Jan. 13, 2020
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TRIUMPH AND TRAGEDY Former guard may never play again after collapsing on court during first game of senior year THE MERCURY | UTDMERCURY.COM
ROSHAN KHICHI | MERCURY STAFF
Four computer science freshmen developed the app, which placed second in the T-Mobile Hacktober Hackathon.
Student app helps keep track of UTD events Application to scan posters, add items to calendar MADISON YORK Opinion Editor
Navigating the galaxies of campus activities, events and clubs can be dizzying. That’s why four computer science freshmen set out to make charting the course a little easier for Comets. Khalid Hossain, Cady Baltz, Christina Abraham and Supratik Pochampally recently placed second in the 2019 T-Mobile Hacktober Hackathon. Now, the team has claimed first place in the Student Government category for the 2019 UTD Hackathon by specifically designing an app that benefits the campus. Hossain said the all-night coding experience was intense — and well worth it. “The problem we saw — my team and I — is that we see all these flyers everywhere. We sometimes are very interested in them, but we’re running to class, we’re going places, we don’t really have the time to stop and really take in the information in the posters,” Hossain said. “And so, what we decided, was what if these posters were much more interactive in a much faster way?” To utilize the app, users simply point their phone’s camera at a poster or flyer, triggering a pop-up on their phone, containing all the information about the advertised event. From there, users can download all the information directly to their default calendar. Gone are the days of snapping photos of posters, then forgetting about them. The app, Hossain said, is appro-
→ SEE APP,
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UTD ATHLETICS DEPARTMENT | COURTESY
Doctors said senior guard Curtis Allen (#40, pictured above) had a 6% chance of survival after the former player's heart stopped during a Nov. 8 game. MRUNMAYI SATHAYE Mercury Staff
Seven minutes into the very first game of the men’s basketball season, a player began to approach the team bench to ask for a substitute. Though it was not unusual for a player to be winded around this time in a game, it was very unusual that this player collapsed before he could get a substitution. On Nov. 8, marketing senior Curtis Allen’s heart stopped during a game against Redlands Uni-
versity. Allen was hospitalized shortly after, and will no longer play for the team. Allen recounted his experience in a video for the Athletics Department. “As soon as I came down, my vision started going black and I walked towards the bench to ask for a sub,” Allen said in the video. “They said I asked for a sub, but I don’t remember asking for a sub. In five seconds I was blacked out.” Coach Terrence Butterfield said that he thought that the cause of Allen passing out was dehydration
or heat stroke because the gym was hot. It wasn’t until the trainers brought the AED when, Butterfield said, the situation took on a whole other dimension. “When something like that happens — which it has never happened to me — time stands still,” Butterfield said. “He was on his back and it looked like he was convulsing a little bit. We called to the other team’s trainer to come down because at that point we were travelling without a trainer. I looked
→ SEE ALLEN,
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CHIAMAKA MGBOJI | GRAPHICS EDITOR
Changes to AES awards met with unhappiness Previous merit scholarship tiers abolished due to university growth, increasing SAT/ACT scores CINDY FOLEFACK Editor-in-Chief
Despite confusion and unhappiness from prospective students following a change in Academic Excellence Scholarships, university officials maintain that UTD is committed to financial merit awards. Several prospective students posted on the UTD subreddit on mid-December as AES awards went out. Historically, the award had three tiers — Honors, Distinction and Achievement — with each tier providing full tuition coverage with a $3,000 semesterly stipend, full tuition coverage with a $1,000 semesterly stipend and $3,000 tuition coverage per semester with no stipend, respectively. After this year’s awards were released, several students voiced their confusion and frustration after receiving less scholarship money
than expected. A Mercury survey of 174 prospective students distributed through the subreddit found that 76% of respondents received an AES offer in December. Of those respondents, 39.5% received $16,000 yearly, 26% received $13,000 yearly, 15% received $10,000 yearly, 12% received $6,000 yearly and 7.5% received a different amount. Of that 7.5%, three respondents said they received $3,000 annually while the remainder chose not to specify. The Bursar’s Office placed tuition at $6,955 per semester for 12-15 credit hours under the guaranteed tuition plan, bringing the total tuition cost per year to $13,910. Nearly 70% of survey respondents said they did not know a change was being made to AES awards and 93% said they felt they weren’t
→ SEE AES,
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CHIAMAKA MGBOJI | GRAPHICS EDITOR
Professors voice concern over gender discrepancies in course evaluations Female faculty note differences in ratings, student behavior toward male colleagues ANJALI VENNA News Editor
Students are encouraged to complete course evaluations at the end of every semester, but factors such as race and gender may influence how students review their professors. Lauren Santoro, an assistant political science professor, received comments in her course evaluations and interactions with students that caused her to question if those remarks were related to her gender. “Research has shown that female faculty and minority faculty members are rated lower than white male faculty members. So the bias against, I feel like myself or other female faculty or minority faculty, is going to be implicit, which means that it's not really intentional,” Santoro said. “It's not like I can essentially point to specific instances where the discrepancies are widespread.
It’s just you wonder, and I know that I am penalized for certain things.” One such instance, she said, are complaints about her sticking to syllabus policy. “I'm a pretty big stickler on deadlines and policies. To ensure fairness for all my students, I don't make exceptions,” Santoro said. “I find in my teaching evals students talk about how that's unfair or that's not appreciated and they can't believe that I'm such a stickler about certain policies. I don't know, but do I get penalized more so for sticking to syllabus policy than my male colleagues?” She said there are more references to ‘teacher’ and ‘instructor’ instead of ‘professor’ in her evaluations, and she read comments that question her qualifications. “When you have students that come in and complain about a grade or they debate you about a grade you always wonder if they feel like they can debate their grade with me because I am a
young female professor,” Santoro said. “In my discussion with my male colleagues, the things that I’ve had to deal with, they don’t deal with.” One example, she said, is she has some male students that will debate and complain about a grade or late assignment with her. This occurs a majority of the time in her state and local government class, which is a mandatory course for all students. “There have been some instances I’ve dealt with that I’ve asked my male colleagues about and they’ve told me ‘we’ve never had to deal with that,’” Santoro said. Santoro said she has also received negative comments through informal methods such as Rate My Professor. One particular post commented on her pregnancy. “In these informal, anonymous
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ANJALI VENNA | NEWS EDITOR
Professor of sociology Sheryl Skaggs said including more qualitative questions may improve the current method of course evaluations.
