The Mercury 11/11/19

Nov. 11, 2019

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‘They ruined their life by doing this’ Students, ex-member talk about experiences with Elohim Bible Study Club CINDY FOLEFACK Editor-in-Chief

Editor’s Note: Christy’s name has been changed to protect her identity due to fear of retribution from church members.

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hristy listened eagerly as the stranger from the post office told her about their bible study group. She’d grown up religious and wanted her son to have a similar upbringing, so she wrote down the church’s address and paid them a visit. Less than two years after joining the church, she was homeless, had lost over $3,500 and was sharing custody of her son with her now ex-husband.

Christy’s experience with the World Mission Society Church of God, which occurred in Nebraska, wasn’t unique. Since the church was established in Korea in 1964, several ex-members have released videos urging the public against joining. Two UTD students report-

ed recruitment attempts from church members while one witnessed what happened after her friend joined the UTD chapter of the church, the Elohim Bible Study Club. Political science senior Kathryn Higgins ran into church members in 2018 while running errands in Arlington.

“I was on the toy aisle and suddenly, I wasn't paying attention to my surroundings, and these two women came out of nowhere, both with empty baskets,” Higgins said.

“They sort of cornered me. They boxed me in with their baskets so I couldn't walk anywhere, I couldn't leave.”

Higgins said the women showed her bible verses on their phones and tried to explain the church’s teachings to her, but the language barrier made it hard to understand what they were saying. The women told Higgins about “God the Mother” and asked for her phone number. Higgins waited for her friend, who she had gone shopping with, to come back so she could exit the conversation. She said the experience left her uneasy.

“When I saw that they were approaching younger women and just with my experience (with) them

boxing me in with shopping carts and targeting young women, it made me feel like they did have nefarious intentions,” Higgins said.

“Maybe they don't, maybe this is all just a bunch of rumors, but it does seem a little bit strange that they would be targeting a vulnerable group of the population in a really aggressive way.”

While the church has been accused of human trafficking, police investigations in various states such as New York, South Carolina and Florida have found no evidence to back up these claims. The church’s beliefs include the existence of Christ Ahnsahnghong, the physical embodiment of the second coming of Jesus. Ahnsahnghong is said to have been born in South Korea, where the church is based. A physical embodiment of God the Mother also resides in South Korea and sends out orders and messages to chapters of the

→ SEE ELOHIM,

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Online student petition for campus swings receives over 600 signatures MADISON YORK Mercury Staff

SAMANTHA LOPEZ | MERCURY STAFF

Swings and playgrounds tend to be associated with the carefree whimsy of childhood — but could they also have a place on a college campus? For Eric Aaberg, business administration sophomore and president of Comet Life, the answer is simple.

“We want to encourage students to stay on campus more,” Aaberg said. “An addition of mobile swing sets at the SU green or somewhere around the central part of campus would be great for students to get outside, destress and just hang out.”

Aaberg said the petition — posted on the Comet Life website — gained traction quickly, and is currently sitting at over 670 signatures.

“I simply shared it on my Twitter, and within a day it got 300 signatures,” Aaberg said.

“The more signatures we get, definitely the

ROSHAN KHICHI | MERCURY STAFF

The petition gained traction less than a day after being posted to Twitter.

faster administration will be like, ‘Okay, yeah, a lot of students want this.’”

Aaberg has been in contact with Ayoub Mohammed, Student Government president,

about how best to begin the swing set project.

While Mohammed said the project hasn’t been proposed to the SG Senate yet, after the proj-

Survey finds mixed opinions on SHC Professor continues exploration of Students report late fees, convenience of center EMILY GAO Mercury Staff

The Student Health Center provides a range of medical services from blood work to prescribing birth control, but despite its benefits, students have given the center mixed reviews.

Criminology senior Simone Sanborn has been a regular patient at the SHC since her freshman year at UTD, and said she has had positive experiences with both staff and medical professionals during her visits. Like other students who aren’t from the Dallas area, Sanborn goes to the SHC during the school year because of its location on campus, and has been going since freshman year.

“I have a chronic illness so I’m in there every three months at least,” Sanborn said. “My primary care physician is in central Texas, so it’s not at all feasible to go down there, so I

kind of switched all of my prescriptions and general health appointments slowly in my freshman year to the clinic here and then I never left. There’s a lot of time dedicated to me, everyone is very nice, I don’t ever feel rushed and they’re always very accommodating with any questions.”

According to Google reviews, a repeated complaint that students have with the SHC is the $25 fine that is imposed if patients with appointments do not check in by their scheduled time. A survey of 104 students conducted by The Mercury found that 4% of students have had to pay this fine. Actuarial science senior Mercedes Rodriguez left a review after she had to pay the fine.

“Most places have a small grace period for being late. I got stuck in traffic and was 8 min-

→ SEE SHC,

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→ SEE SWINGS,

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Italian art as president of art society RUHMA KHAN Mercury Staff

Professor of visual and performing arts Mark Rosen was recently elected as president of the Italian Art Society.

Founded in 1987, The Italian Art Society is a foundation dedicated to the study and promotion of Italian art and architecture. It is made up of a few hundred members who are art historians, museum professionals and academics.

Rosen, an associate dean in the school of arts and humanities, said he has always been passionate about art and art history.

“I always was really interested in artworks and painting. I grew up in Los Angeles and spent a lot of time in museums and I took the AP Art History class in high school and

MARK ROSEN I really loved it. I felt it was something that kind of came naturally,” Rosen said. “I was so excited to learn that stuff. And when I would travel or go places, I would always check out

the museum.”

Rosen said the year after graduating with a degree in English from the University of California, Berkeley, he began working with his university’s travel guide.

“Berkeley started up this thing called the Berkeley Guides travel company that they needed students to go travelling (for). I graduated at the exact perfect time. They only did this for three years,” Rosen said. “One year, I did an editing job with them and then the next year I went to travel. They were doing an Italy book, it was the very first time they had done it so it all had to be written from the ground up.”

Rosen said he spent the majority of the 75day trip in central Italy, visiting and writing about museums, restaurants and the historical

→ SEE ROSEN,

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Nov. 11, 2019 | The Mercury

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THE MERCURY UTDMERCURY.COM Volume XXXIX No. 44

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November 3 • Officers arrested a man on criminal trespassing charges between Canyon Creek Heights North and Phase 2 of University Village at 1:17 a.m.

November 3 • Unaffiliated guests reported their vehicles were burglarized at 7:32 p.m in Lot U. November 6 • A student reported being struck on the face by an unknown male by the Mall at 6:09 p.m.

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DRUGS & ALCOHOL OTHER MAP: UTD | COURTESY

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Nov. 11, 2019 | The Mercury

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BHAVAN MEHTA | MERCURY STAFF

Psychology senior Ruqiya Barreh (far left) was one of the students who attended the letter-writing party to help free death-row inmate Rodney Reed, whose execution is scheduled for Nov. 20.

Students rally around death row inmate Junior hosts letter-writing party in support of man whose capital punishment case received nationwide attention, outrage CINDY FOLEFACK Editor-in-Chief

The impending execution of one death row inmate in Texas has sparked outrage nationwide after new evidence cast doubt on his guilty verdict. In one UTD apartment, students gathered to try and save his life.

Pizza, cider and snacks are laid out on international political economy junior Sarah Whipple’s dining room table. In the living room, she and other UTD students handwrite letters to Governor Greg Abbott as well as the Texas Board of Parole and Pardons. All of this effort is to stop the Nov. 20 execution of Rodney Reed, who was sentenced to death in 1998

for the rape and murder of 19-year-old Stacy Stites on April 23, 1996 near Austin.

New evidence, including a confession from the victim’s then-fiance, has caused public outcry and prompted celebrities such as Rihanna and Oprah to speak out in support of Reed.

After hearing about Reed’s case, Whipple organized a letter-writing party to try and stop the execution.

“Social media is great, petitions are great, but sometimes you just have to flood someone's office with letters, you know. I feel very strongly that he's innocent, but even if he's not, he doesn't deserve to be murdered by the state,” Whipple said. “I wanted to encourage people to really engage with that and do

something tangible.”

