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Welcome to The 1909, the podcast that takes an in-depth look at The State News’ biggest stories of the week, while bringing in new perspectives from the reporters who wrote them.
(Alex) It's Thursday, September 7, then this is the 1909. The state news is weekly news podcast featuring our reporters talking about the news. I'm your host, Alex Walters says a new voice if you're a returning listener, I've been the administration reporter here for a little bit and I'm excited to have you hearing me. We're trying on a new format this semester, so bear with us, but I really hope you enjoy it. This week, we're going to be talking to the state News's administration reporter Theo shear about MSUs latest presidential shake up. Then we'll hear from state news cultural politics reporter Jaden beard about what experts fear is a looming spike in campus sexual assault, then we'll run through the other MSU news you might have missed during move in Welcome Week and the start of fall classes. So yeah, let's start the show. All right. Our first guest is here. Do you want to introduce yourself?
(Theo) Yeah, my name is Theo shear. I'm an administration and academics reporter at the state news. Yeah, first timer at the 1909
(Alex) Nice. Me too, actually. So yeah. Um, so yeah, the latest presidential shake up at MSU. Do you want to tell us about that you wrote about that?
(Theo) Absolutely. So ever since President Stanley was ousted by the board. We've had an interim president. That's Teresa Woodruff. But recently, she just announced that she's not looking to be the next full time president. She's not pursuing this permanent presidential role.
(Alex) So how long has she been, you know, at MSU in that role can tell us a little bit about her?
(Theo) Absolutely. So she is an Ankara Anca fertility researcher, which is sort of a combination of just researching the the areas of cancer and fertility. And she came from Northwestern, to MSU as the provost. So yeah, she's really, ever since being president, she's had to lead MSU through a lot of, you know, rough periods, including the shooting on February. So she's had pretty a tumultuous experience here so far.
(Alex) Well, I mean, she sort of came into the role under Tama last fall with all the, you know, succeeding Stanley with what two votes of no confidence in the board from students and faculty and sort of coming in and riding the ship to an extent after that rocky period. So what was the reaction to her saying that she wasn't looking to pursue this further than the interim?
(Theo) Yeah, so the reaction, the board, chair, Rima Vassar, she sent a message, basically thanking her for her time as interim president, and and providing that leadership within those past 10 months that she's been in this role, which is a little bit interesting, because they've had a little bit of tension in the past, like you just said. So we're sort of wondering, is that just an act of kindness? Are they just being polite? Or has there been a little bit of unity between the two of them? Yeah, you know, you can't really talk about Wonderfest President without talking about the whole Gupta affair. And her decision, you know, last summer as Provost to ask him to resign over his mandatory reporting failure, which, you know, created a lot of tension between her and the board, you know, said that that's played into Stanley's outstaying. And so it's been a tension filled tenure. But yeah, so what happens next, now that she's decided that she's not pursuing the permanent residency? Yeah, so I guess right now, there's a presidential search committee that is searching for the next president, she'll, they'll, they're hoping to choose that candidate by Thanksgiving of this year. However, it's unclear when that person will actually take the job. So she truce is going to be here for a little while. Yeah. And how's that? How's that search going? I know, we've been doing some reporting you might see later this week. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I've talked to the leader of the Graduate Student Council, she says it's going well, and they're looking for a lot of, you know, great candidates with expertise. However, she's a little bit concerned with representation on the board. So there's a little bit of conflict there. She wants more students to be represented, rather than business people.
(Alex) Because there are what you know, to, I think, a 27 member committee and their two students, including yourself, yeah.
(Theo) To undergrad students and one graduate and that would be her.
(Alex) Yeah. And there's, I think, four or five members who, you know, business people and different kind of wealthy alumni.
(Theo) Absolutely. So it's kind of a, you know, combination of, you know, what interests are they really there to represent? Is that their own or is it MSU? She just wants to make sure of that.
(Alex) All right. Well, thank you for coming on the show. Theo. It's always good to have you. Yeah.
(Theo) Yeah. Thank you so much for having me.