Jan. 13, 2020 | The Mercury
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THE MERCURY UTDMERCURY.COM Volume XXXIX No. 45
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Jan. 13, 2020 | The Mercury
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NEWS
Are UTD students unhappy? Commuting, campus involvement may influence student happiness
ANNA PHENGSAKMUEANG | PHOTO EDITOR
75% of undergraduate students commute, according to UTD's Common Data Set. A representative from the Student Counseling Center said commuting may be detrimental to students. MANSI CHAUHAN Mercury Staff
The university recently made another top 10 list, this time for The Princeton Review’s least happy students. While mental health issues are pervasive on college campuses nationwide, UTD’s unique culture may play a role as well. The ranking came after The Princeton Review conducted a survey of 140,000 students at 385 colleges. According to their website, UTD was ranked for happiness based on how strongly students disagreed with the statement “I am happy at my school.” Clinical director of the Student Counseling Center Jenna Temkin said the survey was casually conducted and there is not a lot of truth to the narrative that UTD is actually unhappy or depressed as a school. “Our data is super in-line with what we see nationwide,” Temkin said. “In line with that, the highest prevalence is of depres-
sion, anxiety, adjustment to college. We have a lot of international students, so we see a lot of acculturation issues, we also see a lot of identity exploration.” According to our University Profile, UTD’s students are mainly Texas residents, with a large portion of Dallas residents. Going to college close to home ensures proximity to parents, old friends and general familiarity with the environment. However, commuting may also be detrimental, Temkin said. “I do see students here with whether it's depression or whether there’s sadness, a lot of that I think can be around disconnection, like lack of connection to others,” she said. “There can be a lack of connection to campus and community here and friends here, which can definitely come from commuting.” UTD’s Common Data Set, a compilation of facts and figures about the university, states that 75% of undergraduate students commute. Associate Dean for Health and Wellness Initiatives Laura Smith said that
commuting can be stressful, but there are initiatives such as Road Warriors that students can participate in to combat the stress. The Huffington Post found that it can be tempting for commuter or local students to choose a weekend night at home over a night on campus. It can also be harder for a student to become more independent when living with their family. Neuroscience senior Elise Pariseau said she only spends up to three hours on campus, and she agrees that being so close to home has been difficult. “I often find myself regretting my decision,” Pariseau said. “I would’ve liked going to college far away from home because at this point, I am so ready to get out of Richardson. Sometimes the atmosphere is weary and that’s why I’m anxious to move on with my life.” The majority population of local students can also take its toll on residential students that come from somewhere else, said biochemistry sophomore Addison Branch.
“A major issue that I had when I first arrived was that I was one of the only ones from my area of the state, and the majority of the people I met were already in established friend groups from high school, which made it hard to make friends,” Branch said. “The loneliness from that mixed with the everyday stress from being in college made my not-so-great mental health worse.” Student Affairs implemented a five-year plan in 2018 to increase investment in staff development to serve the growing student body, according to their website. Initiative four of this five-initiative plan is to enrich the student experience. The department plans to provide programs to foster engagement and create opportunities for a holistic wellness approach towards student’s wellbeing, Smith said. “Campus involvement is the easiest way to foster a relationship with your school and make friends,” Smith said. “There are a lot of events that organizations put on that
don’t have good attendance, and even most sports games don’t have a lot of attendees even though we have great sports teams.” Management senior Charles Hooper is another residential student from Austin, who dealt with mental illness and utilized the Counseling Center. They were very helpful, and he feels good about his life on campus, he said. “I love it. I was fortunate to find the right activities and organizations and things to do,” Hooper said. “I took the advice to get involved and take care of myself and it's been a blast.” UTD is still transitioning into a more traditional college campus, Temkin said. The administration is working hard, but the students also have to engage. “Our administration can only do so much,” she said. “We are still transitioning as a school, and it’s partially up to the students to participate and really engage with the school so we can successfully transition.”
Using liquid metal to repurpose waste heat Researchers create generator that uses gallium to convert excess energy to usable electricity
ANNA PHENGSAKMUEANG | PHOTO EDITOR
Two ideas suggested on the subreddit are hanging lights around the plinth and adding more printing locations.
SG offers Reddit gold for student ideas New initiative aims to increase student input in decision making process ESTHER MATHEW | MERCURY STAFF
Electrical engineering doctoral student and research engineer Carlos Caicedo-Narvaez said the technology provides an eco-friendly approach to energy development. RUHMA KHAN Mercury Staff
UTD researchers are taking on global warming with new technology that uses liquid metal to turn waste heat into usable energy. Researchers in the Renewable Energy and Virtual Technology lab at UTD developed a prototype generator that uses gallium to recover low temperature waste heat from data centers. Professor of electrical engineering Babak Fahimi said the project first began in 2015. “We had a project at ARPAE, Advanced Research Program Agency at the Department of Energy, and in the course of that project we were discussing various types of generating electricity and the importance of recovering heat from data centers,” Fahimi said. “That was the first time we seriously looked into this problem. I had a very bright student at the time, Eva Cosoroaba, and she got excited about the prospect of generating electricity from liquid metals.” Fahimi said the majority of electricity consumed by data centers is converted into heat. “Today, we put large fans to cool down
the data centers because a very small amount of electricity is actually used for number crunching,” he said. “The majority of electricity that is consumed by data centers is converted to heat.” Fahimi said that gallium was used as the liquid in the generator because it’s one of few metals that’s liquid at room temperature. “The idea is to polarize the conductive liquid. That happens due to two different processes. One is the spin hydrodynamics that happens when conductive liquids are subject to turbulent motions, and a polarization happens, (then) you can harvest energy,” Fahimi said. “There will be an electric field, that is the main source of harvesting energy, and then Magnetohydrodynamics which is the second effect, meaning you subject that moving conductive liquid to an external magnetic field and the interaction between the two.” Fahimi said the movement of the polarized metal within a magnetic field allows researchers to generate electricity. Electrical engineering doctoral student and re-
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ELLIS BLAKE HIDALGO Mercury Staff
UTD’s Student Government is using a new approach to get ideas from students, now offering Reddit Gold to those who post feasible ideas to the school’s subreddit. The posters get the gold and their idea receives consideration as an SG project. SG first joined the subreddit over a year ago, but their new initiative is a more permanent attempt to increase the organization’s online presence. Incoming chair of the Technology Committee and biology senior Alexander Quach said the idea for online suggestions came about when existing methods, such as meetand-greets and suggestion boxes weren’t working well enough. “We initially thought it would be a great idea to connect with students that way because we know that our Reddit for UTD had a lot of traffic compared to a lot of our universities, so we thought it would be a really good way to get feedback,” Quach said. As leadership of the Technology Committee changes hands, online accessibility is being taken on by Quach. He said having an online platform for discussion was necessary to make sure all students’ ideas would be represented. “A lot of times, you'll hear the same suggestions over and over again. You'll
hear a lot of things about parking, you'll hear a lot of things about food, but sometimes people who might not have the chance to say it will be more willing to share that on the internet,” Quach said. “We weren't looking for anything specifically, but we were just looking to include everybody because that gives everyone a more fair chance." As a part of an SG funded project, the Reddit post is kept clean and on-topic by SG moderators. Outgoing Technology Committee chair and molecular biology senior Yilong Peng said that for the most part, there was very little that needed to be dealt with. “We've had a lot of people suggest project ideas. We've also seen a lot of discussion within the separate project ideas as well, which is something that, while we were not expecting, was very nice to see,” Peng said. “We have a full tabulated list of all the ideas that were brought up, all the questions, as well as how many upvotes, which are points that indicate roughly to us how popular they were with other people, and so that's kind of creates a natural priority list and pecking order for this on how or what order you might want to address those ideas.” When deciding which responses get Reddit Gold, members of the Technology Committee and its officers will consider both their upvotes and viability.