Abbott has commuted the sentence of one death row inmate since taking office in 2015, breaking with the practices of previous governors and granting clemency for the first time in over ten years. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, Texas accounted for more than half of the nation’s executions in 2018, with 13 inmates dying by lethal injection.

Despite these facts, psychology senior Ruqiya Barreh said student activism is still necessary.

“In spite of the apparent injustice that Abbott has displayed, especially concerning death penalty cases, I think if we allow him to continue these things without taking a stand against these issues, then that means oppres-

sion has won,” Barreh said. “We can't allow ourselves to sit idle when there is something we can do, however small it is just because we believe it's impossible or not worth it. At the end, these are lives that we are fighting for, so it's important to put in any effort that we can.”

Reed’s case, Whipple said, has racial undertones. According to an article from The Washington Post, one of Fennell’s colleagues said the former officer had told him that his fiance was “involved with a n——-.” Additionally, the inmate that Fennell confessed to, a former member of the Aryan Brotherhood, said Fennell told him that he had to kill his “n——- loving fiance.”

“You have this dynamic where there's a

white cop who was trying to join the Aryan Brotherhood and there's a black man who's always maintained his innocence,” Whipple said. “Which one do we look at with more skepticism? I think that sort of colors it both at the time of the original trial, but I think still today, (it) would color peoples’ perception of innocence.”

The prosecution’s case lay in DNA evidence from a semen sample from Stites’ body that matched Reed. At the time, Reed initially denied knowing Stites, but eventually admitted to a consensual affair with the victim. While prosecutors point to Reed’s reluctance as evi-

→ SEE REED,

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Student Union to add new service bar Project expands on previous efforts from Office of Information Technology

SHUBHECHHYA MUKHERJEE | MERCURY STAFF

Dean of Graduate Education Juan Gonzales said the scholarship will create more support for graduate students.

University receives NSF funding for scholarship

CHIAMAKA MGBOJI | MERCURY STAFF

The “Knowledge Bar,” OIT’s newest outreach project, will open in spring 2020 and provide a help desk among other things.

AYESHA ASAD Mercury Staff

ELLIS BLAKE-HIDALGO Mercury Staff

Through funding provided by the National Science Foundation, UTD is taking part in a nationwide effort to fund the graduate education of minority students.

After being selected for the NSF’s Bridge to the Doctorate program, the university was awarded $1.1 million to support the education of 12 minority students’ graduate education for the first two years of graduate school.

Dean of Graduate Education Juan Gonzalez said by being able to gain support directly from the university, the students would then benefit from structures created through the grant money.

“The grant strongly suggests that the structures we create support the student. For example, advising on future careers, advising on writing their dissertation, advising on how to effectively work in a lab and interact with your

→ SEE NSF,

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Amidst the ping-pong tables, eateries and reclining areas in the Student Union, the Office of Information Technology is planning to add a new element: a “knowledge bar.”

This knowledge bar will be located in the sitting area to the left of the lower level main entrance of the Student Union. Among the amenities available at the knowledge bar will be a technology help desk where students can fix their devices. It will also feature a CometPrint station, a password reset station, digital

signs that advertise news and events, a reclining area and an area where students can experiment with new forms of technology.

Shannon Cepica, the Assistant Vice President at the Office of Information Technology, said that his hope is that the project will be completed by the beginning of the spring 2020 semester, but that it may be completed sooner.

“It's a place to get help if you have issues with your computer, or just any of the applications that the university supports,” Cepica said.

“It's just a place to ask questions, if you've got questions — anything IT. And it's also a place

to learn.”

Dan Goodwin, the director of Student Union and Student Life Programs, helped come up with the idea.

“Over the last couple of years, Information Technology has set up a booth space on the second level of the Student Union during the first two weeks of school … and it's going over extremely well,” Goodwin said. “So (we were) trying to have a partnership there to see, ‘How can we expand this? How can we do this on a more regular basis?’”

→ SEE OIT,

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Orion redesign offers better user experience to students, applicants PRANATI CHITTA Mercury Staff

ESTHER MATHEW | MERCURY STAFF

The new Orion Student Center was rolled out on Oct. 28. The redesign makes it easier for students and applicants to view pages on mobile devices and reorganizes the home page for easier navigation.

On Oct. 28, the Office of Information Technology made sweeping changes to the Orion Student Center.

The new layout is now mobile-friendly compared to the previous design where accessing the website from a mobile device was not as intuitive, the changes make it easier to navigate and have higher user optimization.

“Well, it started with some feedback we've gotten from users either in our administra-

tive offices and from students over the years,” Director of PeopleSoft and Analytics for OIT Ryan Meyers said.

Meyers and other OIT workers have to work with the Orion system, which is sponsored by Oracle and based on the PeopleSoft system.

“Their technology is moving towards more of a usability focus from an old functionality focus,” Meyers said. “So this was an opportunity for us to leverage some of that new look and feel this new user experience options that they gave us.”

Previously, the student center simply had links to get to certain places, but now, OIT has changed it so students are able to see ten panels of categories that they can choose from.

“In coordination with the registrar's office, enrollment management and some of the other functional areas as well as some of our student workers, we identified some opportunities to make it a little more efficient and more effective and make it more mobile friendly,” Meyers said.

→ SEE ORION,

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Nov. 11, 2019 | The Mercury

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BRIEF Peer advising alters messaging PHOTOS BY: SHUBHECHHYA MUKHERJEE | MERCURY STAFF

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Math research: How does it work?

Take an inside look at how UTD's mathematical scientists operate, solve problems using high dimension math BREANNA SHEN Mercury Staff

When people think of research, they imagine a scientist in a white lab coat pipetting chemicals or culturing cells on a petri dish.

But when asked to consider “math research,” what comes to mind? What does pure math research entail?

This fall, the School of Natural Sciences and Mathematics inducted seven new tenured and tenure-track faculty. Among them, Baris Coskunuzer and Stephen McKeown conduct research in math, while Qiwei Li conducts statistics research.

“Pure mathematicians are not really interested in the real-life applications,” Coskunuzer said. “They are trying to solve nice puzzles, which give you interesting relationships between objects.”

Coskunuzer got his first taste of math as a high schooler in Turkey, where he enjoyed classes in abstract math. He majored in math in college, and as a Ph.D. student at Caltech, his advisor introduced him to geometric topology. Given his knack for visualizing objects

in high dimensions, he decided to enter the field, investigating the shapes and classification of high dimensional objects.

“In the pure math, after (the) third or fourth year of PhD, you start to have a sense of some beauty in the subject … you can think of pure math like an art,” he said. “ You go deep in this sea, and you discover treasures.”

Daily tasks in math research include studying the publications of other mathematicians, attending conferences and collaborating with colleagues, Coskunuzer said.

Like Coskunuzer, McKeown said that a large part of math research involves reading the work of others.

“A lot of the time is (also spent) sitting at your desk with paper and pencil and doing calculations or staring at the wall for that matter, thinking really hard,” McKeown said.

McKeown was first drawn to math when he read a book about geometry and relativity in high school.

“In college I started taking calculus for the first time, and I really loved it,” McKeown said. “I was surprised by how beautiful math

could be, so I started reading popular math books … I got some sense of the field of math … and I found that very exciting.”

At the same time, McKeown was also interested in becoming a lawyer. He finished law school and passed the bar exam before returning to the field of mathematics.

“At some point I realized that I missed math and wanted to do that instead,” McKeown said.

McKeown concentrates on conformal differential geometry in his research. Conformal differential geometry is the study of spaces where angles, but not lengths, are well defined.

In contrast with pure math research, Li said, statistics research centers on application, especially in medicine or biology.

“Statistics is the science about data, because the data can reveal lots of interesting things about the body and the world,” Li said.

Daily tasks in statistics research include collaboration with biologists, chemists and doctors to collect and analyze data using computer models and statistical analysis software.

In college, Li majored in electronic engi-

neering. As a master’s student, Li took a data mining course, where he classified the quality of photos based on different metrics. Li’s interest in photo classification led him to change his major to statistics.

“I didn’t like the electronic engineering research, I wanted to do something new (and was) interested in data analysis,” Li said.

