his way down the field, ultimately plowing into the endzone for his fourth touchdown.

In the game’s waning minutes, when Stroud’s fourth-and-18 heave fell shy of a first down, the reality set in. Bleachers rattled. The stadium shook. Hutchinson and fifth-year safety Brad Hawkins shed tears.

“We have (a sign) inside Schembechler Hall, ‘What are you doing today to beat Ohio State,’ ” Hawkins said. “And today, we beat them. It’s a blessing.”

A blessing, perhaps, but certainly

not a product of luck.

“Every workout, every practice, every game, everything that we put into this season — that’s something that we kept in the back of our minds every single day that we entered Schembechler Hall,” McNamara said of Ohio State. “We did enough to beat them today.” After nine years of perpetual suffering, Michigan had achieved the unthinkable. It’s a game that no one will soon forget.

“We’ve got a lot of hours left today,” Harbaugh smirked, allowing himself to digest the gravity of the moment. “… Celebrating long into the night.”

With a foreword by Nicole Auerbach, senior writer at The Athletic, this all-new hardcover book “Victors” highlights The Michigan Daily’s coverage of the historic 2023 Michigan football season. This limitededition coffee-table book provides a unique perspective and combines student journalists’ on-the-ground reporting on every game, player and coach feature stories, and never-before-seen photos to tell the story of a national championship-winning team across 96 pages. Order today to save 20% and own a piece of Michigan football history.

Michigan punches ticket to Frozen Four, beats Michigan State 5-2 in NCAA

Spartans (25-10-3, 16-7-3) in the NCAA Regional Final. With the 5-2 win, Michigan ended Michigan State’s season and earned its third straight Frozen Four berth.

skidded wide or were turned away by Michigan State goaltender Trey Augustine.

And in a dominant final stretch, Michigan earned it all.

MARYLAND HEIGHTS, Mo. —

‘Little brother’ had all but lost its meaning.

The Michigan hockey team was riding a four-game losing streak against its biggest rival.

Highlighted by a Big Ten Championship victory just last weekend, Michigan State had taken thorough control of the rivalry.

The Wolverines couldn’t claim the Spartans as their ‘little brother’ anymore. In fact, Michigan State could’ve made a case to turn the moniker on its head.

But on Sunday, with everything on the line, Michigan brought its meaning back.

Behind another late-game surge, the third-seeded Wolverines (2314-3 overall, 12-11-2 Big Ten) got their revenge over the top-seeded

“We came into this game with the mentality to just win a game, not for personal battles or to get involved in all that extracurriculars after the whistles,” junior forward Dylan Duke said. “We came to win a hockey game, and we did that tonight.”

Although it wasn’t part of the game plan, getting involved in extracurriculars was almost inevitable in a matchup like this.

Tensions ran high from start to finish, with 10 total penalties levied throughout the night.

The Spartans were the first to capitalize, cashing in on an early power-play opportunity and jumping out to a 1-0 lead. The Wolverines created a number of quality chances in hopes of responding, but their shots either

Midway through the second period, though, Michigan broke through and scored an equalizer. Spurred by quick passes on the rush, junior defenseman Ethan Edwards found space to shoot and made the most of it, sniping one past Augustine to knot the score at 1-1.

Throughout the rest of the second — and especially on the penalty kill — graduate goaltender Jake Barczewski heated up in net. He turned away a number of good looks from the Spartans, preserving the tie as the Wolverines slowed down on offense.

So it all came down to the final period. Twenty more minutes with everything up for grabs. A ticket to the Frozen Four was at the forefront, but for the Wolverines, revenge and name-calling rights were in the back of their minds.

“If you watched our team early in the year, we had a couple of rough third periods,” Duke said. “We talked about learning from them for moments like this. We learned all year … and it showed the past few nights.”

About six minutes into the third frame, graduate defenseman Marshall Warren fired a onetimer from the doorstep and found the back of the net, giving the Wolverines a one-goal advantage.

It didn’t last long, as the Spartans stormed back with another powerplay goal. But after Michigan State pushed, Michigan shoved.

Just a few minutes after the Spartans tied it back up at 2-2, junior forward Dylan Duke took matters into his own hands. Duke charged to the net, eluding three Michigan State defensemen before stuffing the puck behind Augustine.