SG President and political science senior Ayoub Mohammed said that many simple projects have various unforeseen obstacles. “Give us an idea that can be fixed in a physical manner, right? A timely manner as well. Just don't say something like lower tuition, for example,” Mohammed said. “There's a lot of factors that go into every single one of these ideas. I mean something as simple as putting up the homecoming lights year-round, there’s a lot of costs. Some ideas we have seen on there, like more printing locations, maybe that's something more feasible.” The newly implemented CVS vending machines on campus were suggested on a similar Reddit post made last spring. Mohammed said having the post was important to receiving the perspective of the rest of the student body. “There may be around 70 of us, but that doesn't mean we see every single part of campus, or we’re going to see every single point,” he said. “There might be students out there who have ideas that we've never thought of, some 30,000 students. Everyone has different ideas, different opinions.” Vice President and public affairs senior Hope Cory said the idea for the Reddit post came from wanting to be able to
→ SEE REDDIT GOLD,
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LIFE&ARTS
Jan. 13, 2020 | The Mercury
ROSHAN KHICHI | MERCURY STAFF
Child learning and development junior Samantha Prazak began baton twirling in her childhood and reconnected with the sport when she tried out for a high school team.
Twirling to the top Junior finds opportunities to perform on campus, spread interest EMILY GAO
and finds performance opportunities where she can. Even though the regional and state competitions are in the spring and nationals is mid-summer, Prazak said From the racquetball courts of UTD to the competi- that there is no off-season for twirling.” “Twirling is a sport. You mix together contemporary tion stage, Samantha Prazak demonstrates a talent that dance with ballet, and you’re using every ounce of your lies on the intersection of athleticism and artistry. Prazak, a child learning and development junior, has body to practice for these things,” she said. “If you go been baton twirling for 13 years. Prazak’s mother in- and watch these people, it’s amazing to see what your troduced her to the sport as a child, but Prazak said it body can do. At competitions like nationals, which Prazak has took tryouts for the high school twirling line for her to been to twice, she said she finds inspiration from other realize its importance. “I put the baton down for a while and I didn’t twirl twirlers rather than seeing them as rivals. Prazak said until I was about 14 years old, trying out for the high that the world of competitive twirling includes not just the talent portion, which people tend school line, so I picked it back up to assume is the entire competition, but about three months before tryouts also pageants and interviews. for my high school,” Prazak said. My proudest “When you go to the NBTA com“When we went to tryouts I didn’t moment is every petitions, it blows your mind how make it because I didn’t practice moment that great these girls are,” she said. “There’s enough. The next year I tried out, no drama in this — you’re friends. It I made it and it was so exciting. I I am performprepares you for later in life.” joined an elite group and have been ing in front of a Prazak said that she has found a culperforming my entire high school ture at competitions that she has subcareer with them.” crowd. merged herself in and found a comThroughout high school, Prazak munity of people that she looks up to. said she would twirl after classes — Samantha Prazak “I especially look up to Caroline and go to the gym as stress relief Carothers, (UT Austin’s feature twirland to hone her practice. Towards er), but that’s not just because of her the end of her high school career, however, Prazak said she had nowhere higher to go in twirling — I feel that if I want to look up to somebody, they have to be a great person too, and she’s just a great her division. “I loved watching twirling, doing twirling — it’s ev- person,” Prazak said. “There are so many people that ery aspect of twirling that I love, and I want to give are so fantastic.” One of the biggest challenges that she is facing back to twirling,” she said. “I was an instructor as a senior in high school and I still teach private (lessons) as a transfer student at UTD is having to find opportunities to twirl, Prazak said, because there is no to this day.” Prazak was the feature twirler at Tyler Junior College established twirling program. From asking UTD before transferring to UTD, and her coach introduced spirit programs to be part of their performances to her to the National Baton Twirling Association and its teaching other on-campus groups such as Phi Theta competitions. Although she started this style of twirl- Kappa, she has had to create her own performance ing at an older age than other competitors, Prazak said events instead of relying on invitations from onshe has found success competing in the college division campus coaches or directors. “It was really difficult for me to go out on campus through understanding growth and dedication. “Balancing everything is very difficult, especially and contact spirit, athletics, and the band to see who knowing that I’m going to nationals this year too and would let me perform on campus at any event,” Prazak I’m going to compete in the college division,” she said. said. “It’s a great thing to add to spirit programs or to “I’m a part-time worker, full-time student and part- band programs or to athletic programs. You can get out time twirler. I have to go and put in those hours and and be a little sparkle for people to see.” Prazak is trying to spread twirling at UTD and make dedicate myself to get better.” Prazak spends two to three hours at the gym every → SEE BATON, PAGE 6 other day in order to prepare herself for competitions Mercury Staff
ROSHAN KHICHI | MERCURY STAFF
ROSHAN KHICHI | MERCURY STAFF
ROSHAN KHICHI | MERCURY STAFF
SPORTS
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Jan. 13, 2020 | The Mercury
Comets start decade with win streaks Basketball teams bring strong presence in ASC opening games against Ozarks, hope to defend last year's titles AMINA HUSSAIN | MERCURY STAFF
Women's basketball head coach Polly Thomason said despite a rough start in the first few games, the Comets were much stronger in the Dec. 4 opener game. She said they played aggressively and offensively while also getting stops defensively. AYESHA ASAD Mercury Staff
Men’s and women’s basketball won their first American Southwest Conference opener games of the season before starting winning streaks for their respective teams. The men’s team beat the Ozarks 69-57 at the Dec. 4 opener, with junior Kelden Pruitt scoring 21 points and senior Jalen Weber scoring 15 points. Meanwhile, the women’s team won their opener 59-45, with graduate guard Victoria Pena taking the lead with 17 points and junior guard Raenett Hughes scoring 14 points. Women’s basketball head coach Polly Thomason said that the team started strong in the Dec. 4 game.
