Correction: The edition of The Daily Breakdown where this article was included mischaracterized the findings of the UMPD Daily Crime Log. The overall number of rapes this year is down, but the rate of total cases that are occurring in residence halls increased this academic year.

The percentage of the University of Minnesota’s total rape cases in campus residence halls increased during the 2023-24 academic year. 

Over the past six academic years, the majority of rapes on the University’s Twin Cities campus have happened in residence halls, according to the UMPD Daily Crime Log. Since the beginning of this academic year, 16 of the 18 reported rapes on campus have happened in residence halls. That is approximately 89% of cases, which is the highest rate seen in any academic year since at least 2018-19.

While the 18 total reported rape cases this academic year on campus are down from the 50 total reported cases in the 2022-23 academic year, this year’s 89% of reported rapes happening in residence halls is up from about 52% last year. The next highest year is 2019-20 with 75%, according to the Daily Crime Log.

Differing data 

Jacob Richter, a Student Senate representative and co-chair of the Public Safety Working Group, said this term the Student Senate decided to focus on sexual assault on campus and began finding data on the issue. 

“It’s alarming,” Richter said. “The amount of both rape and what they call fondling incidents, which is kind of like sexual battery, on campus has been just disturbing and it’s not something that you hear about that much.” 

Richter said the data the Student Senate used is from the Annual Security and Fire Safety Report, which complies with the Clery Act. The Clery Act is a federal law requiring universities that receive public funding to collect campus crime data and report the information annually to the U.S. Department of Education. 

The report shows 30 rapes and 27 incidents of fondling in 2022 between the Minneapolis and St. Paul campuses, Richter said. In 2021, there were 40 rapes and 12 fondling incidents. Both of these numbers differ from the numbers reported in the Daily Crime Log. 

The Daily Crime Log and data from the Annual Security and Fire Safety Report have different geographical parameters, causing the numbers from the two data sets to differ, according to the University of Minnesota Police Department’s (UMPD) spokesperson Jake Ricker. 

Ricker added the Crime Log includes incidents within UMPD’s patrol jurisdiction, while the annual report only includes incidents occurring on Clery geography. 

UMPD investigates all allegations of criminal sexual conduct, Ricker said. 

“UMPD has investigators who specialize in these types of investigations, but the same level of professionalism and care that UMPD investigators bring to any criminal sexual conduct investigation applies regardless of where the incident occurs,” Ricker said. 

Katie Eichele, the director of the Aurora Center, said the center sees around 450-500 clients each year. 

The Aurora Center works to serve all victims, survivors or concerned people of sexual assault, relationship violence, stalking and sexual harassment at the University, according to their website. 

“We’re kind of average in terms of people coming in for services,” Eichele said. “There’s certainly more people coming and reporting to law enforcement, and that’s actually a really good thing.” 

Eichele added a small number of the center’s cases are residence halls. She said a lot of the cases are off campus because that is where the majority of students live. 

National trends show first- and second-year students are oftentimes the most vulnerable, especially in the first six weeks of the fall semester, coined the “Red Zone,” according to Eichele.

Richter said coed dorms inherently create situations that can lead to sexual assault, and he has spoken with students who have felt uncomfortable. 

“I’ve spoken in loose consultation with people across the campus community about whether they felt safe in coed residential halls, and there was a consensus that females do feel a bit less safe when they are in a twin residential,” Richter said. 

Eichele said as a whole, a majority of the Aurora Center’s clients do not report. 

Some victims do not report 

In most academic years, more than half of rape cases occur months or years before they are reported, according to the Daily Crime Log. 

This school year, the Daily Crime Log showed six of the 18 cases this school year occurred months or years before they were reported. Thirty-seven of the 50 cases for the 2022-2023 school year happened months or years before. 

Eichele said reporting is never the first priority for the center. She said often there are other things survivors want to prioritize like school, safety and their well-being. 

“The last research that was conducted on something like that said that, on average, it takes about a victim survivor 11 months to actually report to an office that has some type of disciplinary authority,” Eichele said. 

According to Eichele, the reporting aspect can come when the victim feels safe enough to report or when they have processed it enough to understand what they experienced was a violation. 

Eichele said they might not see delays in reporting if the accused is a complete stranger. Victim survivors often do not want to do significant harm to others, despite having experienced significant trauma. 

Clara Cashin, a third-year student who lived in a residence hall her freshman year, said it is worrisome that this is happening in residence halls with students who are still very young. 

“There might be a slight increase in reported cases in residence halls because people might feel more comfortable having a CA to report to and they have more confidentiality with that,” Cashin said. 

Education and prevention 

True prevention, according to Eichele, focuses on what society is telling people who consider taking advantage of others in vulnerable situations. Oftentimes, people do not think of themselves as monsters or rapists, she said. 

Eichele added that the number of cases will rise if education and prevention is working.

“We acknowledge that if we’re doing our job, in terms of prevention and training for all students and employees, which is required by the campus, then we’re definitely going to also see increases in reporting and that’s something that we want,” Eichele said. “We want to see that accountability. We want to see that victim survivors are feeling safe and comfortable reporting.”

Eichele added alcohol is a major factor in a lot of campus sexual assaults because it is the number one date rape drug, is easily accessible and is socially acceptable. 

“What we have to recognize is that whether or not you are pro-drinking alcohol under age or not, people have a right to engage in social behavior without being victimized,” Eichele said. 

Richter said the University Student Senate’s goal is to pass a resolution that will address sexual assault. 

“It’s our aim to craft a resolution that will specifically address sexual assault on campus,” Richter said. “We do have kind of a few ideas. The first would be supporting victims by creating clear and established channels for victims to speak out.” 

Other prevention initiatives include the University Sexual Misconduct Prevention Program (SMPP) and sexual assault prevention courses for undergraduates. 

Margaret Campe, director of SMPP, said addressing sexual misconduct requires committed and sustained action. 

