Police arrested 11 pro-Palestine protesters who occupied and barricaded a University of Minnesota administration building early Monday evening. A Minnesota Daily reporter wearing a press vest was also briefly detained.

University of Minnesota Police Department (UMPD) entered the building at 5:40 p.m. with “necessary support” from Hennepin County Sheriff’s Office, according to a statement from the University. A crowd of protesters also congregated outside the building’s west entrance by Northrop Mall.

A SAFE-U emergency alert at 4:40 p.m. said protesters restricted access to the building and damaged University property, advising those still within Morrill Hall to safely exit the building if possible. A follow-up alert at 9:11 p.m. said UMPD cleared Morrill Hall.

Protesters barricaded the building with metal tables and chairs, bike racks, wooden pallets and locked the doors with bike locks around 4 p.m. after marching from a rally outside Coffman Union. 

Employees were present in the building when the barricades were set up but exited the building after protesters directed them to the unblocked entrance.

University of Minnesota police and Hennepin County officers came through the building’s east entrance at about 5:45 p.m.

Inside the building, door windows were smashed with broken glass on the ground and protesters removed filing cabinets and chairs to build onto the barricades.

Morrill Hall houses University President Rebecca Cunningham’s office and other administrative functions. 

Members of the University’s Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) chapter organized the demonstration, protesting the University’s protest policies and investments in Israel and arms companies.

The protesters renamed the building “Halimy Hall,” for a 19-year-old Palestinian TikTok creator Medo Halimy “who died in August in an apparent Israeli airstrike,” the Associated Press reported. 

Sasmit Rahman, a member of SDS present at the demonstration, said the group’s “fight was just” and consequences from the protests are “incomparable compared to the situation in Gaza.” Rahman added the protesters were prepared to stay until their demands were met.

Rahman confirmed 11 protestors are unaccounted for.

Isabel Eguizabal, a member of Young Democratic-Socialists of America (YDSA), said her group chose to not partake in the occupation due to concern over logistics but commends the bravery.

“This will concretely not win divestment,” Eguizabal said. “We need a long and sustained campaign.”

Calvin Phillips, vice president of students affairs, watched protesters from a bench at the rally and later followed the crowd with other administrative staff as they marched to Morrill Hall. Phillips said he was watching the protest.

The University reached an agreement in May with the University of Minnesota Divestment Coalition, consisting of SDS, YDSA and Students for Justice in Palestine (SJP) to disclose its investments in Israel. The University recently committed to sponsor tuition for three Gazan students in the spring semester.

A post on SDS’ Instagram page late last week described the protest as a “No homecoming as usual” march from Coffman Union to McNamara Alumni Center. 

The group changed the protest’s focus to conditions in Northern Gaza, writing “While Northern Gaza burns, (University) administration is worried about chalk and megaphones.” 

Before fall semester, the University consolidated its guidelines for protests, including limiting participation to 100 people and allowing no more than one bullhorn.

This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

The University of Minnesota Foundation (UMF) has seen its share of the University’s total endowment double to more than $4 billion in the last decade, giving the University the fourth-largest endowment of all Big Ten schools.

During its 10-year Driven campaign, the Foundation’s endowment grew by almost $2 billion, with almost half of the increase coming from 2021 alone. UMF Vice President of Marketing and Communications Sarah Youngerman said 2021 was a “really amazing year” for all endowments. 

The Driven campaign began in 2011 and raised $4.4 billion, surpassing its $4 billion goal. One quarter of the money went to students and another quarter went to faculty research, Youngerman said. At the time, it was the fifth-largest campaign from a public research university.

The growth is not due to donor gifts alone — the Foundation endowment grew by around 40% in 2021 from the previous year, a symptom of market success, Youngerman said. 

Americans donated over $58 billion to higher education institutions in 2023, according to a survey from the Council for Support and Advancement of Education. The survey also found gifts from organizations rose while donations from individuals and gifts supporting infrastructure declined.

Almost 40% of gifts to endowments go to financial aid, and nearly one-third of gifts to universities’ current operations go to research, according to the survey.

“The private sector is really heavily invested in the University of Minnesota in a way that really, I think, moves the needle and I don’t think we talk about that in this kind of holistic way,” Youngerman said.

The role of foundations

“Having a philanthropic arm for the University is really important,” Youngerman said. “The volume of scholarships and the need to supplement research costs and grow those portfolios really put a higher focus on philanthropy.”

Public foundations are unique to public colleges and universities because they keep private money separate from state funding, said Brian Flahaven, vice president of strategic partnerships at the Council for Advancement and Support of Education. 