“It was a good game that we came out from the tips just playing aggressively, offensively and getting good stops defensively,” Thomason said. “The first half we really looked like ourselves; we really looked like UT Dallas — you know, the team we should be — so I was just really happy to see that because … the first few games we didn't start off as strong.” Thomason said that she relied on her returners to be leaders for the team and that her team’s goal this season was to develop into the best team they can be. “They've got experience, and they're bringing that to the table every game, you know, with Victoria Pena and Raenett Hughes, they've always been really good players for us and they're continuing to do so,” she said. “I mean, for us, I think
all it just boils down to is just making the right plays offensively, defensively and trusting that your teammates are going to do their job as well.” Hughes and Pena have shown out this season, helping the team get an eightgame winning streak. Pena got a record 12 assists at the team’s Jan. 2 match against Concordia Texas, bringing her season total to 67. Hughes was named ASC East Division Women’s Basketball Player of the Week three weeks in a row, averaging over 20 points in the team’s most recent games and hitting a season high with 35 points at the Dec. 15 match against Trinity. Pena said that the team always has a lot of energy and the teammates have one another’s backs.
“Something super cool about us is that we have a super lit bench,” Pena said. “Whether you play or not or whether you sit on the bench — we don't care what your role is, you matter to our team.” Head Men's Basketball Coach Terry Butterfield said that preparation is always the key to a successful basketball team. “Our kids have to be prepared for every practice and every game. They have to practice well, they have to play well and we have to maximize the skills of our team,” Butterfield said. “I think that we're good enough to have success against anybody, but I think that we're also at a point where if we don't come prepared, anybody can come get us as well and steal the victory away from us.” The men’s and women’s basketball
season ends on Feb. 22, with the last game of the season against McMurry. If the teams qualify for the American Southwest Conference Championship Tournament, they will advance to the first round on Feb. 27. Last spring, both the UTD men’s and women’s basketball teams won the American Southwest Conference Championship. This year, Butterfield said that their goal is to defend their titles. “That's sort of what we play for,” Butterfield said. “And if we're able to win the conference championship, that gives us an automatic invitation to the NCAA tournament, which is the national tournament for division three.”
→ SEE BASKETBALL,
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New year, new meta Patch 9.23 brought map changes that transform 'Rift' into different elements BEN NGUYEN Mercury Staff
ROSHAN KHICHI | MERCURY STAFF
"League of Legends" A team captain and top laner Kyung "Lunarly" Joo said the team takes about one to two days to learn the ins and outs of new meta during patch drops.
“League of Legends” got a massive pre-season patch, changing the drake system, map and various other systems of the game. With massive meta changes, the UTD League team is adapting as necessary. The biggest change to “League of Legends” in patch 9.23 is the overhaul of the drake systems. Of the many monsters in the jungle, elemental drakes come in four varieties and spawn in the dragon pit. There’s an infernal drake, cloud drake, earth drake and ocean drake, with buffs to various aspects of champions given to the team that kills the drake. They respawn in different forms and after two drakes are killed, the third drake’s element becomes the map’s element, changing the terrain of the map. This means that in every game, the map has the potential to become entirely different, and each team has the potential to have a variety of different
buffs as the game progresses. Computer science junior Kyung “Lunarly” Joo, the “League of Legends” A Team captain, said the new drake importance has created a larger focus around the bottom lane, which is closest to the dragon pit. “The dragon changes how the map plays. So as a top laner I feel like there are two big things that I could do: either play for the team and try and secure dragons with saving my teleport or just completely isolating myself and trying to win top and then pushing that lead to again help my teammates and take more dragons,” Joo said. While this patch has shaken up the meta-game in a large way, it’s par for the course for the team. Joo said that because the tournament that they’ve been playing in this semester — Upsurge League — is not Riot-sponsored, the tournament is played on the live game. This means that if a patch is dropped on the day of a match, that’s the version the match is played on. This is in contrast to official Riot tour-
naments that will keep a tournament on a previous balance patch for longer so that pros don’t have to spend too much time adjusting to new metas. “If a patch is coming out on a Wednesday and then we play that Wednesday, we have to play the tournament on that new patch,” Joo said. “So, there’s some things that people might not pick up and that’s kind of the fun of it.” In a best-case scenario, the team will get a few days to learn the ins and outs of the meta after a new patch drops. Joo said the team mostly accomplishes this through playing in solo ranked games and through scrims, taking one or two days. After playing a lot of the updated game, new strategies and builds for characters reveal themselves, with Joo saying that Conqueror Cassiopeia in patch 9.23 is powerful due to how Conqueror stacks quickly and heals for damage done. “When a patch comes out, we need to quickly find out what’s the best in
→ SEE META,
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'League of Legends:' OVERALL META CHANGES 'Rise of THE ELEMENTS' After second elemental drake dies, the map terrain permanently changes to the element of the third drake. This changes the map's landscape and provides unique buffs.
MAP UPDATE The new Summoner's Rift map has two lane alcoves in top and bot lane and has more bushes.
APHELIOS • • • •
CHAMPIONS
Ranged champion Uses five weapons in his abilities. Recommended items include Essence Reaver or Infinity Edge. Currently has a 223% ban rate in Korea.
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SETT
Melee juggernaut who deals physical and true damage. The 'Heart of the Half Beast' ability allows for greater health regeneration when low on HP.
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Omnistone, a new keystone allows players to switch between keystones in-game. Conqueror no longer converts to true damage and now heals for 15% post-mitigation damage.
EMAAN BANGASH | MERCURY STAFF
Jan. 13, 2020 | The Mercury
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benefit other students. By increasing its transparency and visibility, she said it made SG able to access student needs. “Not only does it give Student Government visibility by being on Reddit but it also gives us transparency, showing the students that we really do care
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search engineer Carlos Caicedo-Narvaez said the technology will provide a more eco-
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it a more established event on campus for other students who are interested in the sport. She said that twirling can be for everyone, which is why she is passionate about bringing it to more people. “I’m in the process of starting my own organization, but you
NEWS
about what they want to be done on campus as far as accessibility goes,” Cory said. Despite not having officially chosen responses, Cory said there were certain responses she had taken note of. She said responses discussing creating more print stations stood out to her, mainly due to already having been working to create them. “I think there are a lot of
projects that maybe we have in the back of our minds like, ‘This is something that we should probably get done,’ and then students come forward and they're like, ‘We want this right now.’ That's something we need to move forward,” Cory said. “Some of them are things that we've been trying to get established and maybe didn't have enough student feedback.”
friendly approach to energy development. “If you look at data centers, they spent a lot of energy and money and resources to remove the heat from the electronics.
With this you can recycle some of that heat to generate power,” Caicedo-Narvaez said. “Green power, that's the number one application that when we were doing this, we had in mind.”
have to know advisors and people who want to be a part of it,” Prazak said. “If somebody were to pick up a baton today and start twirling it, they would be amazed with themselves at how much they can accomplish.” For Prazak, twirling is a form of expression that she takes pride in sharing with others. “My proudest moment is every
moment that I am performing in front of a crowd. I’ve performed in hotel lobbies, for flood victims from Houston, in the UTD racquetball courts in front of kids’ camps — they would pass by and they all just stopped and watched me twirl and that was so fun,” she said. “I always strive to connect with an audience while I’m performing.”