“SMPP’s work is evidence-based and informed by assessments completed among our campus communities,” Campe said. “We targeted and tailored our program for student populations at higher risk for experiencing sexual assault, including fraternity and sorority students, student-athletes and LGBTQIA+ students.” 

Campe said SMPP, which started under a different name in 2017, is centered on prevention to challenge the root causes of sexual misconduct. She added SMPP recognizes how power and privilege produce vulnerability and risk for sexual misconduct. 

According to Campe, the University has required all incoming students to complete an online sexual assault prevention course since 2013. 

Richter said the Senate is wondering how important or effective the online course is as they want to make sure students do not just click through a module.

“Something that we were thinking and pondering would be having a live instructor during orientation or welcome week talk about consent and that instructor we would like to be either from the University office or even a police officer,” Richter said. 

Cashin said she heard a lot more advocacy for talking to someone if something happens while living in a residence hall than while living outside of a residence hall. 

“I think the University does a good job with talking about those concerns while students live in residence halls but I think they could do better for students who don’t live in residence halls,” Cashin said. 

Susan Stubblefield, director of Housing & Residential Life (HRL), said HRL partners closely with the Aurora Center to provide training and education for residents who live on campus. As for rape cases in residence halls, she said she has not heard a lot. 

“I haven’t received any direct feedback on this topic,” Stubblefield said. “Certainly as a department, this is an important priority for us when we think about safety and education.” 

Stubblefield said every fall HRL does a safety week, which includes a safety quiz as a way for students to become more aware about resources. 

Community advisers (CAs) in residence halls are required to report any incident of sexual misconduct they become aware of, Stubblefield said. 

“Many times those reporting parties really need that support from the very beginning,” Stubblefield said. “We do a lot of training before the academic year begins and then also throughout the year.” 

A newer safety precaution is adding turnstiles in residence halls. Stubblefield said Pioneer Hall is the only residence hall currently with turnstiles but that more will be installed in Middlebrook Hall and 17th Avenue Hall this summer. 

“Those are really just helping us to make sure that people are not following students into the buildings,” Stubblefield said. “That whole thing of holding a door open behind someone else, we call it ‘tailgating’ sometimes, that we’ve really found that those turnstiles mitigate the tailgating.”

Abby Holien, a first-year student living at Comstock Hall, said there is not a lot of security that goes into who enters the building, including tailgating. 

“It’s not like there’s anybody stopping you from, like, getting in,” Holien said. “That’s why the rising statistics don’t necessarily surprise me. Just the level of safety in some of the residence halls is a little bit concerning.” 

Mariam Hassan, Undergraduate Student Government Sexual Assault Task Force (SATF) chair, said almost everyone she knows had an experience where they felt unsafe in residence halls. 

“As more conversations are had about speaking up and knowing that it’s not your fault and shifting the blame from victims, which I think it historically has been in the past, to like perpetrators and the culture that allows this, has really made people feel more comfortable in reporting,” Hassan said. 

Hassan said she cannot tell if the increase has to do with more reporting or an increase in crime. 

Hassan said SATF is focusing on raising money for different prevention centers in Minnesota, adding SATF is hosting a self-defense workshop to help people learn defenses. 

“There’s only so much you can do and I think it’s really important to consider that you can be the most self-defense trained person in the world and this can still happen to you, it’s not about anything that you do,” Hassan said. 

Eichele said over 90% of campus sexual assaults are committed by someone that the victim knows.

“What a huge betrayal,” Eichele said. “If you are so afraid of rejection that you don’t have a conversation about sexual experiences or sexual expectations with someone, but you still want to be respectful, I encourage those people to really self-examine.” 

Hassan said a big thing is keeping the conversation surrounding criminal sexual misconduct in peoples’ ears and keeping awareness out there. 

“Everyone should always remember that sometimes you can do everything in the world and it can still happen to you, and that doesn’t make it your fault,” Hassan said. “We hear all these bad things happening at the dorm, and that doesn’t mean it will happen to you and you can keep yourself safe.” 

The Aurora Center encourages those who experience sexual misconduct to connect with an advocate from the Aurora Center by calling the 24-hour helpline at 612-626-9111. 

Too Good To Go is an app that allows restaurants and food places to sell their leftover food at the end of the day at a discount, instead of throwing it away.

While the app is big in other cities, it is new to the Twin Cities, having been introduced this past summer and fall. At the University of Minnesota, some students are working to bring the app to more restaurants near campus. 

Avery Erickson, a third-year student in the College of Food, Agriculture and Natural Resource Sciences (CFANS), is one of the students working on encouraging businesses to sign up for the app as part of her year-long food service management class. She said her group started working on a project this fall to promote the app in different restaurants in the community to reduce food waste. 

“We were like right at the beginning of it, we started to kind of look into it and use it as our project,” Erickson said. “We’ve already had a success of signing someone up.” 

According to Erickson, her group was able to sign up a bakery from Mill City Farmers Market on the app last semester. 

“Now we can see all their stats of food that they’ve rescued and all of the good stuff that they’ve done with it so far,” Erickson said. 

People can use the app to scroll through the restaurants that have food available, purchase them through the app and then pick up the surprise bags at the restaurant. According to Erickson, a lot of the bags are usually priced from $3.99 to $8.99, depending on the price of the food left over. 

Sydnee Yengo, a third-year CFANS student working on the project, said their group has talked with a lot of restaurants but has not had a lot of success. 

“We wanted to get more restaurants on it, but we’ve had like a little bit of a hard time with the restaurants around campus because some of the bigger chains are not very easily able to start this,” Yengo said. 

According to Yengo, they are now focusing on outreach and teaching students more about the app. 

Erickson said people either know what the app is or have no idea about it. 

“I went into a few restaurants in Dinkytown talking about it and there were a few people that were like, ‘Yeah, I’ve heard of the app, but we’re just not on it yet,’” Erickson said. 