The first endowment of this kind was the University of Kansas Endowment Association in 1891, created by University officials who feared the state government would seize and redirect the funds. 

“There are a few other public (universities) that don’t have foundations, and even the public (universities) that have foundations, a lot of them are different based on the institution, the culture,” Flahaven said. 

For example, the University of Michigan was established before the state of Michigan, meaning it can operate its endowment without creating a separate nonprofit organization. Youngerman said the University of Michigan is “far less reliant on state support.” 

Youngerman added her peers are often surprised at how much Minnesota gives the University, but “it doesn’t feel that way when we’re here.” 

Foundations being legally separate from the institutions they serve requires a separate board from university boards manned by elected individuals, Flahaven said. This allows a university to appoint key supporters, alumni and community leaders best suited to building the university’s philanthropic resources, Flahaven added.

Only one-quarter of the UMF’s 44-person board is appointed each year, with appointees including the CEO of Minnesota United FC, the CEO of 3M, two regents and the chair of M Health Fairview.

Part of the reason for the board’s size was the Foundation’s 2013 merger with the school’s then-separate medical foundation, Youngerman said. To guarantee the medical foundation was represented, the number of seats on the board expanded. She said the medical school is “the largest philanthropy-producing entity at the University,” and it represents 20-30% of the total production.

The Foundation’s trustees decided to outsource management of the investment portfolio to the University of Minnesota Foundation Investment Advisors, a subsidiary nonprofit, when its net assets reached about $500 million over two decades ago, Youngerman said. She added the intention was to “professionalize the investment strategy” and “maximize the principles by which the investment policy was designed,” a trend in higher education at the time. 

Having a subsidiary nonprofit like the Foundation is an institution’s decision and not uncommon, Flahaven said. Not all institutions have separate financial advising because their endowments may not be large enough to merit it, he added.

Foundation Salaries

Organizations like the Foundation operate in a “unique space” — they are neither private foundations nor community foundations because the money goes directly to one institution, said Russell Roybal, vice president and chief external affairs officer at the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy. 

Roybal said the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy considers it good practice to minimize the gap between the CEO’s wage and the lowest-paid employee. The organization’s policy requires the CEO’s salary to not exceed four times the lowest wages.

In 2022, UMF President and CEO Kathleen Schmidlkofer had a salary of $500,000 while the lowest-paid employee made $44,500 — more than eleven times lower, according to University payroll data. 

The Foundation CEO’s salary is determined based on the market and her peer group, Youngerman said. 

But salary increases for the CEO position have been consistent with inflation, growing from $350,000 in 2010. The wages and compensation are also consistent with or lower than other foundations for Big Ten schools, such as the $715,000 salary for the University of Wisconsin Foundation’s president in 2022, according to its 990 forms.

Who’s going to pay for it?

The University’s endowment is split between the Foundation and the Office of Investments and Banking. The Foundation was created in 1962 as donations became more sophisticated, with the state having played a larger role in subsidizing education costs at the time, Youngerman said. 

“Endowments are a critical part of the philanthropy and the fundraising, and frankly, the budgets for universities as well,” Flahaven said.

Donors want to invest in the “margin of excellence,” Youngerman said, and it is difficult to ask for help with costs like building maintenance because some donors consider it the state’s responsibility. More than 99% of donations are donor directed and can only be used for a specified cause.

When the state does not meet the University’s full request for funding — as was the case for fiscal year 2025 – philanthropy is not necessarily responsible for making up the difference, but the Foundation “certainly feels that tension,” Youngerman said.

The Foundation distributes roughly $250 million a year to the University. 

“It’s not a huge portion,” of the University’s $4 billion budget, “but it’s certainly a portion,” Youngerman said. 

The 2021 boost

The University’s total endowment grew from $3.8 million to $5.4 million in 2021, an increase of more than 40%. Of the growth, $900 million came from the Foundation’s endowment. 

The Foundation received a typical $240 million in gifts in 2021, but the value of its assets grew significantly. 

The Great Recession in the late 2000s was a difficult period for colleges and universities, and “going into the pandemic, there was a lot of fear, particularly when the economy dipped right at the beginning of the pandemic,” that similar trends would happen, Flahaven said.

“There was certainly a sense of, ‘We need to give back to help community organizations, to help institutions,’ and so I think that drove a lot of the giving,” Flahaven said.

Compared to the Great Recession, “fundraising was rather resilient during the pandemic,” Flahaven said.

The University endowment saw a decrease of 24.2% in 2009 from the previous year, one of the largest drops out of Big Ten endowments. Many universities saw a decline of around 20.8% during that time.

Roybal said the pandemic taught a lot of organizations that they need to have a “rainy day fund.”

