MONDAY November 12, 2018
THE DAILY ILLINI The independent student newspaper at the University of Illinois since 1871
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Vol. 148 Issue 23
Students boost voting turnout Polling locations see long wait time despite prior preparation BY ZIHAN WANG STAFF WRITER
Recent research shows the increase of youth voter turnout rate shaped the results of the 2018 midterm elections. The University saw a record number of voters at its various polling locations. A statement from the Illinois Student Government said although many organizations and individuals on campus have been committed to providing accommodations and assistance to the voting processes, many students were still rendered unable to vote. Students experienced waiting times from 30 to 90 minutes at polling locations such as the Illini Union and the University YMCA. “This constitutes an undue burden on students, many of whom had to skip classes and other obligations to vote as a result,” the statement said. “This follows a historical trend of understaffing and underequipping student polling places in Champaign-Urbana.” The ISG said moving forward, it will be reaching out to new leadership in the County Clerk’s office as well as University administration to ensure the same types of problems students experienced while attempting to vote this year will not be repeated in the 2019 municipal election and the 2020 general election. Aaron Ammons, Champaign County clerk-elect this year, said there were voters at the Illini Union polling location lining up from the fourth floor all the way to the first floor. He said students were
also transported to other polling locations to vote, including the Church of the Living God. “It’s extremely important to all of the races, especially for those of the democratic swift that we just witnessed for the countywide races, the students involving is always, what I want to call it, the glue to helping us solidify a more democratic process and to make sure their voices are heard,” Ammons said. Dawson Dodds, junior in Business, said he thought there were a lot of movements behind the midterm election this year. “Everyone seems to be telling everyone else to vote, friends or others, encouraging them to vote in group chats, on Facebook, Twitter and every social media,” Dodds said. Jared Perovic, junior in LAS, said he saw more students voting this year compared with the last election in 2016. He said there were movements to push students to vote during the last general election, but this year it was more effective. “That message of ‘getting out to vote’ has always been around, but I think now that politics looks a little bit different now and it makes people a lot more emotionally angry, one side or the other ... that message was afforded a little bit more power,” Perovic said. Ammons said the work of students groups, community organization and candidates contributed to the high voter turnouts this year, and the need for changes in politics also pushed students to vote. SEE TURNOUT | 3A
JEANETTE YAN THE DAILY ILLINI
Jun Li, doctoral student in Engineering, focuses his research on air conditioning systems and heat exchanger effectiveness. Li is a recipient of the Mavis Future Faculty Fellowship that helps to prepare students to take faculty positions.
Fellowship encourages future faculty BY SANA KHADILKAR STAFF WRITER
Thirty graduate students in Engineering were awarded the Mavis Future Faculty Fellowship, which will enhance their experience in research, teaching and mentoring in their respective fields. The fellowship prepares its recipients to take positions as faculty members in the future, provides them with resources to build strong application materials and helps them connect their research to teaching. Jun Li, doctoral student in Engineering and one of the recipients, said the fellowship gave him the opportunity to meet and train with peers who have the same job
goals. He said the fellowship program also includes a weekly seminar where experts in the field are invited to speak to the recipients. “Officers at College of Engineering come to tell us what a mentor/mentee relationship is like because that is the core of being a professor,” Li said. Muhammad Umer Huzaifa, another recipient of the fellowship, said he feels he learned a lot from the seminars, and they have altered his perspective on his degree. He said the program made him consider what the next steps are for his future and how he can achieve his goals. Another opportunity the fellowship program provides is mentoring undergraduate
students. Huzaifa said his new role as a mentor is very interesting because he has to make sure not to put too much pressure on his mentee and allow the student to come up with his own ideas. “It’s focused on making Ph.D. graduates really understand what they are required of if they end up getting a faculty position, so it’s really geared toward that. It’s very nontraditional from taking courses like engineering (classes) or any other class and doing assignments,” Huzaifa said. Kaihao Zhang, recipient of the fellowship, said being named a fellow gave him confidence that he can secure a
faculty position in the future. “It’s very exciting,” Zhang said. “It’s a very good opportunity for me because I really like research, and after my graduation I want to be a faculty member at the University, so it’s a good chance to start from the student, to an independent researcher, to a mentor.” Each recipient can also choose an adviser as part of the fellowship program, who can help them understand what being a professor is like, said Sameh Tawfick, adviser to Zhang and assistant professor in Engineering, in an email. Tawfick said he gives feedSEE FELLOWSHIP | 3A
Research explores key to collaboration BY CLARE BUDIN
institutions. “For each of our cohorts, we recruited 16 scientists and researchers for radical diversity in terms of disciplines, racial and ethnic background, as well as the constituent communities the organizations the researchers come from represent,” Barley said. For the researchers and co-investigators, this additional method of inclusion acted as another measure to show how diversity can present a group with unique opportunities and challenges, as well as a way to point out a lack of demographic representation in research overall. “Some findings during the course of our project point to barriers for participation in national-level research insti-
STAFF WRITER
PHOTO COURTESY OF SEAN MACDONALD
University graduate student Sean MacDonald watches for birds in Oahu, Hawaii. Different bird calls were recorded to attract birds to disperse seeds of plants.
Bird calls to save endangered plant species BY LUIS VELAZQUEZ STAFF WRITER
A University graduate student is leading research that may bring plant species in Oahu, Hawaii, back from the brink of extinction using bird calls. Sean MacDonald, graduate student in ACES and lead researcher, realized certain endangered plant species historically dispersed by birds were suffering because those birds are now extinct in Oahu. MacDonald hypothesized projecting recorded bird calls on speakers would attract different types of birds that would, in turn, disperse seeds from the plants.
He used a microphone and multiple speakers attached to trees to test his hypothesis. MacDonald would sit hidden nearby to collect enough data for his research. He recorded the number of birds visiting the designated plant species during a control period of one hour in which no bird calls were used and then the number of birds visiting the plants when the bird calls were played. “I had binoculars and full-on camouflage because I’ve noticed they would see me and fly away,” he said. “I would sit there motionless for two hours.” After finishing his exper-
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iment and research, MacDonald concluded recorded bird calls attract other birds to disperse seeds on endangered plant species, even if a particular bird is completely different from the extinct species that used to do the job. “Birds do associate with other bird calls, even outside their own species when foraging — and for fruit in particular,” MacDonald said. “That behavior is important, and it can be manipulated to our advantage.” MacDonald chose to complete his research in Oahu because his adviser, Jinelle Sperry, assistant professor in ACES, was already studying seed dispersal at that
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location. “She already had a project there, and she wanted a student to work with the army and the endangered plants,” he said. “I got that position, and we kinda took it in this direction to monitor these endangered plants and try to get these birds to eat their fruits.” However, MacDonald believes his research can also be applied to other species of plants and animals in different areas of the world. For example, deer living in Indomalayan systems — areas of south and southeast Asia — have been known to follow the calls of monkeys
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Spreading conservatism one Republican at a time
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Anyone who has worked in a group may have experienced moments when the clashing of ideas, schedules and perspectives threaten to derail the project. William Barley and Marshall Poole, professors in LAS, are seeking solutions to this widespread problem with the research project “EAGER Germination: Crystallizing Transformative Ideas by Seeding a Diverse Knowledge Community,” supported by the National Science Foundation. With the help of co-investigators from several minority institutions, the University researchers set up cohorts of four members hailed from land-grant institutions, four from tribal colleges, four from historically black colleges and universities and four from Hispanic
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