Faith Jepson, a third-year student, said she had never heard of the app before but thought it would be a good idea for preventing food waste. 

“I’ve never heard about it, but if I knew about it, it would definitely be an incentive to go to more places too, so I think it would increase business,” Jepson said. 

Alyse Fraase, a third-year student, said she had heard about Too Good To Go through social media but has not used it herself. 

“This is important,” Fraase said. “Lots of college students already order food regularly through apps like DoorDash, and the restaurants that they order from likely generate a decent amount of food waste that they might as well be selling, and so I think this app has something for everyone and is an easy way for consumers to make more sustainable choices.”

Fraase added she would like to see more popular restaurant chains like Raising Cane’s on the app, as these places draw a lot of student traffic and are due to take part in sustainability solutions. 

Mochi Dough is currently the only restaurant in Dinkytown on the app. 

Erickson said Mochi Dough’s to-go bags sell out very quickly, so there must be a good amount of students who know about the app. 

“There’s definitely a good following that uses it there, so that’s why we’re like, ‘Oh, if more people in Dinkytown got on it, they would be successful,’” Erickson said. 

Despite the one success, Erickson and Yengo said they have difficulty getting restaurants interested in the app. 

Erickson said she went to every restaurant in Dinkytown and found that while many were willing to look into it, it was difficult to get in contact with managers or workers who seemed to care. 

“That was kind of good to know, but it is really hard, especially with so many of [the restaurants] being where they make it for the person,” Erickson said. “It’s like made to order so they don’t really have food waste where they just make the food when it’s needed and save that food waste in a way.” 

Erickson added it was important to try to let restaurants know the app is user-friendly, and according to Yango, the bakery from Mill City Farmers Market has had success using the app.

Yengo added it is important to bring awareness to the availability of food on campus. 

“I think it’s just like trying to bring awareness to the issue of food availability on campus and also incorporating that food waste part,” Yengo said. “The way that the app works with both is kind of awesome.” 

The 12th annual Co-Management Information Systems (CoMIS) competition was held last Tuesday through Friday at the Graduate Hotel and Carlson School of Management, with the University of Texas at Austin walking away as the champion. 

CoMIS is a 24-hour case student-run competition designed to simulate real-world business conditions, where students from national and international competing schools try to solve a business problem written by a Minneapolis company. 

The competition was first held in 2012 with eight teams. This year’s event featured eleven teams overall, five of which were international.

Teams arrived at the Graduate on Tuesday, where they stayed for the next three days. The night included a welcome dinner and social hour, with Wednesday exhibiting an “Explore Minnesota Day” where teams were invited to an office visit to RSM in Minneapolis and a tour of Target Field, followed by a networking dinner at College Club with professionals from around the Twin Cities.

Thursday was case deliberation day, where teams were given the cases and 24 hours to solve them. The teams presented their solutions to judges on Friday, with an awards banquet to cap off the evening. 

This year’s CoMIS winner was the University of Texas at Austin, who walked away with $2,000 and a trophy. Second place was the University of Manitoba, winning $1,500, and third place was Maastricht University, winning $1,000, according to Jack Carriere-Auer, co-director of collegiate affairs for the CoMIS board. 

This year’s case was written by dev10, a technology talent development company in Minneapolis. Past case authors include the Minnesota Wild, U.S. Bank, Medtronic and the University of Minnesota’s Office of Information Technology.

What is CoMIS?

CoMIS planning committee co-chair Ingrid Hildebrand said CoMIS is a cool way to meet people from different schools with shared interests in information systems. 

Hildebrand added being on the student board and planning the competition is challenging and fun at the same time. 

“The fun parts are the people, but I would say some of the hardest parts are the people too,” Hildebrand said. “It all pays off at the end, which is just like cool to see everyone have such a great experience and have fun in Minneapolis for a couple of days.” 

Gabby Locher, the other co-chair on the committee, said her favorite part is getting to know all the teams and seeing everything they have worked on for a year come together. 

Locher added being on the board has also been beneficial because it is a way for students to grow their skills and expand outside of Carlson. 

“Even just a liaison, just being assigned to a team and like you learn a lot of soft skills and a lot of great communication skills because you want to be really friendly and connect with the students, but you also have to conduct yourself in a more professional manner,” Locher said. 

Hildebrand said she is excited to see the fun people have and how much they grow while being here. 

“There’s just so much growth from the welcome dinner to closing ceremony,” Hildebrand said. “People get to know each other super quickly and so I’m excited to see all of that develop and see how much fun people have.” 

Locher said she was most excited for Friday night’s awards banquet and to be able to see how close teams have gotten with their University’s liaison and the board.

One such liaison for this year’s CoMIS was Dane Clouse. He said being a liaison involved showing the teams around and making sure they were on time for everything. 

“Most of them, this is their first time to Minneapolis, so they don’t know their way around, don’t know where they need to be and at what time, so you’re just kind of making sure that you’re helping them throughout the competition because they have more important things to be focusing on,” Clouse said. 

What students take away from the competition

While Clouse said being a liaison is a “nice happy medium” between being involved and being on the board, one of the challenges is facing pressure as the team’s go-to guide.

“You hate to be the person that messes it up for them,” Clouse said. 

As a Carlson student, Clouse said the case competition is a great way to apply what people learned in class and he enjoys seeing what teams come up with for solutions. 

“This you can really apply to anything that you’ve learned in any of your classes,” Clouse said. “There’s no real answer because it’s like an ongoing problem that even this company can’t figure out.” 

Second-year student Isabel Holzschuh from Iowa State University traveled to Minneapolis with her team to compete in this year’s CoMIS, her first case competition.

“Our goal as a team is to win and to build better connections with international participants and Minnesota, since we’re super close proximity to them,” Holzschuh said. 

Iowa State made it to the lightning round, but Holzschuh said she was excited to get a case from a real company, solve their problems and connect with business executives. 

The director of competition on the planning board, Sajid Siddiq, made sure the competition day ran smoothly and the rules and regulations were clear for teams. 