“It was such a shock to the nonprofit ecosystem that so many organizations were not prepared to be able to cover even a few months of expenses, let alone a couple of years,” Roybal said.

During the Great Recession, some leaders at the University decided certain research was too important to halt, relying on donors committed to funding the research even if it meant dipping into the principal value, Youngerman said. The Foundation’s investment advisors built their current investment strategy during that period and allowed the endowment to see less loss than foundations with riskier strategies, she added. 

Prioritizing long-term growth

“It’s benefiting both students now but also the future students who go to university, so it’s a different model than the current operations-giving most people think about,” Flahaven said. “You give money, and they use it right away.”

The Foundation’s investment strategy, in good years, will not benefit as much as other endowments, but it will rarely “suffer the consequences of a down market,” Youngerman said.

“We’ve seen trends away from giving to the endowment because a lot of donors want to see their dollars working like today, right now, spending it out,” Youngerman said.

The Foundation is designed so a $25,000 scholarship gifted several decades ago will grow significantly to have a bigger impact on future generations, Youngerman said.

“Maximizing long-term growth is almost, I would call it a fiduciary obligation of the Foundation,” Youngerman said. “To erode the principal (value) of any endowment would be the antithesis of why we exist.”

Donors have criticized the Foundation for not earning more in the market, Youngerman said. But using a more conservative investment strategy keeps the foundation safe from the “dramatic downsides of market fluctuations.”

“Oftentimes we’ll hear from (donors) that say, ‘Why are you not earning more money on the endowment,’ and ‘I can privately go and raise my $10,000 even faster than you all are doing,’” Youngerman said. 

According to Youngerman, the Foundation is working through a conversation with President Rebecca Cunningham about what the next campaign might look like following the success of the Driven campaign.

At the University of Minnesota, almost 12% of students report running out of money to purchase food, and even more express worry over their ability to afford food.

The cost of groceries rose 11.4% in 2022, the highest single-year increase in decades, and has continued growing since, albeit at a slower pace. However, stores like Target and Walmart are among a handful that have announced price cuts on thousands of items.

Many areas around the University, including Como, much of Marcy-Holmes and the St. Paul campus are considered food deserts under the USDA definition of low-income residents who lack easy access to a supermarket. The census tract encompassing Dinkytown and the few blocks to the north is not considered a food desert because of the Target Express located at 14th Avenue and Fifth Street Southeast.

However, Dinkytown is one of the least food-secure areas in all of Hennepin County, with an estimated  31.5% of residents experiencing food insecurity, according to data compiled by the Healthy Foods, Healthy Lives Institute.

Over one-third of undergraduate students experienced running out of food and not having money to buy more, and 38% of respondents said they could not afford to eat balanced meals at some point.

Students have been pushing for a grocery option on campus for at least a decade, and concerns over accessibility and cost have continued through the opening of three nearby stores — Trader Joe’s and Fresh Thyme in 2018, and Target Express in Dinkytown in 2014. 

With the approval of the Universal Transit Pass (UTP) two years ago, students can ride Metro Transit buses with their U-Card and travel to more stores without depending on a car. But travel time, safety and affordability are still major concerns.

The Minnesota Daily compiled a list of the price of basic grocery items, inspired by a Star Tribune comparison of grocery costs in eight Twin Cities stores, and an adjusted dorm-friendly list without items requiring open heating elements, which are against University housing rules.

The list includes 16 items representing each of the food groups and a snack option for college realism. The items were judged by the price of store brands or the cheapest option at the same size.

Grocery list

* indicates an item that would require a stove, air fryer or other appliance not allowed in University dorms

• dozen eggs *
• half-gallon of 2% milk
• sliced loaf of whole wheat bread
• spaghetti *
• boxed macaroni and cheese *
• frozen cheese pizza
• rice 
• black beans
• peanut butter
• chicken thighs *
• tofu *
• carrots 
• baby spinach
• blueberries

Michale Boland, a University agribusiness professor, said the biggest costs of operating a grocery store are the supply chain, labor and property taxes, all of which have been increasing in recent years.

The rising energy costs and inflated supply chain costs from COVID-19 need to be passed on to somebody, Boland said. So stores must either put the burden on consumers or reduce it themselves by selling a smaller amount of a product.

Prices coming out of the pandemic were higher both because of scarcity in the supply chain and making up for selling less overall, Boland said. 

Retailers like Target and Walmart told consumers in early 2023 they would not automatically pass on costs but would push back against vendors who keep prices high. 

A major reason behind the lack of grocery stores near the Minneapolis campus is the current real estate market, according to Boland. There are “very prohibitive” costs to building a store with a parking lot anywhere close to the East Bank.