Li uses Bayesian statistical tools to draw conclusions in two areas of application, digital pathological images and microbiomes, which are collections of microorganisms, using both data and prior knowledge. High resolution images of pathological tissues can be analyzed by a deep learning AI to identify different types of cells, Li said. The patterns of cells are statistically quantified and used to predict patient survival outcome.

“If you are suspicious that you might have cancer … I want to confirm that,” Li said.

Li also identifies biomarkers that can be used to predict colorectal cancer by quantifying bacterial abundance in the human microbiome.

→ SEE MATH,

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University office raises money for minority students Fundraiser aims to support underrepresented Comets through graduation, help with retention ANJALI VENNA Mercury Staff

Mosaic in Motion, a new fundraising event hosted by the Office of Diversity and Community Engagement, seeks to raise money for scholarship, retention and graduation programs for underrepresented students.

Local businesses and organizations become sponsors of the event by donating money at five different tier levels and in turn receive certain benefits and tickets to attend the event on Nov.15 from 6:30 - 8:30 p.m.

Monique Wedderburn, Director of Development and Alumni Affairs, said the goal is to raise $50,000 for the scholarship fund.

The fund’s distribution process and scholarship criteria is yet to be determined, but will be coordinated with the Multicultural Center and Galerstein Gender Center, Raul Hinojosa Jr, Director of Community Engagement said.

“We know students have lots of needs,” Hinojosa said. “Tuition is a challenge, there’s housing expenses to pay and then there are student groups who are first generation or low socioeconomic status that have a greater need for scholarships and support to stay in school and graduate.”

The event was proposed by the Advisory Council in the Office of Diversity and Community Engagement. Attendees will participate in interactive painting, a silent auction, and hear from various speakers, including UTD alumnus and artist Desmond Blair, who learned to create art despite being born without hands.

“Their role as council members is to help fundraise for the office and students, so they got creative,” Hinojosa said. “Rather than do a luncheon or a traditional fundraiser, they put this event together to do something a little dif-

Privacy concerns cause change in communication protocol As of Oct. 18, Peer Advisors had to terminate all existing group chats with their residents and amongst themselves.

In a message sent to all Peer Advisors, Residential Life Coordinators shut down the use of GroupMe and all other social media platforms that Peer Advisors used to directly communicate with their residents, except for direct texting and emails. Coordinators cited potential violation of FERPA and other privacy laws as their reason for taking this action in an email sent to PAs. “PAs are still encouraged to utilize GroupMe, Residential Life Director Catherine Bourne said. “The recent change is just the adding of professional staff in the groups.”

Several PAs have deleted their group chats entirely, while others have deleted and recreated them with a professional staff member present. Freshman Rishika Rakwalsaid her PA deleted and then created a new one with an added staff member.

“Now, nobody besides our PA talks in the groupchat,” Rakwal said.

Peer Advisors are also no longer allowed to have any social media groups amongst themselves without a professional staff member present. If supervisors hear of these groups still existing, PAs will be subject to disciplinary action.

Only direct text messaging is permissible, according to the email.

“Professional staff members are only being included in groups that are in scope of the PA position and Housing,” Bourne said.

GRACE CHANG | MERCURY STAFF

Director of Development and Alumni Affairs Monique Wedderburn (middle), Director of Community Engagement Raul Hinojosa Jr. (right) and Vice President of Diversity and Community Engagement George W. Fair (left) pictured together.

ferent to raise scholarship funds in a fun way.”

This is the first Mosaic in Motion event and Wedderburn said she hopes it becomes an an-

nual occasion. A different scholarship program

→ SEE MOSAIC,

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ANNA PHENGSAKMUEANG | MERCURY STAFF

5 LIFE&ARTS GAME SPACE: TROUBLED BEGINNINGS Nov. 11, 2019 | The Mercury

Gaming club members discuss feeling disappointed, ignored after creation of official esports department EMAAN BANGASH Managing Editor

In 2012, gaming as a competitive sport seemed a distant dream for students at UTD. It began with three students deciding to open up a chapter of TESPA, a known national gaming organization, at UTD to increase awareness about gaming and esports. Its members aspired to see esports as part of something bigger than club skirmishes and tournaments, and built an incredibly close-knit gaming community over the next few years.

Flash forward five years, and esports was being discussed among members of the UTD Athletic department. It became an official university sport in half a year. Within that year, the program has taken their “Smash” team to national competitions, and rose up among the best esports teams in the region.

Members of gaming clubs at the time felt excited about their efforts finally coming to fruition until the program began its course.

Former club members and skilled players migrated to the esports teams, but TESPA members’ attempts to get involved with the program were met with little to no response.

While the esports department flourished, members of the gaming clubs ended up feeling used, their contributions minimized and their efforts ignored.

From the beginning, the clubs aimed to foster an environment that welcomed gamers and enthusiasts through events, competitions and tournaments. Computer science graduate and president of TESPA Tenjue Koh said the club hosts tournaments and events for games like “League of Legends,” “Overwatch,” and “Heroes of the Storm.” Members receive prizes and have opportunities to compete, and the club is sponsored by Blizzard and sometimes Ubisoft.

Up to 50-60 people attend events, and even more depending on the game being showcased at the event, Koh said.

“It's a fun group. It's cool. A lot of the students are really casual. They're all nerds. We can all relate to each other and especially when you have common interests between each other,” Koh said. “There's a lot of gamers (that) are really shy and talk to each other, but as soon as they see that other students have common interests with them, they're really inclined to talk about it or it makes at least easier to talk about it with them.”

TESPA Event Coordinator and business administration junior Adam Alami has hosted weekly Comet Clash tournaments since 2016, where students could compete playing “Super Smash Brothers.” On-campus tournaments sometimes involved other universities competing such as University of Arlington and students from Houston. These often lasted eight hours at a time and up to 80 people would attend and play between a few consoles, Alami said.

As TESPA grew, so did other clubs such as League of Legends at UTD and Rocket League at UTD, Koh said. He said they ended up breaking off into their own clubs to focus on playing in their own games’ competitions and TESPA continued to be a general gaming interest club.

“A lot of the people who are more interested in ‘League of Legends’ or ‘Rocket League’ or ‘Counter-Strike’ usually go through their specific clubs,” he said. “That means the people

→ SEE ESPORTS,

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MERCURY PHOTO DEPARTMENT | MERCURY ARCHIVE

CHINH LE | MERCURY STAFF

UTD ESPORTS | COURTESY

CALIS LIM | MERCURY STAFF

1418 Coffee House, named after the street on which it is located, serves signature and specialty drinks throughout the year.

1418 COFFEE HOUSE CALIS LIM Mercury Staff

ELLIS BLAKE HIDALGO Mercury Staff

With midterms in full swing and finals coming up, most of us students may feel like our brains have reached full capacity. Engaging in learning certainly didn’t sound enjoyable, but after visiting 1418 Coffee House, a homey cafe in downtown Plano, we came to the conclusion that as long as we can get some good quality coffee and be surrounded by art in a bustling yet relaxing atmosphere, studying can be tolerable.

With an array of vintage turquoise tiles lin-

ing the ceiling, warm Edison bulbs casting a glow over tables, worn-in mismatched couches, bikes with heartwarming messages mounted on the wall and other quirky art pieces, the decor is exemplary of the modern farmhouse aesthetic but also induces nostalgia. Although its decor alone makes the restaurant memorable, the coffee and bakery items are certainly noteworthy too.

Although the restaurant’s menu is a short list, its drinks and bakery items are well done.

Each item is specially selected and has been perfected after many years. Every latte, pastry and sandwich has a homemade feel to it. Trying any of their food and drink options leaves customers coming back, but for the new customers, the encompassing aroma of roasted coffee beans and baked goods is enough of a lure.

After going over the fittingly simple menu,

→ SEE COFFEE,

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Nov. 11, 2019 | The Mercury

'UNFINISHED BUSINESS'

Comets redeemed themselves with eight-game win streak in ASC championship MARCO SALINAS News Editor

ROSHAN KHICHI | MERCURY STAFF

After losing the first set (25-20) to the University of Mary-Hardin Baylor, the Comets (24-4) began their climb to ASC victory.