Siddiq said many teams do not cheat as they are there either for a class or because they are personally invested in case competitions. 

“It’s a pretty cool opportunity,” Siddiq said. “Sometimes these students even get offers from the case sponsors after.” 

Hildebrand said they tried to broadcast CoMIS as much as possible and emphasized that students wanting to get involved with the board do not have to be in Carlson or be an MIS major. 

“It’s honestly just about people with a passion for meeting other people, want[ing] to involve themselves in a different capacity than what’s usually available to Minnesota students and just willing to learn and be a part of a fun, unique experience,” Hildebrand said. 

Locher said no experience is needed to be on the board or to be a liaison, which is the “most chill” of CoMIS roles. 

One of the challenges Hildebrand said the board faced this year was learning to be flexible and adaptable when something happened and figuring out how to deal with it in a way that would benefit all. 

“Not taking anything personally either,” Hildebrand said. “There are some things that definitely hurts us, but it’s not like for any intention, that’s just like what happened.” 

Locher said she learned to take everyone’s perspective into account and ensure all voices were heard while knowing one can not cater to the needs of everyone. She added she also liked to see everything come together successfully.

“Just seeing it all come together and everyone have a good time, and our planning efforts come to fruition is just really nice,” Locher said. 

Several University of Minnesota 2024 graduates are facing their first in-person graduation after experiencing limited high school graduations during the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020. 

Amid feelings of excitement and bittersweetness, students reflected on what is still needed to prepare for May’s graduation. 

The undergraduate graduation ceremonies will happen in the 3M Arena at Mariucci, with varying times and dates depending on the college. 

This is different compared to last year’s graduation, which was a joint ceremony of combined colleges held at Huntington Bank Stadium due to renovations at Mariucci. 

Ian McPhee, a fourth-year civil engineering student, said his high school did not have a graduation ceremony, so he was excited to have a big ceremony like the one last year. 

“The ceremony that CSE is going to provide is not quite what I was looking for,” McPhee said. “I was looking forward to having everybody from the whole class in Huntington and there would be way too many people there, and it would be like a big celebration for everybody in the University, not just engineering kids.” 

McPhee said the ideal graduation would have a cool speaker, something he said might not happen if the University is trying to find speakers for every college. 

“I think it’s worth asking the question, we have a football stadium, why are we not using it to have a big graduation ceremony?” McPhee said. 

Despite wishing for a bigger ceremony, McPhee said he is excited about his department’s graduation as it will be a more intimate ceremony experience where he can say thank you to his professors. 

Kiera Sweeney, a fourth-year psychology student, said she went to a big high school, so her school was not able to offer any graduation in 2020. 

Sweeney said the school did a news segment where students could select a picture of themselves which would be shown “for approximately one second” on screen. 

“It wasn’t really like a graduation, it was kind of just a presentation we watched on the news, so that kind of sucked,” Sweeney said. 

With the size of the College of Liberal Arts, Sweeney said they have to split graduation into two parts already, so she does not see how everybody could graduate in Huntington at once. Sweeney added that she always thought the graduations happened at Mariucci, so that is what she was expecting. 

Harrison Sullivan, a fourth-year marketing and computer science student in the Carlson School of Management, said he feels bittersweet about graduating but is excited to have it in person. 

With the pandemic, Sullivan said his freshman year did not feel like college because of all the restrictions, so his time at the University has been cut a year short. 

As for the ceremony, Sullivan said he is indifferent to where or how it happens. He added that it would be fun to have a ceremony all together but feels it would be impossible with so many students. 

“I think I’m fine that it’s all Carlson, but I’m not like, ‘Yes, I just want it to be all Carlson,’” Sullivan said. 

Sullivan added the general sentiment among his friends is not, “Graduation is on this date, at this time, this is exactly what we need to do.” He said he feels there is not a full understanding of what is happening but said he does not know if the knowledge gap is the University’s or his fault. 

McPhee said he started looking for information about graduation a couple of weeks before spring break because he did not know what was happening as nothing was communicated. 

“Nobody else knew,” McPhee said. “I talked with some of my friends, like, ‘Do you guys know what’s going on with graduation?’ ‘No, nobody knows.’”

McPhee added he looks at the emails being sent but many people do not, so if he is not finding information, that means more people are not finding it either. 

Sullivan said he is pretty aware of what is going on but not 100% aware of what is happening. He added he has not received a lot of information but said he probably has it somewhere. 

Sweeney said she feels out of the loop but does not know if it is the University or her. 

“Talking to some of the people I plan to graduate with, I don’t think they really know either, so that makes me think the University is kind of not giving us all the details as early as they could be,” Sweeney said. 

Despite feeling out of the loop, Sweeney said she is excited about the opportunity to put on her cap and gown and feel accomplished. 

“I’m looking forward to actually having a graduation and closure and being able to walk the stage and say I did it,” Sweeney said. 

While Sweeney said she is excited about something she has not done yet, she knows some people who are kind of over it. 

“Some of the people I’ve talked to about it have expressed similar feelings as me, as they’re looking forward to having this experience we never got, and some people are kind of over it, like, ‘I don’t really care, we didn’t get it the first time, I don’t really need it the second time,’” Sweeney said. 

University of Minnesota law students in the Theater of the Relatively Talentless (TORT) are ready to perform their annual parody musical Moot Cars this weekend, based on the 2006 Disney and Pixar film “Cars.” 

The musical, written, directed, designed and performed by students, will take place at 6:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday at the Ted Mann Concert Hall on West Bank. 

Moot Cars follows Lighting McMondale, a first-year law student with his sights set on transferring out of Minnesota Law while traveling on his journey of self-discovery and navigating the antics of a Cars-themed law school.

Molly Kleist, a third-year law student who plays mentor Doc Hudson, said the show is a great way to turn off the brain from the stress of law school while getting to be creative. 