The Wolverines barely had time to celebrate that go-ahead goal before scoring another. Picking up a cinematic between-the-legs pass from sophomore forward Frank Nazar III, sophomore forward Gavin Brindley put Michigan up 4-2, just 12 seconds after Duke’s score.

“It’s huge,” Brindley told The Michigan Daily. “I think any shift after a goal is big with the momentum. So anytime you’re on the ice after a goal, you try to keep that momentum. That was a big goal for sure.”

Michigan State took another penalty in the waning minutes, giving the Wolverines their fifth power-play opportunity — and this time, they capitalized. Duke scored his second of the game, and Michigan iced the victory with just under two minutes left.

“We got that big goal at the end,” Nazar said. “Yeah, we gave up two on the PK but we were able to score

that one on the power play at the end and shut the game down.” Even without one of their most important players in sophomore defenseman Seamus Casey — who was sidelined after an apparent injury in Friday’s game — the Wolverines rode their third-period momentum to the final buzzer. They locked down on defense, with Barczewski standing tall behind them, and kept their season alive and well.

The Spartans might hold a 4-2 record over Michigan this season, but the Wolverines showed out when it mattered most, with their season on the line.

Above all else, Sunday’s victory earned Michigan another trip to the Frozen Four. But perhaps as an added bonus, the Wolverines punched that ticket by way of ending their biggest rival’s season — and with it, they finally brought meaning back to the ‘little brother’ label.

Michigan escapes Sweet Sixteen with win over South Dakota, 52-49

WICHITA, KAN. — The Michigan women’s basketball team knew it was do or die.

With a trip to the Elite Eight on the line — potentially the first in program history — the third seeded Wolverines (25-6 overall) rose to the challenge.

Taking down No. 11-seed South Dakota (29-6), 52-49, in the Sweet Sixteen, the Wolverines once again made history.

“The moment we had today is never going to go away,” Michigan coach Kim Barnes Arico said. “So I’m just so happy for this group. … We’re still playing. There are eight darn teams left in the country playing and we are one of them. That’s pretty incredible.”

From the opening tip, it was a gritty, back and forth game. Throughout the entire game Michigan struggled to score, never truly finding an offensive groove. Instead, short spurts of efficient scoring kept the Wolverines afloat against a physical Coyote defense.

In the first quarter, trying to push the ball in transition, sloppy turnovers plagued Michigan. The Wolverines looked to their onetwo punch of senior forward Naz

Hillmon and senior guard Leigha Brown, but to no avail. Hillmon — who was tripleteamed on every possession — notched zero points in the first quarter and just six in the second. Brown faired slightly better, but any limited success she had was unsustainable. Working deep into the rotation early, Michigan tried to get something going. A short run at the end of the first quarter kept the Wolverines from fully breaking. But opening the second quarter with two missed 3-pointers from junior guard Maddie Nolan and a shot-clock violation, Michigan quickly fell out of what little rhythm it had gained. Short offensive spurts from freshman guard Laila Phelia kept the Wolverines in the game — and a strong defensive showing forced South Dakota into tough shots — but nothing seemed to stick.

It quickly became clear Michigan wouldn’t magically overcome its struggles, but would have to fight for every possession. On this night, nothing would come easy.

With their offense faltering, the Wolverines dug into their defensive identity, trying to keep South Dakota contained on offense. Clogging the paint and hedging high on ball screens, Michigan tried to disrupt the Coyotes offensive game plan.

“We play a different style than a lot of the teams that (South Dakota) played,” Barnes Arico said. “Just going back and watching the film of their first two tournament games, who they beat, two Power Five opponents that are awesome teams, they defended it differently than we did tonight. We wanted to give them a different look. I think it sped them up and made them take quicker shots than maybe they wanted to take.”

Yet, South Dakota still jumped out to an early lead. Failing to put together a complete game, the Wolverines allowed the Coyotes to hang around throughout the half, entering the locker room down by two points.

“They were definitely scrappy, they fought and clawed to the last minute,” Hillmon said. “They were in there running around for every rebound, trying to take charges throughout the game, everything in between.”