The ASC championship rounded out an eight-game winning streak for the Comets who shut down UMHB to take the team’s sixth ASC championship and the third ASC championship for four graduating seniors.

The Comets previously lost to UMHB at the 2018 ASC championship and more recently at the ASC crossover tournament on Oct. 18 losing 3-2. Freshman outside hitter and ASC East coFreshman of the Year Catherine Croft said the loss against UMHB showed the team what they needed to work on.

“Our games, a couple of weeks ago against UMHB which (were) really close point-to-point games, really showed us what we needed to work on. And so I feel like when we get put in those positions again, going to play those teams that are pretty equally matched in this, then we should be able to excel,” Croft said. “I just think we’ve got some unfinished business (with UMHB).”

After the first set, the Comets won three straight sets (25-23; 2516; 25-22). The Comets will be advancing to the NCAA regional tournament on Nov. 21-23. Head coach Marci Allison, who started the volleyball program at UTD in 2004, said the team came out tight in the first set.

“I went during my first time out (and) I said, ‘You're going to

be playing volleyball for the next two hours, so do you want to keep playing?’ They said no and they turned it around,” Allison said, “So that's really all it took and we started playing a little bit more disciplined and making better decisions. The passion followed.”

Senior setter and defensive specialist and ASC East Setter of the Year Caroline Shecterle said the change in energy and momentum helped the Comets make their comeback.

“We were down by a lot that first set and we knew we weren't playing like how we knew how to play, but the end of that score was 25-20,” Shecterle said. “We really picked up momentum for that second set and I don't think we ever let go of it.”

Allison said she likes the character and personality of this season’s team.

“The fun part of our job is seeing somebody like Jillian Via (who) was late as a freshman and forgot stuff and now she is MVP of our division,” Allison said. “So that's what's nice to see, you know, somebody that struggled through her four years and then come in and just have such an amazing senior year; that's the fun part for us.”

Senior outside hitter and defensive specialist and ASC East co-MVP Jillian Via led the Comets on Saturday night with 13 kills, three aces and 21 digs.

Allison said the mix of seniors and freshmen added a good

balance to this season’s team.

“I like this team because you have a senior class that's the largest senior class that we've ever had … but on the flip side of that, you also have half of the lineup that are freshmen. And so even though you have the seniors that have good experience, sometimes

they play a little bit more uptight,” Allison said. “Because the expectations on them, they take it to be a little bit more than it needs to be. And so I think sometimes having the freshmen out there to balance that helps. It’s a good balance this year.”

All four seniors, Via, Shecterle, Lauren Schilling and Alyssa Porter, have played together since their freshman year.

“We came in as freshmen and worked really hard since we got here. I think it’s been fun and this has been the perfect season for us to, you know, say goodbye,” Shecterle said.

ROSHAN KHICHI | MERCURY STAFF

Been there, 'run' that Cross-country starts season off strong with first, second place at recent ASC championship

MINH NGUYEN | MERCURY STAFF

The cross-country team practices every morning at 6:30 for their trainings and meets. In the most recent ASC championship, the men's team placed first and the women's team second.

CALIS LIM

Mercury Staff

At around 6:30 every morning while the campus and sun still lie dormant, the UTD cross-country team warms up and prepares for the day’s training. This is the same routine that the team had leading up to their most recent ASC championship victories, where the men’s team placed first and the women’s team took second.

Both the teams have had a good season so far. At the previous meet — the Oct. 19 Bill Libby invite at McMurry — the men’s team placed first and the women’s team placed third. With those successes tucked away to celebrate later, the coach of both teams, Danielle Kcholi, is already focusing on the next meet.

“Winning conferences is nice, but we do have bigger goals — as in regionals — because the regional meet is what qualifies the

team for nationals,” Kcholi said. “We aim to be on the national level.”

This year, about half of both teams are made up of underclassmen. The athletes are getting along well and everything has gone smoothly, said Kcholi, who has been with the UTD cross-country team since 2017.

“I think that this season, things had naturally progressed and clicked in a way that's pretty cool to watch,” Kcholi said. “Everyone is very cohesive.”

Freshman runner Elizabeth Chimitt, who placed third at the Nov. 2 championship meet with a time of 23:40.7, said community is the best part of cross-country for her.

At the previous McMurry meet, Chimitt ran a 24:10 6K and placed fourth.

“The night before the race, the girls team got together and talked with our coach,” Chimitt said. “The seniors talked and gave inspiration for us younger members. It was really cool to have us all encouraging each other.”

The women’s team had aimed to get first, but more than that, they wanted to improve, Chimmit said.

“Even though we got second, it was still an accomplished goal,” Chimitt said.

“We were so far behind the team that got first in the first few meets, but we gave them a good scare in this last meet, so I say goal accomplished.”

→ SEE RUNNERS,

PAGE 7

SAMANTHA LOPEZ | MERCURY STAFF

Nov. 11, 2019 | The Mercury

7

NEWS

→ ESPORTS

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 5

who come to the TESPA general meetings have a niche taste in games or a niche in terms of how popular they are at UT Dallas.”

It was around late 2017 when members of the Athletics department began to consider adding esports as a recognized sport at UTD. After discussing among student athletes, staff and other student organizations, the esports department was created over a six-month period until its inception in August 2018, Athletics Director Bill Petitt said.

During those six months, former music director and current esports coach Greg Adler was hired after a nationwide search for a coach. He said the combination of passion students had for gaming and esports and support from the university made it easy for esports to flourish and for him to hire high-quality players.

“It's pretty unbelievable, but we kind of expected this. We knew that we would have students that would want to be on the teams that already play at this extremely high level. It was just a matter of actually creating and validating it,” Adler said.

“So, while it is pretty crazy and an amazing experience to get to play these teams, this was the expectation that we were going to be one of the top in the nation.”

Despite the growth and victories the esports department has

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we decided to order one of the signatures, the Purple Haze latte.

The warm drink, served with a floral design atop it, has vanilla and lavender notes in it alongside the roast of coffee flavor. Sweetened just the right amount, this drink was perfect for me, someone who cannot handle black coffee. The mix of the coffee aroma, subtle flavors, creamy milk and light sweetness made for a drink that can be universally enjoyed.

Encompassing the interior design and menu options is the concept of creating a second home for every community member that steps through the doors. This is a reputation that creative director Paul has worked hard at creating and upkeeping. As the creative director, Paul handles most of the visuals that are associated with 1418 Coffee. He takes and edits pictures in order to promote anything from new menu items to upcoming events. With only a couple months of experience, Paul is a relatively new hire. That being said, he had been a regular at 1418 Coffee for around four years prior. From his first impression, he knew he wanted to return.

“The coffee of course was appeal-

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This change was not an easy one, Technical Leader for PeopleSoft and Orion Scott Harman said.

“I think the biggest thing to understand is (that) there are thousands of things that go into this,” he said. “This is not a standalone piece of software that does one thing. There's a lot of changes (in) the way the processing goes on in the background, like number of servers,

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Research is often rife with challenge, as all three professors can attest to. In math research, one can get stuck on an aspect of the problem for months, even years. In statistics research, a major challenge is locating datasets that can prove the merits of one’s methodology.

“You find yourself at this side of the chasm looking across and you just don’t know how you’re going to get across, and I think that’s the most frustrating thing,” McKeown said. “Our students feel frustration because they don’t know how to solve a problem, but we do too.”

McKeown said that he had once been stuck on one problem for three months, another for

gotten over the year, members of TESPA and other gaming clubs said they felt there was little to no opportunity for collaboration between them and the esports department, and their club members, expertise and passion for the field were siphoned off to be a part of the official esports teams.

Adler said the esports clubs have Discord servers, which are linked to the esports department Discord server to give them more attention, direct people to their clubs and help them flourish.

While university officials did not directly respond to these specific concerns raised by TESPA members, Adler issued an email statement to The Mercury suggesting possible future collaborations.

“Our goal is to service the campus as a whole and create a program all students at UT Dallas can be proud of,” Adler said.

“We've already been building strong relationships with our student gaming clubs on campus and will continue to do so going into the future to ensure all voices are heard.”