“What I love about the show is it allows everyone to laugh at ourselves, to realize how ridiculous law school is, how ridiculous the legal profession can be sometimes and just letting everyone laugh it out and be self-aware,” Kleist said. 

According to Kleist, the show has a lot of law school jokes in it, but they provide a “TORTionary” that explains legal terms or niche jokes for the public to understand. 

“There are parts that are accessible to everyone, so just come in with an open mind,” Kleist said. “Maybe don’t expect a Tony-winning performance, but it’s going to be entertaining, I promise.” 

Dominic Detwiler, a third-year law student and director of this year’s show, said they wrote the show with the law school as the primary audience because it is what they know. However, they have had people come in who are not affiliated with the school who found it funny, Detwiler added. 

This is Detwiler’s third year involved with TORT and he said the organization is a great opportunity for people to connect. 

“It really does create a sense of community that I think makes the law school here really unique and particularly TORT is such a strong organization,” Detwiler said. “It’s a really strong community here within the law school that I think benefits the members of the organization both in the law school and beyond.”

This year’s show features TORT’s biggest cast with around 80 students involved, said Mallorie Sckerl, a third-year law student, head producer and playing the lead of Sally in the show. 

“Getting to work with so many different people who care so much about this one show and getting to geek out with them and just really have fun,” Sckerl said. “These are people I see in classes every day and get to build those more professional relationships with, but it’s so great to have this designated time outside of classes that I get to know these people.” 

The cast has been rehearsing since January, putting in six hours a week between rehearsals on Sunday and Monday nights, according to Sckerl. 

Detwiler said one of the bigger challenges of putting on the show is the time commitment, as all of the participants are also law students with full course loads. 

Kleist said her favorite part of the show is when she, as Professor Doc, gets to sing a song with Lighting McMondale. 

“I am schooling him because he has a little bit of an ego problem,” Kleist said. “So we sing ‘Anything You Can Do [I Can Do Better]’ from Annie Get Your Gun and I kind of kick his butt and do it while singing like a bada–. I really enjoy that part.” 

Sckerl said her favorite part of the show is the closing number, when the cast sings “Life Is A Highway” from Cars, changed to “Law Is A Highway.”

“I remember seeing [Cars] in theaters with my family and so to have this over-the-top, cheesy, silly end to law school and my time in TORT, that was something,” Sckerl said. “To have this now at 25 be the literal soundtrack to the end of my law school experience is just really funny and sweet.” 

Violet Butler, a first-year law student and ensemble member in the show, said their favorite part of the show is being on stage giving the reactions to mirror the audience. 

“TORT is really about having fun and putting on a show that’s kind of low stakes because we’re not professionals either,” Butler said. 

Sckerl said she is already looking forward to coming back to see other TORT shows, knowing she has been a part of it. 

“It’s been really great to be one of the upperclassmen that is continuing to help expand and build that community because I know how important it was for me all three years of law school as an outlet, as something creative to do,” Sckerl said. 

Kleist, who helped write the script, said she looks forward to performing the show for an audience to see. 

“The energy of performing with a live audience, nothing’s like it,” Kleist said. “We’ve written a show that everyone should be able to enjoy.” 

The University of Minnesota Undergraduate Mock Trial Association sent two out of three teams to compete in the Opening Round Championship Series (ORCS) in St. Paul this past weekend in hopes of moving on to nationals. 

Despite not getting enough bids to move on, the University’s silver team beat their previous year’s ORCS record, bringing personal success to the team. 

Jin Bang, a second-year student on the executive board and gold team for mock trial, said the University’s maroon team is ranked top 100 in the nation. As a result, they usually go to ORCS, but they did not get enough bids to qualify for this year’s competition.

Bang added this is the first time both the gold and silver teams have gone to ORCS, and the second time in ORCS history the silver team has gotten a bid. 

According to Riley Hetland, a first-year student and silver team co-captain, only two teams are allowed to go to each regional tournament, so the maroon (A) and gold (B) teams went to one tournament, whereas their silver (C)  team was assigned a more difficult regional. The tournament assignments were handed out by the American Mock Trial Association.

“It just didn’t look like we were going to make it and we were facing really really hard teams,” Hetland said. “We got our bid to ORCS at the harder regionals and no one expected it.” 

Emily Sapyta, the silver team’s other co-captain, said last year the team only got half a ballot out of the eight ballots at ORCS, meaning they tied with another team. This year, the silver team won a full ballot and tied for another. 

“I think in that sense, we were very successful, but obviously we aren’t going to nationals so it just depends on how you define it,” Sapyta said. 

What is mock trial? 

The University Mock Trial Association is a student-run organization that competes against other colleges in mock trial competitions. 

In competitions, a group of lawyers or the American Mock Trial Association (AMTA) makes a fictional case released in late August which the team argues for the entire season, according to Sapyta. 

“The entire thing is about not necessarily what the case is, because you know what the case is, you’re just presenting the best case you can,” Sapyta said. 

Sapyta added that AMTA makes all the necessary materials, including affidavits, exhibits, case laws, stipulations and special instructions. The team stays within the bounds of the case packet and presents the case at competitions. 

Each trial consists of a prosecution or plaintiff team from one college and a defense team from another. Teams then form a case theory and select witnesses from a pool in order to structure their case’s narrative. 

Students can participate as witnesses or attorneys, assigned by the coach of each team at the beginning of every “stack season,” Sapyta said. 

The University has three teams: maroon, gold and silver. Each team has between six and 10 people plus a coach and a captain. Students are randomly assigned a team during the “pre-stack,” or first month of the season. 

“After the first two tournaments of randomly being assigned, we get stacked based on skill level and coincidentally, freshmen usually aren’t as good so a lot of us got put on the silver [team],” Sapyta said. 

Hetland said mock trial is a good place to learn all of the courtroom procedures, like the ones seen on “Law and Order,” where actors say “objection” or “hearsay.” 