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the meta,” Joo said. “The main goal for all five of us is just to play as much as we can to gain that knowledge, and also get help from analysts who see what is good at that moment.” Joo said it generally takes only a few days to get used to smaller balance patches, and a week or two for
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Butterfield said that the team is working together towards a common goal, and his players want the opportunity to show who they are on the court. “I really believe that team spirit has to come from within the group. It's got to be about the quality and character of our players to band together,” he said. “And I've got four seniors that are what I call my group leaders who are really important to that spirit and leadership: our point guard — his name is Jalen Weber, Xavier Ferrell is a senior for us, Hans Burwitz is an inside player senior and Dimitrius Underwood, who was an
larger patches like 9.23. Some of Joo’s favorite champions are Akali and Irelia, but as the meta shifts, the champions that the team plays also shifts, whether or not that champion is the favorite of that teammate. “Each player has their best champ. Their little pool of ‘Oh, these are my three favorite champions that I love to play in, that are really, really good that I’m really
confident in,’” Joo said. “But then again, sometimes the meta might not match up with your favorite champs, so you’re kind of forced to learn those new champions to be relevant in the meta … If you have a favorite champ and they’re really good at the moment, play it and you’re going to be successful, but if not, you just kind of have to learn. And that’s how it goes.”
All-American last year and is not participating due to injury this year.” Senior guard Jalen Weber hit a season high with eight assists at a Dec. 29 game against Blackburn. Senior forward Hans Burwirtz was named ASC East Division Men’s Basketball Player of the Week on Jan. 6, averaging 13.8 points and 10.3 rebounds this season. Senior guard Xavier Ferrell has 35 assists this season and got 10 points at the team’s Jan. 4 match against MaryHardin Baylor, bringing their win streak to five games. Butterfield said that defense and rebounding make the biggest impact on whether a team wins or loses a game. “There are going to be nights where you shoot the ball great,
and everybody's hitting shots, and then there's going to be nights where, you know, you can't buy a basket,” Butterfield said. “And on those nights when you're struggling to make shots, that's where your defense and your rebounding have to really take a front and center role on your team.” Butterfield said that the basketball team must grow upwards and get better every day. “What I want to be able to say is ‘look how far we've come since December,’” Butterfield said. “We have really climbed the stairs — we have climbed that mountain — and we're much better now than we ever were back in December.”
COMICS
WHAT DO YOU MEAN I'M NOT PRODUCTIVE
Jan. 13, 2020 | The Mercury
7
NEW YEAR, BUFF ME
JENNA CHERREY | MERCURY STAFF
O&B: HIVE MIND
LOUISE NILLAS | MERCURY STAFF
SARAH STREETY| MERCURY STAFF
BIRDS AREN'T REAL
THE TIME HAS COME
BIANCA DEL RIO | MERCURY STAFF
PRESS F TO PAY RESPECTS
CECILIA ROMERO | MERCURY STAFF
ACTIVITY
ELIZABETH NGUYEN | MERCURY STAFF
8
OPINION
Jan. 13, 2020 | The Mercury
Resolve to not resolve Why New Year's resolutions accomplish nothing
BEN NGUYEN Mercury Staff As 2020 approaches and electro swing hopefully becomes vogue for the Roaring 20’s reboot, some people might wistfully look to the future and make a New Year’s resolution. But they shouldn’t. New Year’s resolutions are a timeless tradition of lying to yourself about self-improvement. Instead, focus on making and achieving goals in pursuit of a vision all year round. Some might argue that New Year’s resolutions are a New Year’s tradition, harmless and made all in good fun. After all, it’s not bad to make goals in the spirit of self-improvement. But the issue isn’t with starting goals: it’s completing them. According to the University of Scranton, only 8% of people follow through on their New Year’s resolutions. That’s a lot of people not accomplishing — and, ultimately, feeling unfulfilled about — something they promised themselves they would do. It really is like lying to themselves about doing something. The trouble is that New Year’s resolutions are too broad. Take the common resolution of losing weight. How is this goal going to be accomplished? Some people think that getting a new gym membership will help, leading to an almost comical rise of people at the gym in January, with the International Health, Racquet, and Sports Club Association reporting a 12% increase in membership at fitness clubs in January. But it almost always dies out as February comes along. Without a step-by-step plan, the goal of losing weight seems constantly out of reach, almost futile. Or maybe take an example closer to
home: getting better grades. This sort of New Year’s resolution brings on a whole slew of new questions: What does better grades mean? How does one make better grades? What must be done to achieve this? Without setting out exactly what must be done, New Year’s resolutions are too broad to be easily accomplished. Instead of diving headfirst into vague goals, these resolutions should be broken down into smaller goals. In the book “The Entrepreneurial Instinct: How Everyone has the Innate Ability to Start a Successful Business,” author Monica Mehta says that the more times someone succeeds at doing something, the more dopamine the brain will release, helping the person continue to succeed. Setting goals too high or too broad increases the chances of failure, and consequently, an absence of dopamine. Take the example of improving grades: break it down to its essential goals. Some readers may be familiar with the concept of a SMART goal. Specific, Measurable, Attainable, Relevant and Timely, goals patterned after this fashion create a specific goal for you to achieve. So for getting better grades, an example goal might be to set aside 2 hours for study every other day for a specific class. This goal specifies exactly what should be done, is measurable because of the time set, attainable and relevant to the overall goal of improving a grade. Now then, some people may still defend the New Year’s resolutions as something fun and accomplishable. And that can be true. People still manage to achieve their broad and non-specific New Year’s resolutions, and other studies done by the University of Scranton point to self-efficacy and readiness to change as traits of those who successfully met their reso-
lutions. But this article isn’t for them. It’s for the people like me who are rather lazy, and perhaps not as ambitious, and more prone to be distracted and not finish things. At the start of 2019, I resolved to go to the gym more, like so many others do. And it did not happen for the majority of the year. Sure, I went to the gym sometimes, and sometimes is more than not at all, but ultimately, I did not succeed in what my goal really was: to go to the gym on a regular basis. I was too lazy to go. I had “more important things to do” like study and play “League of Legends.” By the time 2020 has come around, I fell into the majority of people that do not live up to their New Year’s Resolutions. So when I was reminded of SMART goals for a second time in my freshman seminar class, I resolved to start accomplishing something, however small it was. Funnily enough, it was not any of the SMART goals I created for the assignment that I put focus into, but one regarding my finances: Save at least $20 dollars a week. It fulfilled the SMART goal outline, and it was a nice small thing to accomplish every week, seeing up to even $30 or $40 dollars go into savings if I budgeted that week particularly well. This leads to one more point about New Year’s resolutions: Why wait for the new year? Don’t limit those goals or self-improvements to New Year’s: start making those goals all the time. There’s no magic moment of the year for selfimprovement; self-improvement is a constant and evolving process. Be the change you want to see and manipulate your dopamine receptors to start being more productive. Start small, so that larger goals can be accomplished. Maybe this time, that January gym membership won’t go to waste. CHIAMAKA MGBOJI | GRAPHICS EDITOR
SAMANTHA LOPEZ | MERCURY STAFF
Charged for change Change of major fee ineffective, not always necessary ROMA VENKATESWARAN
Contributor I entered UTD as a visual and performing arts major with a theatre concentration. Over the next year and a half, I added a second major in political science. I ended up changing that political science major to a public policy major and, finally, switched my initial visual and performing arts major to a theatre minor. At each and every stage of this process, I talked to advisors both in the School of Arts and Humanities and the School of Economic, Political and Policy Sciences. The month I changed my theatre major to a minor, I saw a $50 charge that I did not recognize on my student account — a “change of major” fee. I looked up the university policy regarding the fee, and found out that it resulted from changing majors more than two times in one academic career. Over the course of my three degree plan changes through two university schools, I was never informed or given any warning of this fee — and its purpose is still
