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THE DAILY ILLINI
MONDAY March 8, 2021
The independent student newspaper at the University of Illinois since 1871
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Vol. 150 Issue 38
Could Unofficial officially be over?
The UIPD has its own procedure to monitor events during Unofficial. Along with the police presence on campus, as they have done in previous years, the party patrol will also monitor any potential gatherings. “We’ll have our party patrol active and that’s not really an official thing we’ve been doing that ever since the pandemic began, and that will continue this weekend,” Wade said. Businesses that profited off Unofficial such as merchandise stores are also struggling due to COVID-19. “We closed the store permanently this summer due to COVID, so I have no idea what if there are any plans for Unofficial this year,” said a TeShurt representative. The event’s decline has resulted in bars no longer prioritizing the event as much due to the lack of attendance over the years. According to Joe’s Brewery, “Unofficial is no longer a thing.” Overall, students should abide by the COVID-19 protocols this Unofficial season and try to find alternative ways to celebrate the occasion with friends. “Our community is going to be sticking by the rules this weekend, and we would really like to encourage everyone else to as well,” Bressler said. “If you do witness a policy violation, please fill out the form on the IFC website or contact the University of Illinois police via their nonemergency number.”
BY ALIZA MAJID STAFF WRITER
CAMERON KRASUCKI THE DAILY ILLINI
A biohazard trash stands in the middle of the ARC for students to dispose of COVID-19 testing materials on Feb. 1. Illinois graduate students are concerned about a lack of information from the University about COVID-19 disciplinary actions.
Students call for clearer discipline BY VIVIAN LA STAFF WRITER
Graduate students want more clarity from the University about how COVID-19 discipline is being handled, as well as more information about testing guidelines. Angela Ting, a master’s student in FAA and a representative for the Graduate Employees’ Organization, said it’s been hard trying to advise students because the testing guidelines are not clear. “The discipline regime, or structure, is just not clear at all,” Ting said. “So people are being threatened with different disciplinary actions.” The organization has had five graduate students facing disciplinary action for COVID-related infractions reach out to their grievance committee, four of which live in University Housing. The fifth case was Ivor Chen, who lives in an off-campus apartment. Kai Shinbrough, doctoral student in LAS and GEO representative, said the num-
ber of students they’ve had reach out is another issue because they don’t know exactly how many graduates are facing disciplinary action because the University is not telling them this information. Forty graduate students faced disciplinary action for COVID-19 related issues last semester, whereas around 90 have faced or are facing disciplinary action for such issues this semester, Justin Brown, associate dean of students, said in an email.
Lack of communication for students in University Housing
GEO representatives said the overall lack of information from the school concerning COVID-19 testing guidelines is unclear, especially for graduates and their dependents in University Housing. “We’ve heard from a lot of students that are worried, trying to do the right thing but not really sure what the right thing is,” Elinor Fuji-
moto, doctoral student in AHS and GEO representative, said. In University Housing, there are 638 graduate and professional students and 271 family dependents living in the three apartment communities, according to Chelsea Hamilton, spokesperson for University Housing. Family members over the age of 18 are required to test weekly. Those under the age of 18 are not required at this time, Robin Kaler, spokesperson for the school, said in an email. Even though these are the guidelines, it’s largely unclear what happens if their dependents fall off the testing schedule, Fujimoto said. “Does that reflect on the student?” she said. “Does that lead to discipline? That’s just one of the glaring omissions that we’ve unfortunately not been able to answer to any capacity for people.” People also have different dependents of different ages
and abilities. Some of them are older or more vulnerable to COVID-19 for underlying reasons, which makes it difficult to test sometimes, Fujimoto said. “We want more clarity about what kinds of infractions warrant what kinds of discipline,” Shinbrough said.
