Mental health, grades and trust in democracy and law enforcement declined among UMN students as a result of Operation Metro Surge. Armed with pots, pans, drums and other noisemaking tools, scores of protesters gathered on Jan. 28 for what was the second noise demonstration of the semester in front of the Graduate hotel in the…
The university’s policies on immigration lack protections and clarity, students say — a shift from years prior. On his way back from the gym, third-year University of Minnesota student Mascuud Ali turned the corner onto the street of his Hopkins apartment and found the whole block surrounded by federal agents. Unable to make it any…
As Operation Metro Surge shifts and slows, Not In Our Town continues its efforts to cover ICE’s long-term effects in Minnesota. In the weeks after Operation Metro Surge ended, the media organizations that flocked to the Twin Cities soon turned their cameras and attention to other topics, searching for the next big story. Not In…
SPEAK MPLS multimedia journalist, Saniah Bates, limited her time on the frontlines and reported on the events bringing Minneapolis together. When Saniah Bates was hired as a multimedia journalist in 2025 at SPEAK MPLS, a community media outlet and center in South Minneapolis, she was still pursuing her journalism degree at the University of Minnesota. …
When whistles were needed on campus, Steven Bleau was the one who could make them for all. Steven Bleau, a makerspace lab manager for the University of Minnesota Libraries, won’t take full credit for making the thousands of whistles students needed on campus and beyond during Operation Metro Surge, but peers say he was an…
City officials and UMN students gathered to discuss lessons learned from Operation Metro Surge and how to sustain community support. We know what happened during Operation Metro Surge. But what comes next? That question brought students, community activists and government officials together on the University of Minnesota campus for conversations that continued into the late…
The K-pop cover group provides a space for UMN students to come together to find joy and forget the world during Operation Metro Surge. At the start of spring semester, members of K-Move, a K-pop cover dance group at the University of Minnesota, began planning for their biggest event of the year: the annual Spring…
Angela Sanpayo is a fourth-year animal science major at the University of Minnesota. “I was born and raised in Minnesota. Right now, I just want to work with animals because I just love them so much, and the U has a good program for that. “I found it a little concerning how much it [Operation…
As a Hmong American journalist with Sahan Journal, Katelyn Vue faced multiple challenges while chronicling her community. When Katelyn Vue graduated from the University of Minnesota with a journalism degree in 2022, her classes had not taught her how to put on a gas mask. But that was just one of the many skills Vue…
Art major Bryn Allyn is working on tying historical themes of revolution and class warfare into their art. On a chilly February evening in the printmaking studio at Regis Center for the Arts, Bryn Allyn makes prints of hydras onto fabrics of all different bright colors, rolling the pure white ink onto a wooden carving…