unclear to me. Are the administrative costs of students changing majors really so high? Why are those costs not covered under tuition and other fees? While it is in everyone’s best interest to encourage timely degree completion, there are many problems with using the change of major fee as a deterrent and better solutions to encouraging timely completion. Firstly, the change of major fee cannot act as a deterrent if students do not know about it. Every student may promise to read the university policies at the beginning of their academic careers, but advisors play a large role in ensuring that students understand those policies and their consequences. I was not informed about the change of major fee until it was charged to my account, despite talking to advisors multiple times. Additionally, had I known about this policy, I would have wondered, does dropping a major to a minor really count as a change of major for the fee? What other degree plan changes constitute a change of major? While the “Degree Plans” section of the 2019 Undergraduate Catalog states that “If a student elects to modify his/ her major more than two times during
an academic career, the third modification requires a $50.00 fee,” the “Tuition and Financial Aid” section states “There is a $50.00 fee for students changing majors more than two times in an academic career.” This leaves ambiguity as to whether degree plan changes past the third modification also require the fee, or if it will only be charged once during an academic career. If I were to modify my degree plan by declaring a minor, would I be charged the fee again? If these policies are to be effective, they cannot be ambiguous and must be clearly communicated to students well before the fee would be applied. Even if information about the fee was clearly communicated, punitive policies that charge students for actions that may increase their time to completion are not effective. Adding a fee to students who may already face increased costs from having to spend more time in school does not help them finish faster, it just increases their debt. A 2018 analysis from the American Educational Research Association found no evidence that increasing fees to discourage excess hours increases student completion rates.
In 2018, UTD sat right at the statewide average for four-year public institutions of the average number of credit hours taken to complete a degree: 137. Because most degree plans are 120 credit hours, this is an extra one to two semesters students spend taking credit hours in excess of their degrees. Taking excess hours leads to higher costs and more time for students, which can increase overall student debt. Additionally, universities are often evaluated on their graduation rates, so students not completing their degrees in a timely manner — or at all — is not only harmful for the student, but for the university as well. Changing degree plans is one thing that could keep students in school longer than they need to be. I understand that the change of major fee was likely implemented to deter students from switching degree plans so many times that they would need to stay at UTD longer than they needed to. However, if the university wants to deter students from taking excess hours, individual student situations must be considered. Even after my three major changes, I am still able to take two semesters off campus, and I
have around seven elective classes free during my senior year. A $50 fee does not encourage me to complete faster or discourage me from changing my degree plan, it just makes me feel like the university is punishing me. Each student is unique, and the best mechanism to help students make decisions about their degree plan should be their advisor, not a university-imposed fee. Advisors can give students individual attention and make recommendations to encourage students to complete their degree plans on time. The university should be engaged in active, positive advising rather than levying punitive, inflexible fees. I am lucky that I had the means to pay it, but not every student does. Excess fees can keep students from getting their transcripts or re-enrolling at the university. UTD has a responsibility to ensure that its policies are in the best interests of its students, faculty, staff and community members, but the change of major fee is not. Abolishing this fee would be a small but meaningful improvement for the school. Roma Venkateswaran is a public policy senior from North Potomac, Maryland.
Jan. 13, 2020 | The Mercury
9
OPINION
CHIAMAKA MGBOJI | GRAPHICS EDITOR
Diversity, naturally Tokenism isn't representation EMILY GAO Mercury Staff Greta Gerwig’s 2019 movie adaptation of “Little Women” is the newest take on the 1868 classic by Louisa May Alcott. The story has been remade and adapted time and time again, but this gem still managed to move audiences with its talented cast, emotional dialogue and relevant themes. This particular telling is also, undeniably, a white woman’s story — and that’s okay. “Little Women’s” story — both the original and this adaptation — is inherently one of a white woman in the late 19th century, despite its nuanced experience with womanhood and themes of female liberation, an unfair world and growing up remain relevant. It has remained so relevant, in fact, that Teen Vogue even published an op-ed arguing that its characters should have been played by people of color. People of color and queer people can certainly find universality in the March sisters’ struggles with femininity and
not being taken seriously because of their identity but at the end of the day, this story wasn’t written about us. The solution isn’t trying to find crumbs of representation in white stories, no matter how liberating, moving or inspiring those stories may be. Why? It’s because the lack of representation in white stories isn’t the problem in the first place — it’s the silencing and overlooking of stories coming from people of color and queer people altogether that is the injustice. Little Women is feminist and iconic but a race-bent casting of characters in the original setting would be problematic in the same way as “I don’t see color” is. A Hamiltonization of the story wouldn’t contribute to its relevancy, because Hamilton used the cast’s complete diversity to reflect the changing face of America and to draw parallels between the immigrant experience then and now. Being a woman, however, has never stopped being relatable and while the representation of modern-day intersectional feminism in popular media matters, we shouldn’t have to search for it in the newest version of an old story that is rooted in whiteness. Rather than forcing diversity and tokenism into tradition-
ally white stories, we should be giving a voice to writers and directors of color, allowing them to tell their stories through their own lens. With this approach, increased diversity will naturally follow. Casting Hollywood’s favorite “AsianAmerican” actress, Scarlett Johannson, as protagonist Jo March wouldn’t solve the problem of representation. Neither would including black actors as extras or servants with two spoken lines. Although the main roles can be relatable to queer and non-white audiences, they clearly weren’t written with the intention to be queer or non-white. If anything, the tokenization of a couple of Little Women characters would be glossing over the realities of people of color at best and would be sacrificing the validity of those experiences for the sake of “wokeness” points at worst. Media representation that doesn’t solely revolve around stories of trauma not only helps marginalized communities see themselves in meaningful ways, but it also helps close the empathy gap. When we get to hear the voices of people of color or when roles are written by queer people with queer people in mind, that otherness becomes something to be
cherished rather than ignored or used as bait. These stories exist and are being told by beautiful voices, but tragically don’t tend to get the same amount of attention as their straight white counterparts. “Pride,” Ibi Zoboi’s retelling of “Pride and Prejudice” in a modern world, is written by a woman of color about women of color and it proves that it’s possible to make old stories relevant without resorting to tokenization or colorblindness. “salt” by Nayyirah Waheed is a poetry book by a black woman that largely influenced Rupi Kaur’s popular “Milk and Honey” but never gained the same traction despite being uniquely raw and vulnerable. Benjamin Alire Sáenz’s novel “Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe” is a coming-of-age story that explores different types of love, gender and sexuality and the roles and expectations of MexicanAmericans. These are the reflections that queer communities and communities of color can find themselves in and white audiences can learn from. These are the stories that dare to go further than an ethnic-sounding name drop or a two-second onscreen lesbian kiss (á la Disney’s “family
friendly” cut of “The Rise Of Skywalker”) because they have to. Finding universality in stories like “Little Women” is meaningful and empowers women of all backgrounds by reflecting their dreams and passions on big screens. However, stories from white women inevitably fall short when it comes to representing women of color and queer communities. While unfortunately, stories from queer people and people of color don’t often make it to big-budget silver screens (and when they do, are otherized during awards seasons by the stubborn establishment), independent voices continue to make waves. The burden of taking the extra step just to find media that reflects us shouldn’t fall on marginalized communities — they should already be mainstream — but unfortunately, there are only so many times you can watch “The Farewell” at the movie theater in your city’s cultural center. While entertainment companies and studios finally come to the realization that mainstream media representation is a necessity, we can instead turn to stories created for us by artists who are us.
