STORIES FROM DINKYTOWN

“Discover Dinkytown” event to be held during Welcome Week at U of M

Student organizations come together for a scavenger hunt to familiarize students with neighborhood

Story by Hadeal Rizeq / The Hubbard School  /  SUMMER 2023

With the fall semester rapidly approaching, the university is hosting a new event for students to explore the Dinkytown neighborhood near campus.  

Orientation and Transition Experience (OTE) assistant director Olivia Knodel said the event dubbed Discover Dinkytown will help students build community on and off campus and learn more about resources available to them. The main event is a scavenger hunt featuring local businesses in which students can win prizes.

Knodel said OTE decided on a scavenger hunt for the entertainment factor and given how often the Goosechase scavenger hunting app is used on campus.

“We chose Goosechase because it's implemented in some of their classrooms,” Knodel said. “Other offices and other classrooms will use the same app too, so we wanted to introduce them to familiar technology that they could end up using during their time here at the U. We think it's just kind of a fun way to interact with students.”

Undergraduate Student Government (USG) outreach coordinator Annika Prickett said USG decided to reach out to OTE after coming up with similar events for Welcome Week.

“We did a bunch of digging and we actually ran into OTE happening to plan a very similar event to what we wanted to do, and so we saw that as a natural partnership,” Prickett said. 

Knodel said about 2,500 students are expected to participate in the scavenger hunt.

“I think this event will be successful, getting students to navigate the neighborhood that’s so close to campus, and engage in that community over there,” Knodel said.

No housing: students feel taken advantage of by Identity Dinkytown

Students navigate finding alternative housing after learning they can’t move-in to their apartment.

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Story by Grace Henrie / The Hubbard School  /  SUMMER 2023

After students found out their apartment complex would not be ready by the designated move-in date, many University of Minnesota students said they are stressed and upset about the disruption to their Fall semesters. 

Identity Dinkytown is a new luxury apartment complex where students were supposed to move-in on Aug. 27. However, on Aug. 2, Identity management sent an email telling residents the building would not be ready by the move-in date. 

Management gave tenants the option to find their own alternative housing and receive a $150 gift card for each day up until move-in, or to allow Identity to find housing for them and receive an $80 gift card each day. 

Annika Attiah, an out-of-state student going into her senior year at UMN, said because of Identity, she is disappointed with how the start of her senior year will be.  

Attiah signed a lease at Identity in order to live with her friends and to be in the center of Dinkytown. Now she said she doesn't know what the beginning of the school year will look like. 

“All that really mattered to me was getting to live with my roommates and have a really great senior year, ” Attiah said. “It will definitely affect gamedays, recruitment for sororities and homecoming.” 

Hannah Siebenaler, a UMN student, is renting a four-bedroom apartment at Identity. Despite the lack of communication from Identity and the inconvenience the unfinished building is causing her, she has “no hard feelings” towards Identity. 

Siebenaler said she signed at Identity because of the amenities, location and the safety that an apartment building offers. She said even if she was given the option to break her lease, she would not have done it because of the difficulty she thinks it would be to find a different four-bedroom apartment for her and her friends. 

Before Aug. 2, Identity did not communicate with tenants about the unfinished construction. Siebenaler, like other students, said it was pretty obvious that the building wouldn’t be finished on time so the email did not come as much of a surprise to her. 

However, Attiah said Identity management misled her regarding the move-in date when she called. 

“I called two days before the email was sent and they told me the building would be ready on time,” Attiah said. “When I call them, they can never answer my questions. It’s very much ‘all I can say right now.’ Even when I sent them an email they very much avoided my questions.”

Both Attiah and Siebenaler are finding their own housing. Neither said they trust Identity to put them in housing reasonably close to campus. 

“With the amount of money they are giving us, I’m like, okay I can handle that but any longer than that will be annoying,” Siebenaler said.

Identity did not have an estimate as to when construction could be finished. They declined to comment on their plans as to where they will house students. 

Attiah did not pay rent when it was due and is currently attempting to find a sublease that would allow her to commit month-by-month because she is an out-of-state student. 

“I decided I was not going to pay Identity a dime until I was actually living there,” Attiah said. 

Ava Welo, a student at UMN, found someone to sublease her apartment because she thought Identity is deceptive and includes unnecessary fees. 

“I feel like they are trying to make as much money as they can because they don’t have a full set of residents,” Welo said. “I mean, rent was due Aug. 1 and then they tell everyone they can’t even move-in.”

Welo said she has had continuous problems with management and feels like there are more problems to come in the subleasing process. 

Siebenaler, Welo and Attiah all said Identity should have been more transparent and done a better job with communication. 

“I just don’t understand how they are okay with screwing over a bunch of college students,” Attiah said.

Students for Democratic Society holds protest in Dinkytown on behalf of “Tampa 5”

Student activists protest charges against a group of students arrested in March for protesting Desantis’ education policies

Story by Hadeal Rizeq / The Hubbard School  /  SUMMER 2023

The University of Minnesota’s Students for Democratic Society (SDS) group took to the streets in Dinkytown on Wednesday to protest felony charges filed against a group of Florida students and a University of South Florida staffer arrested for protesting changes to education laws.  

The group of Florida protesters, known as the Tampa 5, were arrested in March after protesting the removal of ethnic studies, gender studies and diversity, equity and inclusion programs made by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ administration. 

According to a statement on SDS’ national account on Instagram, the Tampa 5 had a third court appearance on Wednesday, initiating the call for individual SDS member groups to protest across the nation.

Merlin Van Alstine, one of UMN SDS’ members, said UMN’s chapter decided to demonstrate because they believe the arrests were unwarranted.

“So for the noise demo, specifically, it's a national day of action. So SDS groups from around the country are doing actions today, and then they're posting about it on social media. They're getting the word out to say ‘Hey, call the courthouse during this time when they're having their hearing’, Van Alstine said. 

Van Alstine said even though Florida is a Republican state, the public in Democratic states should be concerned about this issue as well.

“(The) first thing to start happening when we go into a recession is the cutting and defunding of arts, ethnic studies programs, and gender studies programs,” Van Alstine said. 

Caroline Weier, a witness to the noise rally said more people need to be familiar with the Tampa 5.

“I definitely think that there should be more acceptance and diversity in education, but I definitely could be more educated, and I think that most people could definitely be more educated too,” Weier said.

Jae Yates, an organizer for The Twin Cities Coalition for Jamar Clark (TCC4J), said during a speech at the noise demo that the Tampa 5 had the right to protest.

“I wanted to speak at this noise demo because I'm an anti-police crimes activist, and I know that if I don't stand up for the Tampa 5, the same thing could very easily happen to me,” Yates said.  “I'm on this campus all the time, and I think that we have to stand up against the political repression that the Tampa 5 are facing.”

Sorcha Lona, another SDS member, said during another speech people take ethnic studies for granted and they need to stay on campuses in general. 

“I think that people have a tendency to forget why we have ethnic studies in the first place,” Lona said. “We wouldn't have Ethnic Studies at the University of Minnesota if it wasn't for activism against the administration in the 1960s.”

Van Alstine said criticism that protesting does not make a difference is false. They said that “change doesn’t come just randomly” and that after the murders of George Floyd and Jamar Clark people protested to be heard. 

“There wouldn't wouldn't have been as much organization if they hadn't been organizing for years prior,” Van Alstine said. “So even in times of high intensity and protesting, there needs to be people who have been doing this during the low periods when nothing is happening.”