In the News
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April 9, 2021
Many women workers who have lost their jobs may never return to the workforce. “We see two phenomenons at work,” said Afton Branche-Wilson, assistant director of community initiatives at U-M’s Poverty Solutions. “Women, and especially women of color, are more likely to work in industries that have been hit by the pandemic. … The second piece of this is women, particularly single mothers, have been forced to leave the workforce to take care of children not in school.”
Michigan Advance -
April 9, 2021
Alcohol-related liver disease is on the rise among young women amid increased pandemic drinking, says hepatologist Jessica Mellinger, assistant professor of internal medicine: “This is what we’re seeing a lot of in our young people and our young women. They have been, we think because of COVID and isolation and the myriad, diverse stressors that have happened as a consequence of lockdown, turning to alcohol.”
ABC News -
April 8, 2021
Rashmi Menon, entrepreneur in residence at the Ross School of Business, says while governments do, to an extent, encourage investing in contractors from underrepresented groups, more economic incentives could be put in place: “How do we change hearts and minds? Government programs are extrinsic motivations. I’d love to see more intrinsic motivations.”
Crain's Detroit Business
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April 8, 2021
“None of the students involved in this project had ever built a spacecraft before,” said Brian Gilchrist, professor of electrical engineering and computer science, and climate and space sciences and engineering, whose class built a small satellite to test using the Earth’s magnetic field for propulsion — which would allow small satellites to orbit Earth without having to carry fuel, allowing them to stay aloft for longer periods of time.
The Washington Post -
April 8, 2021
“We make it clear that this is a core value of the institution. If this isn’t something that’s important to (job candidates), then Michigan is probably not the place that you want to be,” said Robert Sellers, vice provost for equity, chief diversity officer and professor of education and psychology, on the importance of diversity, equity and inclusion at U-M.
The Chronicle of Higher Education -
April 7, 2021
Given the U.S. Capitol’s heightened security after Jan. 6, violent extremists are more likely to target local government buildings, says Yuri Zhukov, associate professor of political science: “Once that happens in one city, people are going to try and replicate it somewhere else. That’s kind of the nightmare scenario here.” Robert Mickey, associate professor of political science, says there are few cases of “highly socially and politically polarized countries that depolarize without something horrific happening. We don’t have a playbook.”
Washington Monthly -
April 7, 2021
“I do feel frustrated that India did not roll out the vaccination drive more aggressively while the curve was in its valley. It is much easier to roll out vaccination when the infection is not so high. Now the health care capacity is stretched between vaccination and COVID care,” said Bhramar Mukherjee, professor of biostatistics and epidemiology.
BBC -
April 7, 2021
“I think we’re at a watershed moment. We used money to respond to an economic crisis and it wasn’t perfect, but we got money out quickly,” said Luke Shaefer, director of Poverty Solutions and professor of public policy and social work, in a story about cities experimenting with unconditional cash transfers to help some residents quickly — an idea that could become the basis for an alternative to traditional welfare and other safety net programs.
The Christian Science Monitor -
April 6, 2021
Matthew Lassiter, professor of history, and urban and regional planning, says easy political labels don’t always apply to suburban voters, who increasingly vote Democrat. “I personally believe that their main political identities are not as Democrats, but are parent, taxpayer, homeowner. The way they think about politics broadly is the thing that we don’t talk about a lot, like zoning, like school boundaries, that those things matter more at the local level than who they vote for every four years in a presidential election.”
National Public Radio -
April 6, 2021
The election of Vice President Kamala Harris “allowed us to demonstrate that a woman of color could now lead — albeit behind a white man — the ‘most powerful’ democratic country in the world,” wrote Matthew Alemu, doctoral student in public policy and sociology. “What should have been a ‘normal’ transfer of power appeared more like a joyous announcement that the vice president’s office had just won the world’s first ‘nonmale, multiracial’ Powerball lottery.”
Blavity