(Alex) All right. Our next guest is here. Do you want to introduce yourself?
(Jaden) Hi, I'm Jayden beard. I'm the cultural politics reporter and thanks for having
(Alex) Great to have you. So yeah, so you wrote a story about the red zone this week, something you might be hearing about, if you're listening around campus these first couple weeks John's talking about, you know, first of all, what is the red zone for someone who might not know.
(Jaden) So the red zone is the first couple of months in college campuses where the statistics for sexual assault and sexual violence are disproportionately higher than the rest of the academic year.
(Alex) And that's observable at MSU. Right?
(Jaden) It is observable at MSU. As well as most college campuses in the country
(Alex) you know, just today with a story about the the Office of Institutional Equity, which is, you know, they do the title nine investigations, if you report sexual violence or harassment or something like that, they investigate it. And they had some consultants come in to see how they could reduce the timeliness of their cases. And they found that most of the backlogs come from three dates, which is just, you know, the first week of campus in the fall, Halloween and the first couple of home football games. So yeah, close to home. Yep, definitely. And so you've talked to some experts for your story, you know, is there a consensus on why that's the case, why it's disproportionately happening, you know, at the beginning of the year
(Jaden) it's not just one reason or one, you know, sort of thing to trace it back to, there is a couple of different factors that come into play. One of them is that it's a new environment for students, particularly freshmen, sophomore students, they're not really familiar with the campus location, resources that they can go to, for these sorts of things. It's a time when students might be putting them might be in situations where they're experimenting with alcohol, and that they haven't before drugs that they haven't before. And that's a situation that, you know, predators take advantage of. And it's never never the victims fault. But it this is something to be aware of.
(Alex) And so other than, you know, not committing acts of sexual violence, whatever, if you want to be a good friend, good member of that community, what are some things that people can do to sort of counter this?
(Jaden) So another reason that this happens is that people are less likely to step in, and that's contributing to the bystander effect. So if you are in a situation where you see something happening to somebody, it could be potentially dangerous, potentially violent step in it's better to say something, and it's just better to be safe than sorry. So yeah, be via good friend via good spark and step in.
(Alex) And you've taken the time, you know, you've put together a little list of resources for your story for things that people can look to. John, talk about those if you're a listener?
(Jaden) Sure. So the first one would be a ASMSU SafeRide. This is something that I've used actually, it's a free way for students to get late night rides until 1:30am. There's a sexual assault healthcare program. They have Forensic Nurses and they could put together you know, evidence within five days of an assault, there's a center of survivors, they have individual and group therapy, safe place that has myriad of confidential services and Employee Assistance Program, which is specialized towards current and retired MSU faculty.
(Alex) And if you're listening, you can find you know, links and further information with all that in Jane's story at state news.com. Yep, yeah. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show.
(Jaden) Thank you for having me.
(Alex) In other recent news MSU. Police is warning car owning students about recent attempted car thefts on campus and in East Lansing. They believe the incidents are connected to the online Kia boys trend, which encourages people to exploit a software glitch in certain key and Hyundai cars to steal them. And the MSU office responsible for Title Nine investigations has completed months of consulting work in hopes of shortening their cases. Years of audits have raised concerns about the department's ability to quickly take reports of sexual violence or discrimination to a final resolution. Most recently, they found that on average a case takes about one calendar year to complete. So this firms report which we've just obtained at the state news through a public records request paints a stark picture of the title nine office it describes mission driven highly dedicated staff that care deeply about their work, but it finds that they're hampered by understaffing, unfilled positions constant leadership turnover and an inadequate software system. The firm's top recommendations for how to change that simply put, hire more staff and it'll be easier to process cases, reach for common MSU declined to say whether they'd be acting on that recommendation. Those stories in greater detail and a bunch more are available at state news.com. That's all we have for this week. We'll be back next Thursday with more stories. Thank you to our incredible podcast director Anthony Brinson, our guest, yo and Jaden and you for listening for the 1909 I'm Alex Walters.