Koh said that members of TESPA were consulted for tips about how to run esports events in the beginning.

“It’s like ‘We'd like to ask TESPA for some tips on that.’

Well, why don't you guys just hire us? Why don't you guys just work in conjunction with us? If you just do a collaboration with us, we'll do it for free and

we'll provide (prizes),” Koh said.

“There's no pain on your end and you get the benefit of hosting the tournament under your name and what we get is publicity for working with UTD, (and) they're like, ‘Oh no, we kind of want to do it ourselves.’’’

Alami said despite feeling excited and wanting to be involved in the esports program at first, the lack of involvement and collaboration opportunities between the esports department and the clubs made it disappointing. He said he, along with current and former TESPA members, applied for advertised positions within the esports department but got little to no response. While it’s unknown what became of the paid and volunteer positions the esports program advertised in the beginning, TESPA members still felt ignored and pushed to the side.

“It's nice to see that UTD recognizes esports as a thing, but I feel like a lot of the time it just kinda feels like they're trying to just take over the esports scene at the school just for themselves,” Alami said. “We worked really hard to get them to recognize it as a concept and then it finally happened.

This is what we've been working towards. None of that really came to fruition. It felt like they already knew exactly what they were going to do with the program and they didn't really want to stray from that.”

ing, but then also the people and the atmosphere too,” Paul said. “I came once and there's just something about the vibe. You know, it just kind of feels ‘right’ in here.”

Once Paul changed over from a regular customer to staff, he had a renewed perspective on 1418 Coffee.

“My favorite part about working for 1418 goes back to the people,” Paul said. “Especially whenever someone comes in and it's their first time and you welcome them.

Then you get to see people go from first-timers to regulars. There are people here who you see almost every day and you start to get to know them. You get to know them personally and then they just become friends. Then you start to feel like ‘Yeah, I'm serving people coffee, but I'm also having really good coffee with friends all day.’”

Watching the staff serenade the customers sitting within a close proximity, bust out some subtle dance moves to the retro music and poke fun at each other, it’s clear to see that the friendly smiling faces at the counter are a part of the experience.

“There’s very much a homeaway-from-home feeling in here,” Paul said. “Come talk to us, we love talking to people.”

Judging by the lack of empty

seats and the ongoing hum of conversation, the staff appear to never have a shortage of people to talk to.

Although the cafe is certainly thriving now, the restaurant had previously struggled with visibility.

“We're in the downtown Plano area, which is a really great area, but it also has some of its own limitations,” Paul said. “This strip is less lively than other parts of downtown Plano. It wasn't until a few months ago back in April that we redid the whole front.

Ever since we've been able to redo it, it's become noticeable. That's probably when people started to notice this place a lot more.”

With struggle and growth, 1418 Coffee House was able to get themselves on the map in a short period of time, and they intend to stay there right on 1418 K Avenue.

All in all, our short time at 1418 Coffee House was certainly memorable. The interior design, crafted menu items and welcoming staff were experiences we would like to repeat. However, the drive over is not ideal for students without a car. We would recommend trying this concept at least once if you would like a warm welcome. After you visit, any homesickness that you might have had will disappear.

things like that.”

In terms of feedback, Meyers said students and other users have given positive reviews to the changes.

“We've had a lot of students say ‘It's easier to use, I can find things faster,’” Meyers said.

“We've had a couple of students report some bugs. It's allowed us to adjust some things fairly quickly based on that feedback.

But for the most part, they like the fact that it's mobile-friendly all the way through where it wasn't before.”

Harman sees this change as a learning curve as the OIT workers also learn how to change the program. Students can visit the OIT website for more information.

“It's an opportunity for us to continue to expand. If you're in IT, one of the things that you have to do is enjoy learning new things because the technology always changes,” Harman said. “While on the front end, the goal is to make it look simple and you know, very streamlined.”

nine to ten months, and is still grappling with a third problem, which he set aside a year ago because he did not see a solution.

“One of my mentors in undergrad said, ‘the mathematician spends 90% of his time depressed and 10% of the time elated,’” McKeown said.

To bridge that chasm in a problem, McKeown may write out arguments or read papers that reference a similar concept. This helps him gain a new perspective on the problem and adapt other techniques to his situation.

“The actual process of sitting down and doing math, I enjoy,” McKeown said. “I think that moment of when you actually understand something you didn’t before is … in some sense why you’re a mathematician,

because that’s really rewarding.”

He also appreciates how complex math ideas are built around simple fundamental concepts.

“The biggest, most beautiful proofs in the subject are reducible in some sense to (the) little things in the most pleasing way,” McKeown said.

As advice to aspiring students, McKeown suggests taking a variety of math classes and participating in an undergraduate research project to find out whether math is a good fit.

“Challenge yourself and put yourself in classes where you’ll have to prove things, (to experience) a small taste of getting stuck on something (and of ) the frustration and the excitement and joy of getting past it,” McKeown said.

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The men’s team won the conference title for the second consecutive year. Trent Sakakini, who placed seventh at the championship meet and was put on the All-Conference First Team, said he wants to continue to win conference again next year and keep it

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and cultural significance of many of the sites.

“I was there (during) a good time,” Rosen said. “It was summer, the dollar was strong, I sort of had to see things and eat and I had to be out there on my feet and doing everything.”

Rosen said he later returned to Italy as a postgrad to do research in Florence and now travels to Italy around twice a year.

Economics and political science Senior Chetan Reddy said Rosen was their guide for a week in Rome during a study abroad trip.

“We saw Raphael’s ‘School of Athens’ (and) we saw Michelangelo’s

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dence of his guilt, Reed said the details of the situation, including the fact that at the time of their affair, Stites was engaged to a white police officer, kept him from admitting the truth.

Former chief staff attorney and executive director of the Innocence Project of Texas Natalie Ossenfort, who teaches Innocence Project courses at UTD, said Reed’s conviction makes it harder to prove his innocence in a court of law.

“The law explains that in order to be convicted of a crime, a defendant must be found guilty ‘beyond a reasonable doubt.’ Unfortunately, this means the burden placed on the defendant to have his or her name cleared post-conviction goes up and oftentimes requires that the defendant present new evidence of innocence that wasn’t available at the time of trial,” Ossenfort said in an email interview. “Legally, this is a difficult

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mentor. All of these things that are essential for the student,” Gonzales said. “It strongly suggests that those structures you create are not only to support the students receiving the grant, but also to support all of your students on campus. Supported one way or the other, a Ph.D. is a hard thing to do. We need to support them.”

UTD was one of 20 universities selected for the grant among 200-300 applicants. The nearly six-month application process involved the work of Gonzalez, materials science and engineering professor Amy Walker and various other faculty members of the

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At the knowledge bar, training sessions will be held for students to become more attuned with the technological tools they have at their disposal.

“If you've ever been to the Microsoft store or the Apple store, where they have little training sessions or somebody telling you about a product, they’ve got the microphone on and they're giving you little demos.

We’re going to be doing that throughout the days on the products we support, whether it's Office 365 or maybe it's Microsoft Teams or maybe it’s a new portal in Orion,” Cepica said.

He said that the Office of Information Technology plans to foster the

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from the Office of Diversity and Community Engagement is the Diversity Scholars Program, which provides scholarships for academically excellent students in need of significant financial aid. Mosaic in Motion has a different focus.

“I believe this (Mosaic in Motion) is going to be the first emergency scholarships fund that we've established through this office,” she said.

“There’s always a need for scholarship funds, and we don’t want to lose students who’ve made it into their freshman/sophomore year. It’s

a tradition. At the last McMurry meet, Sakakini ran a 27:38 8K and placed 11th. Earlier this season at a UTD-hosted meet, he ran a 16:27 5K and placed sixth.

“We’re going to do some more training in the off-season, get ready for next year to win again,” Sakakini said. “But the most important thing is seeing how we can do in regionals. Possibly in the

next couple years, seeing if we can go to nationals.”

Sakakini said the team keeps him going and contributes to a generally great atmosphere.

“Whenever you have teammates with you, it’s a lot more fun,” Sakakini said. “You have people to train with, and you want to make them better and you want to make yourself better.”