According to Hetland, one of mock trial’s bigger challenges is about presentation and confidence. 

“It’s a lot about confidence and how you present yourself in the round and a lot of people get nervous if there’s like an objection they don’t know very well,” Hetland said. 

Bang said there are a lot of big personalities in mock trial that can sometimes make it difficult for everyone to be on the same page. 

“Everyone is really dedicated about the organization,” Bang said. “I’ve met so many friends through mock trial now. It’s just a good activity to meet people and try new things.”

Sapyta said many people in mock trial plan to go into law school or some political field, but that is not true for everyone. 

“We all pretty much want to be lawyers, we all love to argue,” Sapyta said. “That can always be a hurdle to jump through because we all like to think that we’re right, and we all just like love to hear ourselves talk.” 

According to Sapyta, one of the messages she and Hetland pushed as captains was to stay positive. 

“How accepting and how fun it is to both enjoy the activity and know that I’m doing something that is going to help me in the future — that probably is one of my biggest takeaways from this year,” Sapyta said. 

To find out more information about the University’s mock trial teams, go to the Litigophers Instagram or website.

This article has been updated.

Several businesses provide discounts for students, but do students use them?

College students, including University of Minnesota students, can receive student discounts on products such as food, sporting events, streaming services, electronics and University services. 

Students get discounts at food places such as Domino’s, Burger King, Chick-fil-A and HelloFresh. Students can also get discounts on popular music streaming platforms like Spotify and Apple Music.

Sports teams also provide discounts for students, like $10 college student night for the Timberwolves, the $5 Minnesota Twins college tickets and student rush tickets for the Minnesota Wild. 

Many student discounts come through apps, such as UNiDAYS or Student Beans, which list available discounts and makes it easier to register for them.

Anisah Carson is a student worker at the University Bookstore and said she knows there are some student discounts but she never uses them. 

“I feel like it’s too much work,” Carson said. “I’m just like, I might as well just pay for it.” 

Carson said there have been a couple of times where she was online shopping and there was a student discount that she used. Coffee shops are also a place she said she has gotten a student discount. 

“I go to some coffee shops and they’re like, ‘Are you a student?’ and then I show them my U Card and I get like 10% off or something,” Carson said. “ I use it then, but not really.” 

According to Carson, Spotify and Hulu are the most popular businesses that students use their student discount on, but she said she thinks the University should have more for students, even at the Bookstore.

“You don’t get a discount just for being a student, and I feel like that’s kind of dumb because a lot of people look for that, especially when they’re new students,” Carson said. “I feel like the University should have more for us.” 

The University provides free services for students including free legal services, counseling and public transit. 

Bayleigh Bergner, a first-year student, said she does not use any student discounts because she does not know of any. 

“Maybe there could be posters up in the dorms and stuff, just because I haven’t really seen anything like that,” Bergner said. 

Paola Azuaje, a third-year student, said she benefits from a lot of student discounts because they are useful. 

Azuaje said she uses a student discount for her car insurance, museums, Spotify, Amazon Prime, American Eagle and Nike. 

“Anything I can get on I will, because it’s a lot cheaper, so why not use it?” Azuaje said. 

According to Azuaje, some student discounts are not well advertised and businesses do not let it be known unless it is asked about, which is why a lot of people do not know about them. 

Kayla Mesin is a first-year student who said she is unaware of any discounts provided for students. 

“I don’t know if I know of any,” Mesin said. “I know like movie theaters or something like that.” 

Mesin said she thinks businesses should advertise more and food companies should have more discounts as well. 

Tenley Madson said she uses the apps Student Beans and UNiDAYS to get online student discounts for many places. 

“I don’t know as much [discounts] in person, for me, it’s always like online I can always find student discount codes,” Madson said. 

According to Madson, students need to register with their student email for either of the apps. She added more student discounts for fast food places would be useful. 

“It would be nice to have a student discount where it’s easier for students to afford to eat out,” Madson said. 

The Society of Women Engineers (SWE) held SWE Week this past week, highlighting all twelve of their communities with a focus on celebrating women in engineering and their allies.

SWE is a professional and social student organization at the University of Minnesota focused on professional development and community building. The University’s SWE chapter has 300 of the 40,000 global members.

Some events featured during SWE Week included lantern decorating, Family Feud game night, a scavenger hunt, professional mentorship and others, all hosted by the numerous committees in SWE. 

One of the newer SWE committees is He For SWE, focused on male allyship for women engineers. 

“The first thing to know about SWE is that it is not a group that is entirely for women,” said Nikhil Kapur, the co-director of the He For SWE board. “It is a group for people who are supportive of women in STEM spaces.”

Kapur is a fourth-year student who became involved with SWE after having classes with engineering women and wanting to support them.

“I know I come from a place that needs a lot of learning, so I knew it would be a good place to learn for myself,” Kapur said. 

Darin Phlork is the other co-director for He For SWE and a fourth-year student. He said the committee advocates for male allyship and shows support for women in STEM. 

“When I attended my first SWE meeting here at the U, I think I was the only male at the event,” Phlork said. “It gave me an experience of what it’s like, maybe not necessarily the exact same experience, but what it’s like to be a woman.” 

Raised by a single mother, Phlork said he wants to give back to the women in the world on her behalf. While Phlork knows people may not intend to inflict negative consequences, at least from men, they still do. He said he believes awareness can improve the environment around this issue.

“After hearing from other SWE people about their own experiences, I’ve been able to better recognize them,” Phlork said. 

Showing up to a meeting is an important first step, according to Kapur. As a place to advocate for equitability in a variety of different spaces in STEM, he said the problems SWE deals with are not just for women to face.

Apart from building allyship, SWE also values professional excellence. With SWE’s professional development committee, members work on resume building, networking and talking with SWE’s company sponsors. 

According to Natalie Mac, SWE’s president, College of Science and Engineering students in SWE get paid more after graduation and have a higher salary in internships, with $2.07 more per hour in internships and a few thousand dollars more in a post-graduate salary. 

