SERVING THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS AT AUSTIN COMMUNITY SINCE 1900 @THEDAILYTEXAN | THEDAILYTEXAN.COM
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 19, 2018
VOLUME 118, ISSUE 105
N E WS
O PI N I O N
LI FE &A RTS
SPORTS
UT hosts Texas’ largest Shabbat dinner, with around 500 in attendance. PAGE 2
Candidates for editor-in-chief weigh in on students’ housing struggles. PAGE 4
Giving a spin on a classic story, “Wazir of Oz” captures audiences’ attention. PAGE 8
Texas can’t finish the sweep but still take the series, 2–1, over Louisianna-Lafayette. PAGE 6
UNIVERSITY
UT addresses concerns of sexual misconduct Expanded faculty, staff training to aid in harrasment claims. By Maria Mendez @ mellow_maria
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n an anonymous spreadsheet listing accounts of sexual misconduct in academia, UT appears multiple times. The spreadsheet “Sexual Harassment In the Academy: A Crowdsource Survey,” first reported on by The Wall Street Journal in January, is completely anonymous and unverified but has garnered attention because of the widespread accounts of misconduct. The University said it is reviewing the allegations. “The source of this information is unknown,” University communications strategist Shilpa Bakre said in an email. “However, the University takes all complaints of discrimination/harassment seriously. The Office of Inclusion and Equity is therefore reviewing the allegations.” The spreadsheet mimics the “Shitty Men in Media” list, which along with news investigations of film producer Harvey Weinstein, forced the media to begin confronting issues of sexual misconduct last October. These revelations sparked the Me Too movement, which has spread to multiple industries, including universities. The University is limited in its ability to investigate the anonymous claims because they are unofficially reported and some are decades old, Bakre said. More credible concerns about inappropriate employee behavior and sexual misconduct at UT have arisen due to recent
rena li | the daily texan staff investigations from the Austin American-Statesman. However, the University has been working to prevent sexual misconduct by expanding employee training since last spring, Bakre said. After UT System’s 2017 Cultivating Learning and Safe Environments report revealed the prevalence of
sexual misconduct at UT in March, the University decided to hire an education coordinator to develop comprehensive faculty and staff training on its policies against sexual misconduct and gender discrimination. Texas’ labor code requires state agencies, such as UT, to offer employees courses defining harass-
ment, assault, stalking and interpersonal violence as employee misconduct. The courses must be taken within 30 days of employment. In addition to these course modules, Bakre said the University has always offered in-person training for faculty and staff. But with the education coordinator, the
University is working to expand in-person training on “prevention, culture of respect, and personal accountability,” Bakre said. Through the expanded in-person training, the University hopes to better communicate ethics focusing on behavioral and cultural change. The University does not currently have a campus-wide requirement for the in-person trainings. Instead, departments can request or require the trainings for their employees. In the 2016–2017 academic year, the Title IX office provided 843 in-person trainings. However, the University employs more than 11,000 personnel, 3,385 faculty members and over 10,000 student employees, according to 2017 UT System and UT data. Elizabeth Matlock, senior human resource coordinator for UT’s Harry Ransom Center, said she recently worked with the education coordinator to provide all of the Ransom Center’s staff in-person trainings. Unlike the required state modules, Matlock said the in-person training encouraged staff members to ask questions. “We talked through several scenarios in small groups and were able to share perspectives and ask questions unique to our institution,” Matlock said in an email. Government and Plan II senior Austin Smith took a similar in-person training as a resident assistant and said he hopes more University departments will offer in-person training to employees in order to combat sexual misconduct. “I think that one solution is making sure that authorities on campus are aware of the nuances of (sexual misconduct),” Smith said.
STUDENT GOVERNMENT UNIVERSITY
University targeted by white supremacist propaganda By Tehreem Shahab @turhem
According to a report published by the Anti-Defamation League, white supremacist organizations have increasingly targeted college campuses to spread propaganda by using flyers, posters and banners. Between September 2016 and December 2017, 346 incidents of white supremacist propaganda were reported. Colleges in Texas were targeted the most with 61 incidents reported. UT-Austin was one of the colleges targeted by such organizations. In February 2017, posters were put up by the American Vanguard encouraging students to imagine a “Muslim–free America.” In November 2017, masked protesters appeared on the South Mall and were found to be a part of the white supremacist organization Patriot Front, according to the Anti-Defamation League. UT Police Department Chief David Carter said
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Name: 6791/Texas Exes Width: 60p0
Student government presidential candidates push for ‘A New Texas’ By Brianna Stone @bristone19
Student Government campaigns for the 2018–2019 student body president and vice president have kicked off with two candidates advocating for representation of students from all backgrounds. Guneez Ibrahim and Hannah McMorris are one of nine executive alliance campaigns. They hope to enact change for underrepresented groups on campus, with the motto, “A new Texas looks like this.”
The candidates’ platform includes extending bus hours to Riverside and building a Riverside student center, bringing halal and kosher food to dorms to tend to different faiths and backgrounds, include locally sourced foods in dining halls, provide free tampons and pads in restrooms of every major campus building, add gender-inclusive signage to major campus restrooms, offer garage parking validation for students visiting centers in the Student Services Building and modernize the Perry Castañeda Library. Ibrahim, running for president, is a sociology and design senior from
Lafayette, Louisiana. “(Elections) end up being more about the two people themselves versus the communities that they can support,” Ibrahim said. “We felt like a lot of the campaigns tokenize certain groups but then forget about them after being elected. We’ve both been really involved on campus and, after working with different groups, we saw different issues that need to be tackled.” Ibrahim said she is a first-generation Pakistani-Muslim from
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juan figueroa | the daily texan staff Guneez Ibrahim and Hannah McMorris are advocating for better representation of students from all backgrounds with their executive alliance campaign. They are one of nine alliance campaigns running for student body president and vice president.
CITY
Ellsworth Kelly’s art structure ‘Austin’ opens to acclaim By Justin Raga @ragajus
Anthropology freshman Manuel Ortiz gazes at a starburst of multicolored glass windows, set high in the stark white walls of the newly-opened “Austin” exhibit, located right outside of the Blanton Museum of Art. “I felt very at peace in there,” Ortiz said. “It was calming.” Nearly 200 people attended Sunday’s opening ceremony of the late artist Ellsworth Kelly’s ‘Austin.’ Mayor Steve Adler and University President Gregory Fenves were among those to speak during the ceremony, as well as Blanton director Simone Jamille Wicha and Kelly’s longtime partner Jack Shear. Hundreds more visitors waited in lines, which wrapped around the Blanton, to spend a few moments inside the long-awaited freestanding structure. The exhibit is the only one of its kind Kelly designed during a career as one of the most notable American artists in the post-war era. Kelly died of cancer in December 2015, only months
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