Sistine Chapel. These are works of art that we’ve analyzed in high school before, but when he took us there to see it in person and pointed out things we’ve never seen before or things we never would’ve noticed,” Reddy said.

“It was really cool how he was able to take works of art that we’ve already looked at multiple times and still point out things that we’ve never seen.”

Rosen said he has been member of the society for nearly a decade, after being recruited by a colleague, and has served in various offices over the years.

“It's really easy to join, it's not like we make it hard for people. I also wanted to be part of it and that's essentially it,” Rosen said. “It's been fun and I've met all these great people that I'm in touch every day with

from it.”

Rosen said he finds the organization to be a collaborative community with mentors helping younger scholars excel in the field.

“It's really amazing: we do mentoring and have an Emerging Scholars Committee (for) people who are finishing a Ph.D., or just having finished, kind of at the beginning of their careers. That's been very lively recently, really good younger scholars come in and have been mentored by more senior people,” Rosen said. “I really liked that program. I think the people that have been involved in (it) recently have been outstandingly good. It may be the best thing we've done.”

burden to satisfy, which means that the defendant has a very uphill battle when seeking exoneration or other legal relief from the courts.”

Reed is being represented by the Innocence Project, not the Innocence Project of Texas. Although both organizations are part of the Innocence Network, the two are legally separate entities.

The event held in support of Reed isn’t the first time Whipple and her friends have become involved in on-campus activism, international political economy senior Samee Ahmad said.

“I think it's really important to build collective movements on campus, especially because students, though they may not realize it, are very important parts of national political discourse. This apartment was also where we drew up some of the posters for the Botham Jean protest two weeks ago. Two nights ago we had a Kashmir solidarity protest,” he said. “It's important to have this space,

even though it may seem futile, but the long-term goal and the vision is to build a coherent, rigorous and involved incubator of student activism on campus.”

Whipple said that students can get involved by signing the petition and writing letters to Abbott as well.

While she’s happy to see students rallying around Reed, Whipple said this issue goes far beyond his case and that she hopes to see systemic changes come from not only Reed’s case, but others like it.

“Our criminal justice system operates by taking your worst thing and making your life hell for it and I really hope that we can start looking at that at a more systemic level,” she said. “I want us to reconsider the criminal justice system and what it means to have justice in America. Part of that is rallying around individual cases. Part of that is taking a step back and thinking about what it means to be a just society.”

UT system. A primary focus of the application was UTD’s diverse undergraduate student body, highlighting the potential for a similarly diverse graduate student body.

“We're showing that we need more diversity in our program, more diversity at the domestic level. We have big diversity on campus internationally, but at a domestic level we don't have the diversity would like to have,” Gonzalez said. “We want more Hispanic and African American students, and more women in the engineering side and more firstgeneration students involved.”

Much of the focus for selecting grant recipients is being placed on members of the Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Par-

ticipation, another NSF program aimed at improving accessibility of graduate education for minority students in STEM. However, Gonzalez said that the grant is available to any minority student interested in graduate research.

“We're looking for students that clearly have a path towards research … and research students with the letters of recommendation that clearly show that they have the potential to be researchers in the future,” Gonzalez said. “The end goal is not necessarily (that) students are going to become part of a faculty of a university. We want them to be in the workforce at the doctoral level, so that way we increase the diversity we have at those levels.”

spirit of innovation in students by providing them with access to new technological devices.

“We're going to be putting devices out there, kind of like you would see in a Microsoft or Apple store, of things that are just brand new to the market,” Cepica said.

“Maybe it’s not even on the market for general release and we just want our students to be able to check things out.”

The bar’s hours of operation will be the same as the Student Union building, and it will be staffed primarily with student employees alongside a staff supervisor, Cepica said. The bar will also be more convenient for students living on campus, Goodwin said.

“We realize that going off-campus for things isn't always easy, nor is it the most cost-effective solution in the world,” Goodwin said. “With this kind of project … it just makes it easier for students to tackle one more road bump in their way of student success.”

Aishah Khan, a psychology junior, said the addition of a knowledge bar would be beneficial to students.

“I think this will be a great addition to the Student Union, because it will allow students to become familiar with new and upcoming technology that they may or may not be able to afford,” Khan said. “I really hope that this project will help make technology more accessible to all students here on campus.”

a means of us retaining them and developing a fund that allows us to respond to student needs.

Lennox, Central Market, BB&T, GXA IT Solutions and the Erik Jonsson School of Engineering and Computer Science are confirmed sponsorships. Tickets to attend the event cost $100 and community members are purchasing tickets for students. If a student is interested in attending, Wedderburn said they can contact the Office of Diversity and Community Engagement. Another way students can be involved is by volunteering at the event; information regarding volunteering will be released in the days before the event.

The Office of the President, university leadership and different committees created the Strategic Plan, which describes how the university will grow going forward and has different points of commitment. Wedderburn said the Mosaic in Motion event is part of the university's strategic plan.

“If you look at our strategic plan and our president's commitment to ensuring we have a diverse student body, this (Mosaic in Motion) is a way for us to profile the importance of having diverse perspectives,” she said. “This is just a wider way for us as a university to show that we are committed to ensuring we have that diverse voice.”

8

COMICS

Nov. 11, 2019 | The Mercury

DOG YOGA

HELL'S KITCHEN

QUINN SHERER | MERCURY STAFF

O&B: UN-FUR-TUNATE FLAVOR

SARAH BESSERER | MERCURY STAFF

SARAH STREETY | MERCURY STAFF

YOU WOULD NOT BELIEVE YOUR EYES

SWEET SUFFERING

LOUISE NILLAS | MERCURY STAFF

HAVE YOU SEEN NARUTO?

JENNA CHERREY | MERCURY STAFF

BLESSED DINNER

ELIZABETH NGUYEN | MERCURY STAFF

YEAH I'M AN ADULT

BOWL CUT 2.0

KEATON NATIONS | MERCURY STAFF

KEATON NATIONS | MERCURY STAFF

BIANCA DEL RIO | MERCURY STAFF

OPINION

Nov. 11, 2019 | The Mercury

9

Meals that make cents Why mandatory meal plans are detrimental to freshmen ELLIS BLAKE HIDALGO Mercury Staff College is costly. Student loans are as synonymous with the college experience as midnight cramming and keg stands.

However, as UTD’s freshman class begins its journey laden with student loans and college fees, it seems unnecessary that UTD saddles those living on campus with the burden of paying for meal plans.

For UTD freshmen living in the residence halls, the unfortunate reality is that the already high cost of living is exacerbated by overpriced, non-flexible and entirely mandatory meal plans.

Given the options of 10, 14 and 19 meal swipes a week, the cost of dining per semester is between $1,877 and $2,038.

Averaged among meal plans, that puts

CHIAMAKA MGBOJI | GRAPHICS EDITOR

the average cost of a Dining Hall West meal swipe between $9-12. For an entrance into a buffet with several stations, the cost of a swipe is not relatively high.

However, the problem isn’t charging students $9-12 for entrance into a buffet; it is failing to realize that some students cannot afford to regularly eat at a buffet. The burden of college costs can be crippling, and a mandatory meal plan puts unnecessary extra weight on many families. By opting out of a meal plan, on-campus freshman residents would be free to save the money they would spend on meal swipes, instead spending far less on groceries or cheaper restaurant meals.

The opportunities for cheap, affordable food are plentiful, but freshmen are chained to unwanted and bank-busting daily buffet meals.

By making meal plans as paid per semester, UTD saves a lot of hassle. Students’ families pay once every couple of months,

and from there the students are doled out their swipes on a weekly basis. However, by structuring not only the payment, but also the distribution of meal swipes, UTD has created an inflexible system that consistently wastes students’ money.

Every Monday, students receive their paid-for amount of meal swipes. As the week progresses, some students dutifully use every swipe. However, others don’t want to go to the dining hall every day, and this leaves them with an excess of meal swipes every Sunday night. Then at midnight, rather than allowing students’ swipes to carry over, or simply be refunded back, UTD deletes those swipes — starting students over with the prescribed amount of weekly swipes—and pockets the money.