The decision of stores to keep prices low comes from wanting to hold onto lower-income customers, who are the quickest to be priced out of buying name-brand products or shopping at that store altogether, Boland said. 

Additionally, retail grocers do not want customers to default to the cheapest options because those products have the lowest profit margins, he added.

One concern for food costs and accessibility right now is over the election in November. If Republicans take Congress, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP) will have less funding, Boland said. SNAP, formerly known as Food Stamps, provides individuals and families with financial assistance in purchasing food and can be used at many major grocery stores.

SNAP is the “last resort” to make sure people do not starve, but stores also have an interest in consumers having access to funds that can be spent at their stores, Boland said.

One resource for students is the Nutritious U food pantry, open four days per month during the fall and spring semesters and in the summer, the pantry offers free meals on Thursdays. According to Boynton Health, around 1,500 students use the pantry every month.

The University provides information on navigating the SNAP application process for students who may qualify for its benefits.

Students continue to push for solutions

The Undergraduate Student Government (USG) has been pushing for a grocery store on campus, having passed a ballot measure in a campus-wide vote in the spring, said Amara Omar, chair of USG’s basic needs task force.

A campus grocery store would be located in Coffman Union, a centralized location close to students who live farther from the Target in Dinkytown, according to Omar. 

Although planning is still in the early stages, the store would operate on a break-even model and possibly accept SNAP benefits, Omar said. Another goal is to stock halal, kosher, vegan and vegetarian options.

Sourcing produce and other items might mean searching for an outside sponsor — a method used by campus grocery stores at other major universities — or working with The Food Group, a Minnesota non-profit that supplies the Nutritious U pantry, Omar said.

Omar said one of USG’s priorities for the project is affordability, and the goal is to negotiate prices comparable to Aldi prices.

As the project progresses and space is leased from Student Unions and Activities, USG will work through the logistics of staffing. But Omar said she estimates it will require about 15 employees, each of whom would ideally be paid $15 per hour.

If the East Bank location proves successful, she added the next step would be to implement a similar store in St. Paul.

St. Paul campus lacks food accessibility, support

Ensuring the grocery store will be helpful to students living on and near the St. Paul campus has been a challenge, Omar said. She added Nutritious U is hoping to expand to the St. Paul campus, but spaces there lack the infrastructure to support deliveries of canned goods and produce.

Commuting from the St. Paul campus to East Bank for Nutritious U is a major barrier for students, especially those with classes coinciding with the pantry’s operating hours, said Grace Atchison, who recently graduated from the University with a master’s in nutrition sciences. 

Atchison said there has been a lack of proactivity from the University to supply the St. Paul campus with resources available to students on the primary Minneapolis campus.

To combat food insecurity among nutrition students, Atchison said she and a few classmates from her year-long Food Service and Management class decided their project would be setting up a food pantry on the St. Paul campus. Her group mapped out dining options and found the Bailey Hall dining hall, a few nearby restaurants and vending machines were the only walkable options. 

The St. Paul campus is classified as a food desert, but the operating hours of the St. Paul Student Center, Bailey dining hall and nearby restaurants add extra barriers to food accessibility, Atchison said. 

Though the UTP has been helpful, relying on buses at night may not be as reliable or safe, she said.

Atchison’s group was connected with CHIP Care Corner, which has multiple pantries to address the 11% of health professional students who experience food insecurity. CHIP Care Corner was able to expand the pantry’s offerings beyond the donations from Department of Food Science and Nutrition staff and students.

The College of Food, Agriculture and Natural Resources (CFANS) selected the pantry as its cause for Give to the Max Day last year, bringing in roughly $6,500 in donations from alumni — enough to keep the pantry going for a few years, according to Atchison.

CFANS professor Len Marquart said finding solutions to food insecurity “is everybody’s business, but it’s nobody’s business.” 

Students in the Food Service and Management course that Marquart teaches have been increasingly interested in solutions to combat food insecurity on campus since the pandemic, he said. 

“How do we allow students to have enough voice to spark that interest from administration and higher-ups in the University to seriously address this issue?” Marquart said. “It’s not being addressed.” 

The starting point for working against food insecurity is “asking the right questions and allowing students to participate because they can drive issues that others can’t,” Marquart said. 

Education on budgeting and nutrition might be one way to help students, but it would take funding and an evaluation into whether that would work in practice, Marquart added.

“We know education can be effective, but education doesn’t always translate into better behavior,” Marquart said.

Voter participation in neighborhoods around the University of Minnesota increased in the last decade, but municipal election turnout has remained significantly lower than citywide averages.