DELIVERY FROM TOBRRR
CHIAMAKA MGBOJI | GRAPHICS EDITOR
Jan. 13, 2020 | The Mercury
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down at him again and his eyes were rolled back in his head, and all you could see was the whites of his eyes. The AED said a shock was warranted. We all stood back and the shock lifted his shoulders off the ground. It took a long time for the ambulance to show up, and by that time he had sort of come back to life.” Allen was hospitalized for six days and went through testing to determine the cause of his heart stopping, the extent of damage, and treatment. Surgeons placed a defibrillator in his heart to prevent another incident. “The cause is still unknown,” Butterfield said. “A defibrillator is like a portable AED, so if something like that were to happen again, the unit would sense it and apply a shock to get him back in rhythm again. All the testing was negative. When the surgeon went in to put this instrument into his heart, they said that there was no heart damage. It’s a very imprecise sort of thing. There’s no logical answer for what happened.” Butterfield said the survival rate is under 10% when something like this happens. The doctor told Curtis that, based on what had happened, he only had a 6% chance of survival. “There was no indication at all that there was anything wrong,”
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priately coined “Orbit” for its ability to encourage Comets to more effectively navigate activities around campus. Abraham also said Orbit is meant to stimulate student engagement. “We really hope it can get students more involved on campus,” Abraham said. “You’re always passing these posters on your way to class, and you never really take the time to think about or interact with them, or just think about what interests you.” Designing and coding an app within 24 hours came with its fair share of challenges. Baltz said one difficult problem was coming up with their idea to begin with. “We basically completely started from scratch I’d say around five or six p.m.,” Baltz said. “I think that’s a problem with lots of Hackathons: you start working on something, and then you realize, ‘Oh, wait, this is not going to work’ —
NEWS
Waking up with 12 people around him, Allen said that he figured something went wrong, and he saw his mother crying. His parents, who were present at the game, remained in California while he was hospitalized. The athletic director sent an assistant coach to California to escort his family home. “It shook our kids to the core. We took them all to the hospital to see Curtis after that was over,” Butterfield said. “It was very hard to fly back to Dallas without him. When he
did return, he came to practice and everyone gave him extended hugs. Everyone was affected by this incident. Curtis is a very well-liked member of our team, so he’s very much at the center of our culture as a team. He’s got a second chance at life, and even though he’s not physically on the court anymore, he’s coming to games and practices. He is still part of a team — he’s just not dressed out and playing.” An incident like this has never happened in Butterfield’s 40-year career. He said that it has been impactful and has shown him what’s really important in life. “Now when Curtis walks in the room I make my way over there right away and I give him a long hug, and he is gracious so he returns the hug,” Butterfield said. “It is very important to me that he knows how much we care for him and how much we love him and how much we miss him as a player. Basketball is not life and death, but this incident drove the point 100 times over that life is precious.” Although Allen will not be playing anymore, he said it’s fun to watch them play every day. “It’s getting better every game,” Allen said. “It’s still tough to just sit there and watch but these are my brothers. Ultimately, I hope they win the championship because that’s the whole reason we’re here.”
and you’re still within that 24hour time span.” Although Baltz and Abraham had some prior experience coding for iOS devices, Hossain and Pochampally said the development code for Orbit was mostly new to them. “The biggest challenge was we had to learn as we went,” Pochampally said. “There weren’t many Internet resources where we could find these frameworks, so, we were trying to figure out the whole framework by ourselves.” Despite the bumpy start, Hossain said that it was surprising how straightforward the project flowed after the initial set-up, when they began to code. “Just the bugs and errors (and) starting it up were problems,” Hossain said. “We just realized, this is some powerful technology, but it’s really accessible as well.” Orbit may even end up extending its reach beyond campus. Hossain said the team
has contacted a few companies about implementing the app in the greater Dallas area. “After the T-Mobile Hackathon, we were invited to this networking event with people from all over Dallas, mostly creative arts specialists. We discussed our apps with them and what we’ve done,” Hossain said. “We want to do this on a large scale for the murals around uptown Dallas and Deep Ellum, and we’re working with artists there so we can make their murals interactive.” While the app isn’t available to be downloaded yet, Hossain said the four designers have been talking with student government about integrating Orbit directly into the UTD mobile app. “We feel like it’s a really longterm scalable solution as well, because once people begin getting involved just through this app, then they kind of stay involved through their college career,” Pochampally said. “And it’s all thanks to their first attempt to try and put themselves out there.”
Butterfield said. “It was our first game of the year. He was working out all summer and fall through weight lifting, sprinting, conditioning, and open gyms. He had two scrimmages and did very well. There was absolutely nothing that led to that happening. It was completely arbitrary, and completely sudden.”