By creating this mandatory system, UTD has set up every freshman living on campus to lose hundreds of dollars per semester.

As UTD consistently takes student money in what is clearly a for-profit scam,

it’s important to distinguish Dining Hall West from the meal plans it’s tied to. As a freshman myself, I enjoy the food it provides and appreciate having a source of food so close to where I live. Additionally, the application of meal exchange does allow various ways to use meal swipes. In a world with optionally bought, customizable meal plans, I would be an ardent supporter of UTD’s efforts to provide an easy and efficient way for students, especially freshmen, to find food on-campus. But the issue isn’t the quality, type, or accessibility of food: it’s the mandatory way it’s shoved upon us.

Making on-campus living unaffordable is UTD’s business, but enforcing an inexcusably expensive policy on students needing housing is predatory and needs to change. Supporting customizable meal plan options would allow students to minimize their spending and build a financially efficient budget, tailored to

every student’s situation. Eliminating the mandatory inclusion of meal money into every meal plan would allow students to then avoid changing their money into UTD-exclusive meal money, as well as saving hundreds, if not thousands of dollars per semester. Finally, removing the weekly distribution of meal swipes would eliminate the possibility of losing meal swipes.

Students should not be spending money for a product they have a specific period of time to claim. Implementing changes that support student saving would not only show that UTD cares about their student body, it would also encourage every incoming freshman to think through a financial plan and begin learning about budgeting. Making these changes would be beneficial to every UTD undergraduate. In the end, it will come down to the university’s priorities.

Falling out with ‘Fallout’ How Bethesda's premium memberships scam gamers BEN NGUYEN Mercury Staff

LOUISE NILLAS | MERCURY STAFF

Bethesda released a scary addition just in time for Halloween: a “Fallout 76” subscription service. This “premium membership” promises all sorts of bug-ridden benefits for the low price of $12 a month and might as well be a spooky scam.

Fallout 1st is billed as a “premium membership” that brings one of the most requested features to “Fallout 76”: private worlds. That’s right, for a low price of $12 per month or $100 per year, you can have the privilege of playing by yourself. Along with unlimited storage in your scrapbox, premium currency monthly, an outfit and emotes, what more could you want?

Sarcasm aside, this is a straight rip-off.

Not only is it a subscription service, it’s a subscription service for buggy features that should have been in the game already. In private worlds, some containers spawn already looted — supposedly due to how

loot is instanced — and people from your friend list can freely join your private, invite-only server. Besides the private-butnot-actually worlds, the “unlimited space” scrap box is losing things put inside of it, never to be seen again.

These features should not be locked behind a paywall — a monthly/yearly one at that, especially when it’s for a game that you presumably already bought. Right now, I can boot up “Borderlands 2,” and have the choice of a public online game or a private game by myself. While “Borderlands 2” is a vastly different online first-person-shooter RPG, the ability to play by myself is not locked behind a monthly fee. I paid for the game. I should have a complete game to play. Everyone should, if they pay for one.

This is ultimately the result of the prevailing “games as a service” philosophy. Get the game, and the developers keep working on it to improve it over time. Except now, it’s become an excuse to release buggy and unfinished games to be improved as the “service” continues for another five years.

Examples of failures include “Evolve” and “Anthem,” the former an example of bad

support and the latter an example of a dumpster fire. That’s not to say that there haven’t been some successes, with “No Man’s Sky” and “Destiny 2” becoming actually fun games, despite failing spectacularly in critical and public opinion on launch day.

Despite its shortcomings, “games as a service” is still generally implemented in a more consumer-friendly manner than in Fallout 1st. Downloadable content is also released for most triple-A titles as additions funded by their purchase. For example, “Destiny 2” has multiple DLCs adding on more campaigns and missions, but the base game is still playable and feature-complete.

You don’t have to pay $12 a month to be in a party with your friends or have more room for your guns.

Ultimately, the problem isn’t with subscription services in general. It’s the terrible value proposition that is Fallout 1st.

“World of Warcraft” is a subscription service that acts like an arcade machine: pay to play the full game with all its features.

“Guild Wars 2” is a free MMORPG that compares very favorably to WOW. Fallout

1st’s value proposition is small conveniences for the same price of playing a better game. The features in Fallout 1st should have been quality of life improvements, a step in the right direction to making “Fallout 76” not garbage. Instead, it’s a testament to Bethesda’s greed.

If you’d like to play “Fallout 76,” I’d recommend instead installing “The Outer Worlds,” “Fallout New Vegas,” “No Man’s Sky,” or literally anything else. If you are still playing “Fallout 76” and want it to be at least decent, continue bothering Bethesda. While it’s not clear if Bethesda director Todd Howard and the team have functional ears, they seem to be continuing to support the game, and are clearly responsive to some degree. But most of all, do not support this business model. Don’t buy this game, don’t buy the “premium membership,” and don’t buy other games that attempt to implement “games as a service” in such a greedy manner. The only reason why Fallout 1st exists is because Bethesda thought they could profit from it, and players should ensure they don't.

Unpredictable Orbits Comet Cabs' timing inconsistent, need overall improvements BEN NGUYEN Mercury Staff

SAMANTHA LOPEZ | MERCURY STAFF

Comet Cabs are supposed to be handy transit options on campus, but more often than not are a dice roll of whether or not you find a cab when you need it. While practical on occasion, Comet Cabs have lingering issues that reduce the usefulness of the service.

Comet Cabs are a service that provides a ride in a golf cart from the Activity Center to six stops at various locations on and near campus. I am an infrequent user of the Rutford South cab as a commuter, but have noticed a thing or two about the service in general.

The reason I say infrequent is not because I don’t want to use the cabs; I use them whenever I can. Yet, more often than not, if a cab is going back to the Activity Center, it takes about the same time to walk to the Activity Center from the lots — so why bother taking the cab in the first place? This wouldn’t be true if the cabs have consistent cycle times. Information tech-

nology and systems junior and cab driver Nirvan Velmurugan said the cabs are supposed to wait at all stops for three to five minutes. However, not only are cabs obligated to stop for anyone that waves them down, they tend not to stick to the allotted stop times. I’ve seen cab drivers waiting for up to 10 minutes at the Activity Center with empty cabs.

Given all of this, the Comet Cab rider-to-be has a decision to make: walk for 10 minutes, or wait as long as 15 minutes depending on all the unknown factors? Most of the time, I’ll walk.

Even when the cabs pass by people on the way to the same direction people are going, I haven’t seen anyone wave them down. Maybe they don’t know they can, or just can’t be bothered. If I can use the cab, I’ll obviously choose to. The travel time of the cabs ranges from about two to five minutes depending on the route, so it’s not like they aren’t useful when you can catch them.

It all comes down to catching a cab, which is easier said than done. Both Velmurugan and marketing graduate and driver Jeong Su Han said there is a need for more drivers. This

can occasionally lead to shifts being dropped, with a lack of drivers meaning that there is no one to pick up dropped shifts.

Velmurugan and Han both said that the carts need some maintenance on the GPS trackers, blinkers and other minor things. The GPS trackers specifically are used in tandem with the UTD mobile app, but the trackers are about two to three minutes behind, even when they work.

So what do we do? Ultimately, we should try to support the drivers and push for improvements to the service.

What they have is nice, but flawed, and should be improved to be a more consistently useful service for UTD. More cabs running each route would be awesome, and along with that, more drivers. A set timetable similar to buses may be more useful as well. And besides the improvements that should be made by the service itself, students can improve in little ways as well. Velmurugan suggests closing the doors properly, as well as treating the drivers with respect. With a coordinated effort, we can make the Comet Cabs zoom at the speed of light.

Nov. 11, 2019 | The Mercury

10 → ELOHIM

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church worldwide, Christy said.

Another UTD student who chose to remain anonymous encountered church members late one night while waiting for his friends on campus.

While he was raised Methodist, he is no longer religious, but said he was willing to hear the church members out. Like with Higgins, the members blocked him in, making it difficult for him to exit the conversation.

“I kind of walked them through what I think, and they started pulling out their phones and quoting different Bible verses at me to try to persuade me that I was wrong,” he said. “They all sounded like Bible verses I had never heard before. Some of them were obscure books that I didn't remember from 10 years plus of going to church every week.”