All 13 seats on the Minneapolis City Council are up for grabs in this year’s election. Elected city council members will serve a two-year term due to redistricting in 2021. 

In the past, turnout in precincts on and around campus has been markedly below the turnout citywide. Barely a quarter of registered voters in Dinkytown participated in the 2021 election, making it the lowest turnout across the city.

Como, Prospect Park, Stadium Village and parts of Marcy Holmes also trend below the city’s average turnout. Cedar-Riverside sees similar electoral participation in state and presidential elections, but turnout for municipal elections is slightly higher than other neighborhoods close to campus, according to voter turnout data from the city.

Lower turnout in local elections, generally, is due to less public interest as well as fewer resources than national elections, according to Larry Jacobs, director of the Center for the Study of Politics and Governance in the Humphrey School of Public Affairs. Presidential elections generate billions of dollars, and there is no comparable investment in turning out the vote for city council elections.

It is impossible to escape coverage of presidential elections, and city council races are almost the opposite, Jacobs said. He added students in particular are influenced by national voter campaigns, while older voters have had their voting habits tracked over many years.

In 2021, same-day registration rates in precincts on campus and in Dinkytown ranged from 70% to 80%, considerably higher than the rest of the city.

One explanation for this comes down to the timing of elections in the lives of college students, according to David Schultz, a political science professor at Hamline University. Leading up to elections, students are preoccupied with moving into new living spaces and starting classes.

Nearly half of U.S. states allow same-day voter registration, including Minnesota. Schultz said this makes it easy for students who were distracted earlier in the semester to still cast a vote.

“I think students are particularly confused with the amount of moving that oftentimes happens, and they’re thinking, ‘All right, here’s where I’m living now. But I still have a room in my parents’ house. Where do I go to vote?’” Schultz said.

The Minnesota Legislature passed three bills related to elections, including automatic voter registration for U.S. citizens applying for a driver’s license and allowing 16-year-olds to pre-register to vote. Schultz said these changes will be helpful, but more election education programs through high schools and colleges would be even more beneficial.

“Frankly, our election laws are very confusing,” Schultz said.

There needs to be more effort in explaining to college students why local government is important in their lives, according to Schultz.

“There is kind of a perversity here, that voter turnout for students is certainly better than presidential, as opposed to non-presidential [elections],” Schultz said. “Joe Biden or Donald Trump aren’t going to help you pick up your garbage. They’re not providing police protection. They’re not going to help you.”

The Undergraduate Student Government (USG) is putting together a voter guide to educate students about candidates in this year’s election, including responses from candidates about campus issues like safety, renter protections and student inclusion in policymaking, according to Katie Smithberg, local government coordinator and former voting captain for Row the Vote.

Row the Vote is USG’s voter registration initiative that involves visiting classrooms, voter pledges and making casting a ballot more accessible. Last year’s program resulted in over 4,000 students registering to vote on top of over 7,000 signed voter pledges.

Smithberg said this year, she has been more involved in educating students on the importance of elections and relating local races to students’ lives. There has been lots of positive feedback about voting in the upcoming election, she said, as well as surprise that there is an election to vote in this year.

One point of confusion in the registration process has been what materials voters need to bring to the polls if they have not already registered, Smithberg said.

For students who are unsure whether they should vote at their permanent or current address, the most important thing is just to go out and vote, said Carter Yost, director of government and legislative affairs. 

“Students participating not only ensures that students are getting represented, as those voices are being heard, but also those democratic habits are shaped and set up,” Yost said. 

When people vote consistently for the first few elections in which they are eligible, the likelihood they will become lifelong voters is dramatically higher, according to Yost.

Some of the biggest barriers for young voters are their school and work schedules, not knowing where to vote and not having transportation to the polls, according to CIRCLE. 

Yost said USG worked with the University, the Secretary of State’s office and city voting services to bring an early voting pop-up site to Weisman Art Museum throughout the day on Oct. 31. Voters from any precinct in Minneapolis can cast a ballot, but they must be registered to vote before Oct. 17. 

Having a one-day pop-up, rather than maintaining, staffing and monitoring a voting site for multiple weeks, as there has been in the past, has made it easier to ensure that the pop-up can happen at all, Yost said.

Early voting in Minneapolis began on Sept. 22 and will continue until election day. Voters can cast a ballot at the Election and Voter Services office at 980 E. Hennepin Ave., which is accessible via bus routes 4, 25 and 61.

USG will also host a voter registration and networking event with the Undergraduate Political Science Association on Thursday, Oct. 12, from 3:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. Students can register and have a chance to talk with their city council members.