Concerns for international students
“Unofficial St. Patrick’s Day,” a March day of partying and binge-drinking at local bars and parties, is a longstanding tradition for University students, though new restrictions have shrunk the event significantly. The pandemic may be the final straw in putting this event to rest. “I think a lot of the efforts that have been taken on by the University and the city over the years are what has contributed to sort of this downward trend of an unofficial St. Patrick’s Day,” said Patrick Wade, communication director for University of Illinois Police Department. Students are still required to abide by the city’s emergency COVID-19 orders set in place that limit social gatherings to 10 or fewer people while maintaining social distancing and wearing masks. The Interfraternity Council has also placed restrictions reiterating the fact that no social events are allowed this semester due to COVID-19, and these restrictions will be heavily monitored during the weekend in order to hold chapters accountable. “We check houses two to four times a day starting from March 4 going through March 7,” said Reese Bressler, the vice president of public relations at IFC. “We want to make sure that our houses are clear of any social events this weekend because that is the rule from FSA fraternity and sorority affairs, and that is a rule that we echoed to all of alizam2@dailyillini.com our chapters.”
Fujimoto said the GEO is hoping Chen’s widely-publicized situation and resulting campus support will cause more students to reach out to them for help. “In the face of no information from the University, we only know what’s happening because people are reaching out to us,” Ting said. Brown said the overall disciplinary process for testing noncompliance is the same for any other Student Code violation and applies to undergraduate, graduate RYAN ASH THE DAILY ILLINI and international students. Students wait in line to get into KAM’s during last year’s “It really seems to us like Unofficial on March 6, 2020. Constant campus patrolling and warnings from University officials resulted in a decline of
SEE DISCIPLINE | 3A Unofficial activities this past weekend.
UI loses key member of virus response team University students BY MONA ALRAZZAQ STAFF WRITER
Greg Gulick, University of Illinois’ Interim Chief Information officer and key member of its COVID-19 steering committee, passed away from COVID-19 on Feb. 16. “Greg’s empowering and compassionate leadership during this COVID-19 year is a major reason why our university was able to reopen this fall and bring our students back to campus,” according to a Masssmail sent to faculty and staff. Gulick contracted COVID-19, but continued working with the University by “attending meetings remotely and offering his staff and other colleagues wisdom, moral support or just a funny comment to make them laugh,” according to his obituary. “As an integral member of our University COVID-19 Steering Committee and part of our SHIELD team, Greg was instrumental in guiding our decisions and actions in directions that always put the well-being and needs of our students, staff and faculty first,” said the University through the Massmail. The COVID-19 testing dashboard was publicized in August to make information about the University’s response to the virus wide-
ly available. The most recent version of the dashboard has been in the works for weeks, but was delayed after Gulick’s death. This update includes breakdowns of the different categories by each population on campus, including undergraduate students, graduate students, faculty and others. It also includes data regarding how many unique users there are of the Safer Illinois application on a daily basis. The goals of this update are to make the data easier for researchers to interpret and also to enhance transparency in order to allow people to better understand the consequences of their actions, according to Robin Kaler, associate chancellor for Public Affairs. “The goal is always to try to change and help people to understand the risks better,” Kaler said. According to Kaler, the hope is that by providing a clearer understanding of how the virus is spreading amongst undergraduates specifically will encourage students to make decisions to slow that positivity rate down. The update also includes a link to share the dashboard with other people and allow them to directly access the information through the
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demand recognition through census category CONTRIBUTING WRITER
Several University students are currently working towards getting a space for the Middle East and North Africa community and advocating for the identification of Middle Eastern and North African classifications on student censuses. On March 2, the University’s Arab Student Association and Students for Justice in Palestine participated in an event hosted by the Arab American Cultural Center at University of Illinois at Chi-
link instead of having to go through a different webpage to access it. The University plans to gather data about how many people are in isolation versus how many people are in quarantine in the near future. Any other updates would also continue to make data more accessible to researchers or
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others who intend to publicize it. The University has processed 1,539,374 tests as of March 4 with an overall positivity rate of 0.40%. On March 4, the positivity rate was 0.09% with 10,237 tests processed.
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Opinions
Features: Student stock market interest skyrockets
Sports: Curbelo, Dosunmu thrive in win
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PHOTO COURTESY OF UNVIERSITY
Technology Services Interim Chief Information Officer Greg Gulick poses for a professional photo. Gulick passed away in February from COVID-19 and was an essential part of the SHIELD team.
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cago addressing the lack of representation amongst the student population who identify with the MENA. MENA is an acronym for the regional subcontinent of the Middle East and Africa that many of the Arab Americans in the United States identify with and is seen as neglected by many Arab American students who have been told to check off the “white box” because they are neither Asian, Hispanic or Black.
BY NESHMIA MALIK
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