He said their conversation lasted 30 minutes and sounded rehearsed. He added that he was initially suspicious of the members because the conversation occurred at 10 p.m., leading him to wonder why a religious group would recruit members late at night.

After he left, he said the members followed him until he stopped walking, then approached someone else who was alone.

“It was like they had markers or something and they were trying to steer the conversation back towards things that knew they had something that they could quote,” he said. “By the end of the conversation, we had gone so far off course from where they had started that I was completely dazzled with how we got there.”

Brianna Redick, the off-campus adviser for the Elohim Bible Study Club, provided a statement in response to the allegations from UTD students and Christy.

“Statements such as these presented by non-UTD students and nonElohim Bible Study Club members cannot be considered as valid,” the statement reads. “It is unfortunate that these false allegations are spreading amongst those who have never experienced or studied with the church and I hope that everyone can learn on their own the facts correctly.”

The Mercury made repeated attempts to interview church members, but was denied interviews or did not receive a response.

When Christy initially joined the church, the conversation she had with

NEWS

a member was what led her to join. At first, she only attended one bible study per week, then she began attending services and classes that would start at 9:00 p.m. and end at midnight.

Christy said one of these classes once ran from 9:00 p.m. until 8:00 a.m. the next morning. The time she was dedicating to the church took a toll on her marriage, Christy said, and although her husband tried to warn her about the church, she refused to listen.

“When he found out it was a cult, he started telling me … he would text me and he would message me the videos that past members had been doing and the missionaries and he would message me articles,” she said. “But we were told in the church that anything that's against the church, the bad slander, that's the enemy. That's Satan.”

One UTD student whose friend joined the Elohim club said she noticed her friend becoming more withdrawn after becoming a member of the church. The student said that after their friend joined the church, they'd leave for long periods of time and began making monetary donations to the church.

“They’re lying to us. We know that they’re at church all day,” the student said. “It's gotten to a point that they’re (gone) from 7:00 a.m. to 11:00 p.m., which is not right.”

Christy said that she, like the UTD student’s friend, also became more isolated after joining the church.

“Eventually you get so isolated because that's the outside world and you guys are different and you get so into it. Then people don't want to talk to you because they know that what you're in is in a cult,” she said.

“They're brainwashing you. Eventually you just get so isolated that these members are the only people that you get a chance to talk to.”

At one point, the student was concerned that her friend was forced to sign a non-disclosure agreement, as ex-members have stated in the past.

While Christy wasn’t require to sign an NDA, she witnessed church practices such as gospel couples which help WMSCOG expand.

“I did witness a lot of gospel couples together,” she said. “They never dated as far as I knew, but they get together and they get sent off to run their own church for the WMSCOG and since they're doing that, they believe it's just for the gospel.”

Christy said the church required members to donate 10% of their in-

come and donation envelopes would be marked with each member’s name to ensure they were keeping up with donations. Parents, Christy said, would be given envelopes with their children’s names and would be expected to submit donations for them as well. Church members were also told that the world was coming to an end, Christy said, leading some members to make drastic decisions.

“The deacon that was running the place quit his job as an underwriter because he wanted to make more room for preaching. Why? Because they think the world's going to end anytime soon,” she said. “In the services, they remind you that the world's going to end in days now and that you’re going to heaven. I remember periodically, after services, the sisters and I, we would be talking about, ‘Oh my gosh, it's coming soon, we're going to go to heaven soon.’”

Christy finally left the cult after it began affecting her son. She said he’d constantly act out after they joined. A majority of the people in her church were college students, because they were isolated and he was a toddler at the time, he didn’t get to interact with many other children and became more aggressive as a result of the isolation. Additionally, she said she found a computer monitor with live video feed of each room in her church, but hadn’t noticed any cameras throughout her time there. When she went back to the rooms to investigate, she still didn’t find any visible cameras.

The student whose friend joined the group said that she believes the Elohim club should be barred from campus and has negatively impacted their friend’s life. However, as the group hasn’t participated in any illegal activity, there is no legal reason for police to ban them.

“They shouldn't be anywhere. They shouldn't even exist because they're just separating families, taking people's money and it's a false idol,” she said. “You get nothing from it. They ruined their life by doing this.”

Higgins, along with the other UTD students and Christy advised students against getting involved with the group. The student whose friend joined the group said students should be leery of the church’s claims.

“Everything you read online about them is true, but if you ask the church members, they will deny it,” she said.

“They'll lie, they'll deny it, but I've seen everything with my own eyes.”

→ SHC

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

utes late, tried calling but got a weird menu,” Rodriguez wrote. “I was charged $25 for being a no-show even though I was there. I didn’t get to see a doctor and was told to wait another hour for a new appointment.

I will never ever go there again.”

SHC Director Lea Aubrey, said that the no-show fee was raised to $25 from $5 in order to encourage students to call ahead to cancel appointments that were no longer needed, which would make room for other students who need medical services, and would match the practices of other schools in the UT system.

“We advise (students) that if you decide at any point that you don’t need this appointment anymore, please call within the hour so we can cancel (the appointment) without a no-show fee,” Aubrey said.

“By increasing the fee, it promoted people to call and actually cancel the appointment. I get it, the $25, they don’t want to pay it. But what you’ll see in the community, it’s more than that — it’s up to $50 if you miss an appointment.”

The administration has implemented changes after feed-

→ SWINGS

CONTINUED FROM PAGE 1

ect gains more interest, Student Government will liaison with administration to move things forward.

“If students really want to do this, then that’s great — they should go for it,” Mohammed said. “The extent of this so far is that I had a chat with Eric

back in the patient exit survey, including those of staff and practitioner interactions.

“We usually survey our patients after their visits as a way to keep on top of how we’re doing and to see, ‘What are some things we can make better?’ and ‘What are the students saying we could do better,’” Aubrey said. “There is constantly staff development going on whenever there is an incident outside of annual training. We come together and talk about how we can improve.”

The SHC provides a medical care option for students without insurance who have paid the medical service fee, which allows students to schedule appointments without additional cost. This affordability is a contributing factor of 29.6% of respondents who chose the SHC as a medical care provider. The SHC minimizes student costs by working with community partners that provide free additional services to students.

“We have free dental screening because students would come in and ask about dental services, so we reached out to a community partner. Another community partner comes on and they do free vision screenings,” Aubrey said. “We also

have a mobile X-ray service that is really convenient for the student — they don’t have to leave the campus, they can get everything done here.

We work with Turning Point, a local company that provides an advocate and a sexual assault nurse examiner.”

In addition to partnering with local service providers, the SHC employs board-certified/licensed medical staff and patient care specialists that directly treat patients, administrative staff, an insurance coordinator to manage records and a consulting pharmacist. In the survey, two of the top services respondents chose were physical exams and vaccinations, and 5 of the 104 respondents said they go to the SHC for gynecological care. The SHC is also in the process of hiring a phlebotomist, Aubrey said, in order for the center to be more efficient.

“I always encourage our staff to have really good bedside manners as it pertains to our clinical staff and really excellent customer service for our front staff,” Aubrey said. “I want our students to have a really positive experience. It is about being a really good listener, to respect our students as young adults, making sure that we are transparent with them, and it is to provide them with options.”

about this, and I told him I support any idea that students may have.”

Another question to answer, Aaberg said, is where the swing sets would be located. One solution would be mobile swing sets, which would have all the benefit of typical swing sets, but also allow maintenance to move them as necessary.

Aaberg said that swing sets with

four to eight swings can cost as little as $800 to $1600.

“I think it would just be a good campus enhancement,” Aaberg said.

“Spending just a dime for the university on something that would really bring joy for students, especially for the hundreds that have already signed the petition, would be fantastic.”

Seeking Part-time Technician for small optometric practice on Saturdays from 10-3; optional Tuesday and Thursday 2-6. Pre-screening patients (training provided) and casual receptionist work.

More hours available seasonally. Next to a major retail location near UTD email: eyedoctor@preciouseyes2020. com for more information.

2019

NOV. 13-16

utdallas.edu/homecoming