Despite obvious halftime adjustments, the third quarter followed the same narrative of offensive struggle. Doubling down on finding Hillmon and senior forward Emily Kiser in the paint, Michigan finally found the shots it wanted — but failed to capitalize. More short spurts of successful offense from Hillmon and Brown kept the Coyotes from deepening the wound, just barely.

The Coyotes continued to force the Wolverines out of rotation and score at every level. Draining 3-pointers and finding their forwards inside, South Dakota kept Michigan from gaining any momentum. Regaining the lead at the tail end of the third quarter, the Wolverines narrowly escaped with a one point lead.

With the game very much within reach for either team throughout the entirety of the fourth quarter, Michigan continued to struggle finding offensive consistency and keep the game within its control.

Wolverines ride defense to stifle Florida State, advance to Elite Eight

INDIANAPOLIS — The Michigan men’s basketball team rode its offense to reach the Sweet Sixteen. On Sunday, it used its defense to punch a ticket to the Elite Eight.

In a game they dominated at every stage, the Wolverines (23-4 overall, 14-3 Big Ten) downed Florida State (18-7), 76-58, to keep their season alive for at least one more game.

From the beginning, that defense frustrated the Seminoles. Michigan forced 14 turnovers, including nine in the first half alone, and limited Florida State to 40% shooting from the field. In transition, the Wolverines capitalized on the Seminoles’ miscues, scoring 16 fastbreak points while surrendering just six. Florida State looked out of sync all night long, going on two separate scoreless stretches lasting over four minutes. The dominant defensive effort was something that Michigan coach Juwan Howard envisioned for his team from the day he took the job in 2019.

“Defense has been one of our staples of our identity as far as on the offensive end,” Howard said. “We have habits on how we developed it last year when I first arrived, and when we returned to the campus in June, first thing that we met as a staff, and then also the first meeting when we were able to have our first official practice, we talked about how we’re going to be a better defensive team.”

On the offensive end, the Wolverines got a lift from junior forward Brandon Johns Jr. Starting in just his fourth game of the season, Johns scored a season-best 14 points to lead the way, punctuated by a series of high-flying jams. On the defensive side, Johns drew two charges and notched a steal, coming through on both ends in the biggest game of his career.

“We always tell him that he can really be the best player out there when he steps on the court,” sophomore wing Franz Wagner said. “So we have huge confidence in Brandon. I think he does too. You can see, he played a stellar game today, got some key offensive rebounds, and those little things, I think, are very important when you try to win the championship.”

Wagner produced another allaround statline with 13 points, 10 rebounds and five assists, routinely scoring inside on crafty finishes and finding teammates inside of the dribble.

“I think I always try to attack the basket, be aggressive,” Wagner said. “But like I said, I think all that only happens when we move the ball and don’t dribble too much. That’s when really everything opens up.”

Facing off against a Florida State team with an average height of 6-foot-7, Michigan dominated on the glass. Led by four from freshman center Hunter Dickinson, the Wolverines hauled in 11 offensive rebounds and scored 17 second-chance points off of those opportunities.

“Our guys came with a mindset,” Howard said. “We talked about it leading up to the game. We showed it on film. We also talked about it before the

game, about we have to attack the offensive glass. We can’t sit back on our heels and leave it untouched.”

On the opposite side of the court, Michigan prevented the Seminoles from ever establishing an offensive flow. The Wolverines limited Florida State to a 5-for20 shooting night from beyond the arc, and proved themselves to be disciplined inside as well, allowing the Seminoles to shoot just six free throws.

In the second half, Florida State appeared to gain momentum for the first time since early in the first half with its first two 3-pointers of the night. The Wolverines quickly ensured that any hope of a Seminole comeback would be relinquished quickly, countering with an andone from graduate guard Mike Smith before senior center Austin Davis followed with two straight finishes inside to key a 7-0 spurt to push the lead back to 46-36.

“I think you can see that out there on the court that people are really confident out there and just confident and comfortable within their role out there,” Wagner said. In the game’s final moments, Howard called for a timeout and brought in his reserves.

LYS GOLDMAN Daily Sports Writer

ABBIE TELGENHOF Daily Sports Writer

LILA TURNER/Daily

TEDDY GUTKIN Daily Sports Writer