Basketball is not life and death, but this incident drove the point 100 times over that life is precious. — Terrence Butterfield
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properly notified. The AES webpage used to provide a description of each award tier along with the SAT/ACT and GPA requirements. That page has since been taken down. “I’ve planned for a while now (at least a couple years) to go to UTD. It’s been my ideal school for a number of reasons — community, location, majors. But my number one reason has been the affordability through the AES program. With my testing scores (1530 SAT, 31 ACT, National Merit Commended), even with my poor class rank of 151 and GPA of 3.67 weighted, I still had a good shot of the low and mid tiers of AES, possibly even full ride,” one post read. “Well, now the time has finally come, and when AES recipients were sent out Sunday, I received nothing. Not even the lowest tier … At this point, I’m down to the decision of the FAFSA gods, or I’m gonna be tens of thousands of dollars in debt by the end of my bachelor’s program.” Senior Director of Enrollment Management Michael Seeligson said the changes came as a result of UTD’s growing student population. According to the university’s Common Data Set for academic year 2018-2019, the university received 13,123 freshman applications, up from 5,554 in academic year 2009-2010. “As you see that type of extreme growth, it's natural to see that the merit scholarships would become more competitive over that time period,”
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channels, that implicit bias does become more explicit. I try not to look at those other sources but if you read them they are completely disparaging,” Santoro said. “In the fall of 2018, I taught right up to my due date and so there was a comment disparaging me for panting too hard while lecturing. I feel like students who are commenting on your appearance, are they really able to evaluate you effectively or unbiasedly?” Santoro has not gone to administration about this because she said there’s nothing that's been so egregious that required her to go to her program head. “I think that a lot of this is part of the job and I think it's unfortunate that I have to deal with it, and until students see more young female faculty in front of them it's going to happen, unfortunately,” Santoro said. “There is definitely some understanding and sympathy. I know that people in my program are aware of the implicit bias against women in course evaluations, but I don’t know the extent to which that goes into our (overall) evaluations. I think that, and I can only speak to my program, that the EPPS college is going to be supportive were I to raise (the concern).” Santoro said she believes there's a role for student evaluations in the university but that we need to be aware that they have limits. In her courses, she has students give critiques to improve her class, but these critiques are not anonymous. “I appreciate students' feedback and I try to get it from my classes in ways that are constructive and helpful for me,” Santoro said. “Regarding course evaluations, I think there's a role for them to play, but if we know that they’re biased against certain members of academia, I think that bias should be incorporated in our female and minority evaluations.” For Larissa Werhnyak, professor of interdisciplinary studies, critiques are helpful when they discuss details such as the usefulness of the books she assigned, the pacing of the course, and the amount of time spent on topics. “Anything that really goes to the substance of the course
Seeligson said. “Current scholarship recipients continue to receive their awards based on the agreements that they had signed at the time that they enrolled in classes before the first semester.” The survey found that application submission dates varied from July to December. This year, all applications received by the Dec. 1 priority deadline were reviewed at the same time for AES consideration, Seeligson said. Applications are evaluated based on academic factors including SAT/ACT scores, the types of classes students took, class rank and grades, he said. “(We also look) at the opportunities that students have on a high-school-by-high-school basis, understanding that not all high school experiences are the same or can be compared,” Seeligson said. Nearly all respondents had an SAT score of 1400-1600, with 42% scoring from 15011600 while 61% of respondents who took the ACT scored from 30-36. The majority of respondents who received AES offers had a GPA of 3.90 or above and were in the top 10% of their high school class. Over 70% of respondents said they were slightly, moderately or extremely unhappy with the change and 82.6% of respondents said they were counting on AES for financial reasons. Seeligson declined to comment on what the current AES tiers are, but acknowledged the role financial aid plays in university admissions. “We understand scholarships and financial aid are both
important considerations in the college choice process,” he said. “Current students and alumni who might've learned about UT Dallas because of merit scholarships regularly highlight the quality of education and the preparation for the next stage of their careers … I think some of the increased growth in the freshman applications shows that people are finally recognizing that UT Dallas really is the outstanding academic institution that it is and that students can receive truly an outstanding value in their education.” Seeligson said that students who submitted their applications by Dec. 1 and believe a technical error was made in the application process are welcome to appeal their AES award. “If students feel that there might've been some sort of technical error, then we're happy to look into that,” he said. “But if students have received updated information after the priority deadline or if they otherwise might have a reason to believe that something to outside of a procedural reason, then typically we do not go back and re-review applications on their merit.” When asked, Seeligson did not state upcoming plans to increase transparency for AES scholarships. “UT Dallas is already recognized as a Carnegie (Research I) university,” he said. “While we're proud of the role that we play in educating these students already, we anticipate that our reputation will continue to grow.”
that I may not be seeing is really useful,” Werhnyak said. “In general, if you’re making comments from a place of ‘I really was here to learn and here's something that maybe would have helped me to learn better,’ if you can say that with a 100% confidence then that is a useful comment.” The way course evaluations are used in the hiring, promotion and tenure process of faculty members varies wildly, Wernhyak said. When she served on hiring committees, she considered course evaluations, but was a lot more interested in a sample assignment, syllabus or teaching statement that the candidate submitted. “If we interview that person they will do a teaching demonstration, so seeing them on the spot tells me a lot more,” Werhnyak said. “The way that evaluations play into that is that it's one of the main ways
versity committee that oversees the tenure and promotion cases or within programs or departments within schools — is that the peer evaluators look at a raw score and say ‘Oh they're not a good teacher because they got a 3.8 instead of five, so that means they’re not as good of a teacher,” Skaggs said. The second thing the peer evaluators do, Skaggs said, is look at the grades of students in their courses. “If you place all the emphasis on the average score or average GPA for a course then I think you're missing a lot of important information, like how difficult is that course? Is it a required course, is it known to be a challenging course to students?” Skaggs said. “I think that kind of stuff is missed in these basic teaching evaluations, and unfortunately I would say (at) UTD we’re still doing a lot of what we were doing 20 or 15 years ago.” In their statement, the ASA suggests five examples of how SETs can be used more effectively. Changing the rating scale from five points to 10 points is one way to reduce the amount of bias, Skaggs said. “A lot of it, too, is paying less attention to the personal characteristics or traits of the faculty members and more about the contents of the course,” Skaggs. “Universities are being almost lazy in relying on these kinds of measures largely because they’re cheap and easy to administer, but they’re neglecting things like response rates and how the measures are actually used to assess the quality of ones teaching. (They pay) less attention to putting in more qualitative types of open-ended questions, which means it would take more time to look at and assess the quality of the teaching.” This means moving away from personality traits, and moving toward getting students to discuss what was useful in the course or what teaching strategies could be implemented to improve the course, she said. “I encourage the university to think about if this is truly important, that faculty are effective teachers, then there should be more effort to improve the way that teaching is evaluated and not just relying on a cheap easy type of instrument,” Skaggs said.
In my discussion with my male colleagues, the things that I've had to deal with, they don't deal with. — Lauren Santoro to improve. If I'm seeing somebody who’s a good teacher, then part of that is having read their evaluations and implementing pieces of constructive criticism from the past.” In September 2019, the American Sociological Association released a statement on the use of student evaluations of teaching. “A scholarly consensus has emerged that using SETs as the primary measure of teaching effectiveness in faculty review processes can systematically disadvantage faculty from marginalized groups,” the ASA said. Sheryl Skaggs, a professor of sociology, said emphasis on raw scores of the evaluations is one problematic effect of course evaluations. “I think across the board what ends up happening — whether it happens at the uni-