Mac said SWE has other benefits, too, one of them being a safe space for students. 

“My freshman and sophomore year, engineering was very difficult and I was feeling like the minority in all my classes,” Mac said. “When I joined SWE, I was able to meet other women who were in the same boat as me. It was a safe space for me, and now I’m making sure it continues to be that safe space for everyone.” 

Every year, SWE hosts an event called “SWEekend at the U” geared toward seniors in high school interested in engineering. Makayla Cizek, SWE secretary, said she joined SWE as a freshman because she had been to SWEekend at the U while in high school. It ended up being one of the main reasons she chose to go to the University. 

“I get to give back and engage in that now,” Cizek said. “It’s so much fun to volunteer at SWEekend and you see them come back and they join SWE as freshmen.” 

With 50 to 60 leadership roles in SWE, Mac said it is a great way to build leadership skills. Mac added that SWE offers a low-stakes environment where students can figure out their leadership styles and get feedback. 

Irena Hong is a third-year student who has been attending SWE events since her freshman year. Along with finding them fun, Hong said going to SWE events helped force her out of studying and do something other than worry about school. She added these events help her de-stress because she does not worry about the fact other people might be studying while she is not.

“Not only are the events super fun, but also being able to have events and activities to go to with fellow women in science and engineering is so fun because you can bond with the other girls in your major or in engineering in general,” Hong said.

The Minnesota Daily has seven editorial desks, each working on different types of stories. Here is what you need to know about them. 

Each desk at the Daily has a different role, contributing different types of stories to create what the Minnesota Daily is. The desks include campus activities, campus administration, city, sports, opinions, arts and entertainment, and podcast. 

Campus Activities 

The campus activities desk covers events and activities happening on campus. This includes student groups, student issues or anything involving campus and student life.

“Anything that pertains to students, we write about,” said Amirah Razman, a campus activities reporter and third-year University of Minnesota student. 

Razman said being on campus activities has allowed her to make more of a connection with campus and learn about what makes it so special apart from the academics. 

Activities covers the Undergraduate Student Government (USG), student groups and even health-related topics like the pandemic and public safety incidents on campus. 

“We’re trying our very best to cover all of campus life and all of the student body and faculty too,” Razman said. “We’re just trying really hard to get their voices heard.” 

Razman started as an intern on the other campus desk, campus administration, during the summer of 2022. She switched to the activities desk in the fall and has been there ever since. 

“I definitely learned a lot about how a newsroom operates,” Razman said, adding she has learned what to expect when it comes to brainstorming, pitching and interviewing in a newsroom. 

Not only is Razman a reporter, but she also runs the Content Diversity Board (CDB) at the Daily. 

“I make sure the stories that are going to be put out before publication are free of any biases or are being addressed accurately when it comes to sensitive topics, or if it comes to mentions of race, gender or sexuality,” Razman said. 

By working to make sure all people are being represented accurately in stories, Razman said she hopes the CDB can become a learning experience for everyone. 

Campus Administration

While the campus activities desk focuses on student life, the campus administration desk focuses on everything administration-related at the University. 

Campus administration beats include faculty and research and development, which focuses on any research projects coming out of the University. It also covers the Board of Regents, or anyone in higher-up administration –– including the President, deans of schools and the Board of Regents members –– as well as meetings along with any policy changes at the University. 

Alex Lassiter is a third-year student who has been working at the Daily on the campus administration desk since the summer. 

Lassiter said while it can be frustrating dealing with people who do not respond to interview requests, he enjoys working on the desk.

“There’s always going to be someone who is smarter than you,” Lassiter explained. “The benefit of being a reporter is you get to learn those things from those people who actually know them.” 

Lassiter understands some people have trouble trusting the press because of how reporters are portrayed in other forms of media, but he wants people to know he and other Daily reporters are trying to do their jobs.

“I just want to make sure that everybody knows what’s going on around campus because not everybody does,” Lassiter said.

City

Unlike the campus desks, city desk has more latitude in what they cover, which includes topics like public policy, bills and things that might not happen on campus but affect people at the University. 

“We have the ability to tell stories about our University community, but we’re not limited to the University campus,” explained Devlin Epding, fourth-year student and the city desk editor. 

Epding said one of his favorite things about working on the desk and for the Daily is getting to talk to activists, business owners, politicians and random people on the street, who he said are more fascinating than he could have ever imagined. 

Epding also emphasized that the Daily is a learning institution. 

“A mistake isn’t the end of the world,” he said. “We’re here to get better.” 

Working on city desk comes with a responsibility to establish and build good, positive relationships between the Daily and the communities the desk covers, according to Epding. The desk tends to go into communities that are not familiar with having the media report on them. 

“If people are generous enough to tell their stories to us, then we have the responsibility to take care of that story for them,” Epding said. 

Having been an editor since May, Epding realizes how quickly personal growth happens while working at the Daily. 

“Your growth personally happens so quickly and before you realize you’ve made any progress, you’re helping the next class of people,” Epding said. 

Sports

Sports desk includes stories written about the student-athlete experience at the University, as well as the analysis of the athlete’s performance and the camaraderie surrounding the teams. 

Theo Franz has been the sports desk’s editor since May and a reporter on the desk for a year before that. 

Franz said it is important to document the student-athlete experience because, in the ever-changing landscape of sports, it is important for people now and in the future to know what the University has gone through. 

“The hardest part about sports desk is finding an available time to talk to student-athletes, as well as the athletic code which they have to abide by in talking to media members,” Franz said. 

Franz knows each athlete has a unique story and it is the job of sports desk to find and share them. 

“We’re cooperative and driven,” Franz said. “We’re creative and we like people to experience sports in other ways than watching the game over television. As a student-run newspaper, we’re in the perfect place to do that.” 

Opinions

Opinions desk is another editorial desk producing columns and stories involving the expression of opinion.

“A big misconception about the opinions desk is it’s strictly about opinions of the columnists,” said Spencer White, third-year student and editor of the desk. “The idea behind an opinions section is creating discourse.” 

This year, White and the desk are working to integrate differences in opinions and readers’ voices through polls and debates. An individual opinion piece does not have the most discourse within it but can instead spark discourse, according to White.

“Even someone in the comments being like, ‘You’re stupid and wrong,’ is better than no conversation whatsoever, in my opinion,” said White. 

Amidst the creation of discourse in opinion pieces, the desk still upholds journalistic standards, even though they are different from the hard-news pieces of the other desks. 

Arts and Entertainment

Anything that can be consumed as art or be defined as entertainment or culture is found within the arts and entertainment (A&E) desk. 

Film, music, theater, art galleries and food reviews can be written by A&E reporters, focusing on the Twin Cities area, not just campus, according to Cole Bursch, the A&E editor. 

“One of the biggest challenges is figuring out how to write for arts and entertainment,” Bursch said. “It’s much different from hard news, and there’s a lot more flexibility in terms of what you can write about and how you can write it.” 

While A&E writing can be compared to opinions more than hard news articles, Bursch said they do not always use their own opinion, but there is more leeway and creativity involved. 

“It’s just fun,” Bursch said. “We get to do fun things. I’ve talked to some of my favorite bands and I get to write about things that I’ve never known about.” 

Bursch said learning how to improve reporters’ writing has been a fun challenge for him.

“We have a lot of different types of people on our desk,” Bursch said. “We have a lot of different stories coming out; we have something for everyone.” 

Podcast

Podcast desk is another unique desk at the Daily. While podcasts can cover topics similar to A&E, they can not cover breaking news because the stories take longer to produce, according to Kaylie Sirovy, the editor and producer of the Podcast desk. 

Each podcast is anywhere from seven to 10 minutes long and takes the desk two weeks to produce, Sirovy said. 

“We can put in what we call natural sound, or background noise,” Sirovy said. “It’s really fun to be able to listen to other people and their voices. You really get a feel for the person you’re interviewing when you can hear their voice.” 

Sirovy is a third-year student who started working at the Daily in February, where she was a reporter for two months before becoming the editor/producer. She said editing has come naturally to her after she had to learn a lot on the fly. 

With two reporters and an intern on the desk, Sirovy said she tries to talk about less well-known parts of campus in the podcasts. 

For anyone possibly interested in reporting, Sirovy said to just put your name out there.

“Be willing to just throw yourself into the stuff,” Sirovy said. “Be willing to talk to people. Emailing is a big part of this job, and you have to be willing to talk to anyone about anything.”

If you are interested in applying to work at the Daily, applications can be found on the Daily’s website. While some positions are still open for the fall semester, most positions typically open at the end of each term.

Since the start of the University of Minnesota Graduate Labor Union (GLU) in the spring, the union worked on creating proposals to present at the bargaining table this fall. 

GLU is a graduate worker-led organization working toward improving conditions for graduate workers across departments and colleges at the University. 

The union officially won its campaign at the end of this past spring semester by a margin of 97% voters voting yes. Since then, GLU held elections for their 25-member bargaining committee, which was trained by United Electric (UE), their parent union. 

GLU’s first bargaining session with the University was held Sept. 11 and was used as a way to introduce proposals and allow the bargaining teams to meet each other, said graduate worker and GLU organizer Anya Auerbach. 

Auerbach is not on the bargaining committee for GLU but instead an organizer who communicates between the 25 members of the committee and the over 4,000 members of the union. 

As an organizer, it is part of Auerbach’s job to see what the union members want and communicate it with the committee, who then create proposals accordingly. 

Proposals were voted on and ratified by the union members ahead of bargaining, according to Auerbach. She said one of the reasons they chose to affiliate with UE is because they take the democratic process of the union seriously. 

“Does everyone always enjoy the democratic process?” Auerbach asked. “Probably not, but does everyone invest in it and care about it and want it to go well? Absolutely, yes.” 

Auerbach said GLU’s bargaining team is working on the non-economic proposals.

“The non-economic proposals are really important because they win us things like job protections and anti-discrimination protections and include the grievance procedure,” Auerbach said.

The grievance procedure makes the contract enforceable, something Auerbach said is as needed as winning the contract itself. Along with those, she said these proposals are not about specific amounts of money, but rather they address GLU’s wants of raises and the elimination of student fees. 

According to GLU representative Yusra Murad, the union is also fighting for workplace safety and quality of life demands. 

“Our union is fighting for the working conditions that we deserve,” Murad said in an email statement. “Conditions that our boss, the University of Minnesota, has the resources to assure for all workers.” 

The relationship between the University and the union has so far been respectful and collaborative, according to Ken Horstman, vice president for the Office of Human Resources at the University. 

“Unlike traditional employees, Graduate Assistants hold a unique role as both employees and students,” Horstman said in an email statement.“The University will focus bargaining on conditions of employment and refrain from bargaining on academic matters, which remain the purview of our facility.”

During their initial campaign to start the union, they did not see a lot of anti-union messaging from the University, according to Auerbach.

“Getting 1,700 cards signed on day one, the day we went public, was a pretty strong message that we were not to be messed with,” Auerbach said. 

While GLU is preparing for any eventuality and outcome from the bargaining sessions, they continue to communicate with their members and keep them up to date. 

“Beyond the strong contract we know we will win,” Murad said. “We want every graduate worker to know that this is their union, and that the power of our union lies in the rank and file membership.” 

Auerbach believes it is important to keep people engaged with the process and hopes the graduate workers will be involved in whatever way they can. The union is as strong as the membership is engaged and involved, she said. 

“What we hope and expect is that the University will bargain in good faith with us,” Auerbach said. “We now need to win an awesome contract that is worthy of all the efforts we’ve put in thus far and actually meets our needs.”

The University and GLU are tracking updates on the bargaining efforts.